Two Pickles and Some Government Cheese

July 7, 2026

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An article I read in the WSJ Sunday really stayed with me. It characterized NYC's new Mayor as in a pickle. It covered the debate surrounding the New York City mayor’s proposal to create city‑owned public supermarkets. The piece described a roundtable discussion between city representatives and local business owners, during which the city asked for details about top‑selling products and profit margins—information the business owners considered proprietary. Many expressed concern that this initiative could significantly harm small businesses and negatively affect an already struggling local economy. History suggests that concern may be valid; similar concepts have been attempted with limited success.

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It reminds me of the Grantland story about when Vitali Klitschko, former WBO Heavyweight Champion, first arrived in the United States. (*I have spectator enjoyment for boxing, especially when the athletes are telling a surprising story.  The fight between Vitali Klitschko and Lennox Lewis was one of them.)

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                                                                                          Lennox Lewis and Vitali Klitchko - 2003

On his first impressions of the United States:

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“My whole life I was told that the U.S. was a horrible country…I was in total shock…I felt like a little kid, in awe of things. I always thought there was one type of cheese, you know, the thing we’d always called ‘cheese.’  And in the grocery, I saw a hundred kinds of cheese!  It was amazing.  My mouth was hanging open.  When I came home, everybody wanted to know what the U.S. was like.  At the time, it was easier for a Russian to travel to the moon than to the United States.  When I explained what I’d seen, it made quite an impression on people.”

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(*Some would say World Cup 2026 has created the same reversal of impressions.)

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Similarities between the DSA-led initiative in NYC and the GSA-led initiatives are not difficult to make. In fact, many small businesses working to help advance federal agency missions have the same concerns as the neighborhood bodegas in NYC.

 

• Both initiatives are an attempt to fix a market and manage a market.

• Both initiatives are based on a tenuous track record of outcomes.

• Both initiatives are devastating to the small business communities who support their respective ‘neighborhoods’.

 

This is a feature of the “Consolidate under GSA” initiative that their Coalition of Interests have been pushing forth that I find interesting.  ‘Market fixing’ through government storefronts is something you would expect from the former Soviet Union. Government‑run storefront models have historically been associated with heavily centralized economic systems, and they can conflict with the market‑based mechanisms that have shaped much of the country’s economic landscape over the past 250 years.

So, the communists have not only infected our elections but apparently infected the former GSA executives who pushed this as an administration initiative as well.

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This is just another reason why OMB, OFPP, Federal Agencies, Contract Holders, and OEMs won’t allow the ‘takeover’ of NASA’s program.  Not only is it a matter of executional excellence, but really a matter of market economics and national pride.

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The market is already speaking.  Too bad the GSA interests are tone deaf.

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Happy belated 4th of July!!!

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                                                                                                                                                                           ~ J. Johnson