[title]
Picture it: You’re heading to a movie but have a little time to spare, so you decide to pop into a nearby watering hole for a quick drink. Sidling up to the bar, you order a beer, hang up your bag and settle in for what you expect to be a short stop before catching your flick. The bartender brings back your Stella, you flourish your plastic, and then he smiles apologetically and says those dreaded words: “Oh, I’m sorry. Our credit-card minimum is actually $25.” You’re sorry?
RECOMMENDED: See more New York rants
Suddenly, you’re presented with a list of increasingly unattractive options. Will you use the ATM in the back of the bar that charges a $3 fee on top of your $5 bank fee and just piss away eight bucks? Will you order three more beers and turn this quick after-work drink into a full-on Oktoberfest rager? Or will you just say “fuck it” and buy everyone in the goddamn bar a drink because, apparently, it’s just assumed that you’re Mr. Moneybags? It’s a trick question because, no matter what you decide, you’re going to walk out of that bar considerably poorer (or so trashed that you forget you were catching a flick in the first place). If you find yourself cashless in one of these shady bars, there’s only one guarantee: You booze, you lose.
Credit-card minimums make sense up to a point, but there’s no reason they should be so sky-high. Luckily, City Council members Ritchie Torres and Andrew Cohen have introduced a bill that aims to prohibit NYC businesses from setting credit-card minimums greater than $10. If passed, the legislation would impose fines on noncompliant businesses. What’s that? Force people to pay money that don’t want to? You don’t say.