Get to Know Phil

September 23, 2022 | Interview by Emilia Charno

Phil with three current and one former Deputy Mayors of New York City.

Phil with his son James and nephew Chris in Colombia.

As NYC Deputy Mayor for Strategic Policy Initiatives under Mayor Bill de Blasio, J. Phillip Thompson was responsible for leading a portfolio of City initiatives, including Democracy NYC, the Minority and Women-owned Business Enterprises Program, the Mayor’s Office of Workforce Development, the Office of the Census, and the Young Men’s Initiative. Phil is an Associate Professor of Urban Planning at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and has spent his career working and researching in service of community health and wealth, inclusive economic development, and racial justice. 

How do you define economic democracy?

I view democracy as a system where citizens are the stewards and guardians of the entire society, which includes the economy. That is very different from how the economy is usually thought of; it is usually considered a separate economic system that almost mysteriously works on its own according to its own internal dynamics - I reject this viewpoint entirely. In the United States, the way of thinking about the economy in relation to democracy is rooted in the experience and institution of slavery.

This nation was founded as an experiment in democracy, and slave owners chose to not extend this system to the main part of the economy, which at the time was slave plantations. There was a myth created that you can have a political democracy and economic hierarchy (or dictatorship) with no, or diminished, rights for labor. This is also connected to how women were viewed at the time. The basic problem of most people spending most of their waking hours in places that do not cultivate habits, cultures, or skills rooted in democracy explains a lot about what our problems are now.

Former slaves like Frederick Douglass wrote about how the economy would be much more productive if slave owners had recognized that Black Americans had ideas and innovations to share - if they had treated us as equals and allowed us to put our knowledge to work. I think that fundamental problem is still true today. As the economy becomes increasingly knowledge-oriented and skills-based, I think that traditional ideas of labor, school, and training underestimate the ability and capacity of people. This will continue to hurt our country and our economy in big ways. For all of these reasons I think the time is right to reconsider how we think about the economy, and I call this economic democracy.

What’s an example of the transformative power of community wealth-building that you witnessed during your time as NYC Deputy Mayor for Strategic Policy Initiatives (February 2018 - December 2021)?

One example was our work with the building trades on a project labor agreement, or the rules that govern how city construction projects will operate. The building trades agreed voluntarily that 30% of job openings at city-funded construction projects go to residents of public housing or to people who live in NYC zip codes with levels of poverty at 15% or greater. Every year, this creates around 6,000 job opportunities for New Yorkers in these two categories.

This agreement came about after many conversations about democracy and the future, including a conversation around what role - if any - labor has played in working towards a society of inclusion. The leaders of the building trades, primarily white men, agreed that things needed to change. Mayor de Blasio supported this initiative, which we announced two years ago this month. I view this as an example of what change looks like. Thinking about the workforce of the future, to leverage money the city would spend anyways can create paths out of poverty and uplift city residents. There are thousands of different ways to approach this issue.

What are missed opportunities to leverage community wealth-building tools as a measure to promote environmental and racial justice in NYC?

One missed opportunity was an initiative surrounding a banking chip option on the IDNYC card, which services over 1.2 million New Yorkers. We did a Request for Proposals from different banks and financial technology institutions asking what kind of terms they would provide for a product that reaches over 1 million customers. The average Black or Latino worker typically spends over $1,200 per year in New York on excessive financial charges.The responses we received were incredible, wiping out many of the excessive chargers that low income communities bear now. These included low charges for remittances and zero or very low withdrawal fees for ATMs. They also included proposals for profit-sharing and even contributions to a civic fund for community-led organizing.

How can we link community wealth-building with efforts to combat climate change, e.g., retrofitting city buildings for greater energy efficiency?

New York has more than 520 miles of ocean coastline, more than Seattle, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Miami combined. We are very vulnerable to sea level rise, and the oceans are rising. This means we have to dramatically invest in adaptation and remediation measures, which will create many jobs for people in design, construction, and engineering to figure out how to proceed.

