Courtesy http://www.frugal-cafe.com

The financial stress of the City of Chicago financial obligations is growing. This week the city had to make a $634 Million payment to Chicago teachers pension plan and now are looking at a $175 Million property tax increase. But they are not done taxing and when governments are broke, they get desperate. Here is more from Fusion.net:

The Windy City needs cash, and its citizens like to watch movies and develop web apps. Time to get on that gravy train.

A ruling by Chicago’s Department of Finance allows the city to add an extra nine percent tax onto “electronically delivered amusements” and “nonpossessory computer leases.”

In an odd combination, buying a subscription to streaming media, such as Netflix or Spotify, would qualify, as would using a cloud computing platform, such as Amazon Web Services. Each would be subject to 9% tax; Chicago is the first major American city to levy a tax on either streaming services or cloud computing services.