Cuomo proposes plugging budget gap with more than $1 billion in taxes and fees .Governor pitches excises on health insurance, painkillers and online shopping .

Crain's New York reports:

Gov. Andrew Cuomo called for an array of new revenues to close the state’s $4 billion budget hole on Tuesday while sketching his spending plan for the coming fiscal year.

The governor asserted that Albany could reap $750 million from sales of health care nonprofits to private entities, $140 million from a new tax on health insurers, $170 million from an opioid surcharge, $300 million through a one-year suspension of certain corporate tax credits and $318 million through an internet sales tax.

The state would allocate the proceeds to a “health care shortfall fund”—which Cuomo said would “make up for these federal cuts that are coming down the pike”—and education spending.

Cuomo's total budget would be $168.2 billion, up 2.3% from last year. Expenditures of state funds would rise by 1.9%.

In keeping with all of his recent speeches, the Democrat deflected attention from the state’s longstanding fiscal issues by railing against the tax law Congress passed and President Donald Trump signed in December. He pointed to the massive federal corporate tax cut to defend the proposed levy on health care providers, and the one-year deferment of credits for companies holding more than $200 million in such incentives.

“They weren’t expecting the tax cut, they got the tax cut," he said. “I think it’s totally justifiable to have a tax to recoup part of their windfall benefit.”

King Andrew has plans for your money...