[zoul]

We have a kind of “TV tax” here in the Czech Republic. (AFAIK the system is more common in Europe.) It mostly works, the “national TV” is much better than the commercial ones overall, in quality journalism. It is also under a constant attack from various politicians and other people, as it’s obviously inconvenient for them.

Regarding local news, I run a local newspaper in a town of about 11 thousand people and I strongly disagree that local news aren’t interesting. Having a good local newspaper is an important catalyst for higher quality local government, for example.

[smcl]

I've experienced both UK and Czech TV/radio tax and can confirm that both are better quality than their commercial counterparts (though the BBC is on a downward trajectory) and are under periodic attacks by the right-leaning parties.

They're surprisingly cheap too - it works out something like 2160 CZK/year (US$100) for Ceska televize/rozhlas, and 150 GBP/year (US$200) for the UK TV license.