[Ed. – What does charging people for purchases made online have to do with funding buses and subways?]
With the Metropolitan Transportation Authority facing a budget crisis, New Yorkers may have to dig into their pockets to help out.
Under a new proposed bill, New York City residents would be required to pay a $3 surcharge on packages they ordered online, with the exception for medicine and food.
Assemblyman Robert Carroll, who proposed the bill, says the online shopping fee would raise more than $1 billion a year “to fund the operating costs of buses and subways in the city of New York.”
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In a joint Daily News op-ed with John Samuelsen, the International President of the Transport Workers Union, Carroll (D-Brooklyn) said the MTA cannot rely solely on a federal bailout.
They argued that the surcharge would incentivize New Yorkers to support small local businesses instead of buying from corporations like Amazon or Walmart.
