Save Cleveland with a cellphone tax?

Are you willing to pay a cellphone tax to keep the City of Cleveland solvent? Baltimore and other cities are trying it, but cellphone companies are crying foul. Why should cellphone use, they say, be singled out for sin-taxing like tobacco?

"In Cities Facing Budget Deficits, Cellphone Becomes a Taxpayer"Cingular Wireless, Verizon Wireless, Sprint and T-Mobile filed a lawsuit in February in Maryland Tax Court against Baltimore and Montgomery County, which has its own wireless tax. They contend the cellphone fee is effectively a sales tax, which only the state has the right to impose."

One city is proposing a 5% tax. Well, I don't know about you, but we already pay luxury tax on special items and sin tax on drinking (in some states like Ohio we render it directly through the nasal passages because they control the price as well), so I don't see why cell service doesn't fit into that type of category.

I understand the cellphone companies' concerns that this might cut down on the number of subscribers they can enlist. But it seems shortsighted to think that if a major city dies and puts thousands out of work, you'll have a bigger subscriber base.

And also to think that somebody--but not you--should be taxed to keep that from happening. My dad used to say that when he'd hear people complaining, "Why me?" he'd look back on all he'd seen in life and think, well, why not me?