The state of New York has spent money and imposed taxes so recklessly that it has gotten itself in deep financial trouble. So it is searching for ways to raise more revenue.
One of the more amusing ways it is trying to raise money is by enforcing a previously mostly unenforced tax on the slicing of bagels.
Yes, that’s right.
An unsliced bagel – whether sold by a sidewalk vendor or in a deli – is not considered “prepared food.” So it is not subject to the roughly 9 percent food tax. But if you let the vendor slice it before he hands it to you, he must apply the tax. And even if the bagel is unsliced, the tax applies if you eat it in the store where you bought it rather than get it “to go.”
In a bit of word play, the New York Post joked that only New York “could find a way to tax a cut.”