Buenos Aires City’s Mayor, Horacio Rodríguez Larreta and Buenos Aires Province governor María Eugenia Vidal have collectively introduced a new slot prizes tax, that if approved, would become effective immediately in both jurisdictions. The proposal’s objective is to raise tax revenue for both governments, since Argentina’s current economic crisis is expected to cost 6,500 million pesos (USD 1,8) to the City and 35,000 million to the province. Rodríguez Larreta put forward a draft law providing for a new tax on slot prizes, aimed at financing infrastructure and welfare programs. The proposal’s objective is to create a social development and integration fund (FIDes in Spanish), quite similar to Vidal’s project submitted together with the annual budget for 2019 for her jurisdiction. According to local news agency Télam, this fund will be made up of a 2% contribution on the prizes awarded by slot machines. The tax would be levied on the coin out of those machines. Estimates show the City and the Province would collect 2,000 and 5,000 million in taxes, respectively. Both Vidal and Rodriguez Larreta are seeking to copy Córdoba province’s current scheme. According to officials from both jurisdictions, the tax will begin to be charged around March 2019. (2018/11/14)