The city also has almost 900,000 buildings in need of energy retrofits to reduce our use of carbon. This too will take countless jobs, people, and creativity to monitor and retrofit systems. There is work for generations in NYC to deal with climate change. I am interested in how we align our education system to prepare our students in public schools and city colleges to be the workers, engineers, and designers who enable NYC to cope with the climate crisis. Our native-born kids should not sit on the sidelines as individuals move in to deal with these problems. Education and training is key.

What is happening around the world in terms of economic democracy efforts?

There is momentum around the world and experimentation in thinking about changing how capitalism works to make the system more responsive to the needs of ordinary people. About 4 years ago I attended a conference in Spain on the shared economy, where I sat on a panel with other deputy mayors from cities such as Seoul, Paris, Montreal, Mexico City, and Bilbao. All around the world, mayors’ offices have created offices for deputy mayors to address the shared economy - or what I would call economic democracy. There were 2,000 delegates to this conference from around the world, and I counted six Americans in the entire audience. I think the rest of the world is moving, booking, and experimenting in this direction and we are really behind the mark. I think the best way to learn is to travel.

What do you see as the 2-3 most critical strategies for NYC to better promote equitable wealth generation among its communities?

I think the most important thing is to abandon the notion that communities and workers should not have a voice in thinking about how to innovate in the economy. Federal investments related to pandemic recovery and infrastructure and the Inflation Reduction Action could be deployed in a way to build community wealth and disrupt patterns of traditional wealth extraction in low-income communities.

One example is an energy microgrid, where you produce electricity locally. NYCHA could look into these, creating greater efficiency by generating energy closer to communities and facilitating community ownership. Residents could organize around when to do laundry, for example choosing to use this energy when it is cheaper and selling excess back to the grid. This would in essence create a community foundation that directly benefits residents, who could decide how to organize and use this money.

What are the places that have deeply shaped you?

I grew up in Inner-City West Philadelphia, which had a lasting impact on me. Where I grew up was majority-Black and also existed in a floodplain. Growing up, I always knew we had flooding in the basements all around when it rained hard. What I did not understand at the time is that this is what racial oppression meant - that Black folks ended up in places with structural problems, making it difficult to sell or accumulate wealth in homes. Reflecting on this, I now understand better how these problems affect families of color.

Then I lived with my grandparents in rural Pennsylvania near the Maryland border, which helped me appreciate nature in a whole new way. This part of my family had been involved in landscaping in these areas since the early 1800s. I went fishing and hunting with my grandfather and picked berries with my grandmother. Living in a rural area and being close to these folks who lived off and close to the land, I developed an appreciation for nature and what it provides for us. To this day, I take wilderness trips with my three sons and family.

Living in New York in the 70s and 80s in the Lower East Side and Brooklyn also had a powerful impact on me and in seeing how diverse the world is. I saw people live together and work through tensions - which there always were. This had a large impact on me and how I think.

Is there anything that you’re reading or watching that’s inspiring you?

I am working on a book so I’ve been reading so much! The book I continue to find rich and rewarding is W.E.B. DuBois’ Black Reconstruction. It was written in the early 1930s and talks about how after the Civil War there was an opportunity to rebuild the United States from the ground up and establish democracy for all for the first time.

I am not the one who invented economic democracy. The Civil War was really about economic democracy - it was a fight for freedom, inclusion, and participation of everybody. I am reminded of how hard the struggle is and how opportunities can be lost. We have to fight for visions. We can not sit back and expect good things to happen to us and our communities.

I view democracy as a system where citizens are the stewards and guardians of the entire society, which includes the economy. That is very different from how the economy is usually thought of; it is usually considered a separate economic system that almost mysteriously works on its own according to its own internal dynamics - I reject this viewpoint entirely.

Phil speaking at the UN General Assembly on Nelson Mandela International Day.

Phil and his students doing a class on sustainability in the Amazon.