you're asking for an explanation of the 40 years comment?
it was made offhand. 30 years is arguably more accurate.
still, you could argue that this present era of political economy in the united states (you know, the one that is utterly impossible to reconcile with western values) began with the defeat of the air traffic controllers union in '81. The american labour movement, which epitomized everything good and noble about western culture/western moral philosophy, faded from relevance shortly afterwards. the results of this have been disastrous:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...00_Billion.png andhttps://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8a/Epsilon-theory-ben-hunt-westworld-may-11-2017-graph-wealth-inequality.png (there is no one sole cause of this trend, obviously, but you will find that the dates match up)
the anti-culture globalists found themselves more able than ever to prey on the United States, expertly dissolving the time-honored social bonds that saw american capitalism's worst impulses checked by a shared sense of national identity/community
with most of our real values totally sidelined and authentic western individualism distorted into a ghoulish, debauched, "it's not only okay, but actually admirable to exploit your community for money" ethic, elites are empowered to undertake profit-making actions that the country would formerly have been capable of collectively objecting to on a moral level. The .1% owns most of the wealth, so they fund most of the state. Cuomo not feeling super-duper concerned about placing infected people in such a way that makes the state less expensive is possibly related to this fact.
i suppose that in short, i think that the particular cuomo decision you highlighted is part-and-parcel to the same process of moral/civiliational decay that has led to the invasion of iraq. you follow me?