Giuliani wanted to give $200,000,000.00 to the New York Mets to build a new stadium, as well as spending another fortune on transit infrastructure to serve the new stadium. He justified this on the grounds that the 3.5% city income tax on the Mets' $100,000,000.00 payroll would produce a net gain from the expenditure.
Mayor and former prosecutor Giuliani also used the dot com boom to balance the city books. I remember reading New York Times financials that called a stock a buy because it had a high Price to Anticipated Return. The dot com boom was a stock rip off of Enron proportions; the price of the stocks had no basis in any fiscal principle. But the city was raking in the taxes and Giuliani was taking credit for it.
Thanks, I'll take a peek at the revenue increases as related to market activity. It's worth remembering that the revenue surge was to some extent the result of the market surge, which even his staunchest supporters don't credit to Rudy. And though the use of surplus to prepay spending was mentioned earlier as a commonly used practice, it could be used to pay down debt as well. Not a bad idea in a city with a cyclical economic base.