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Oh, Independent Budget Office, Gothamist looks forward to your suggestions every year. On Tuesday, the IBO, a City Hall watchdog group, has announced various measures raise money for the city. These ideas are both unhinged and totally sensible. Some of the ideas, per Newsday , the NY Times and the report itself:
- Charging fees for plastic surgery - Charge every household for garbage collection depending on the volume of trash they produce - Increase tolls on East and Harlem Rivers bridges to $8 - Taxing dry cleaning and shoeshining - Ending Madison Square Garden's tax exemption - Making teachers work one more day, but with a raise - Making city class sizes bigger by two students - Charging a $1 video rental fee at libraries (it's now free) - Adding a restaurant tax - Taxing things like refurbishing floors and other home improvements - Charging a fare on the Staten Island FerryRead the report (PDF) for chuckles as well as "Hmm, why isn't the city doing ___" musings. The IBO outlines the pros and cons of each. What Gothamist finds interesting is that many ideas have merit, but if any one of them were proposed and passed, at least 40% of the city would seriously freak out. We can understand why a ferry fare might be good, but on a purely emotional level, there's something wonderful about taking the Staten Island Ferry for free - like it's a gift for us to see the city's skyline so magnificiently.
What do you think of these ideas? Last year, the IBO suggested a latte tax.
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A blog tax ... for all of the lost productivity at work reading stupid sh!t like this.
Agree with HR - he beat me to it...We should tax people who read blogs from work - that's lost company revenue...
Having said this - I will now go blog on www.Verbosecoma.com, www.Engadget.com, www.Afullbelly.com and www.Lovescool.com (my personal favorite :) - run by my boy Andrew Lin and his hot mama Kelli Bernard!
1) "Pay As You Throw" trash programs: one of the downsides to this type of program is that a "black market" is often created for illegal bag/tag/can sales.
2) Eviction Insurance Pilot Program: If you're in constant danger of being evicted from your housing, shelling out $10 or more a month may not be the best solution.
They should tax people who complain that reading blogs takes time away from work.
They should also tax people who say the word 'Hella' and 'sweet' on a regular basis.
They should tax political contributions. Imagine the mayhem.
They DID charge for the Staten Island Ferry, way back when, but it turned out that maintaining the turnstiles alone cost more than the revenue they were collecting... so it was actually cheaper to let everyone ride for free.
They should tax Kojak for the air that he breathes...cause that's a huge waste!!