How do you kill E-Commerce ? Tax it.

[MazeRat7]

http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9595_22-6004917.html?tag=zdfd.newsfeed

<snip>
This may be the last holiday season to enjoy tax-free Internet shopping, thanks to new legislation in the U.S. Congress.

Two bills introduced Wednesday propose sweeping changes to how Americans are taxed for online and mail order purchases. Businesses initially would be required to collect sales taxes on purchases shipped to roughly half of the country, and that percentage is expected to rapidly increase.
</snip>


I would suspect that most small business would shutter their e-sales offering rather than try to deal with the different sales tax codes in each state. Of course, there would be little impact to large corporations. Suprise..suprise.

MZr7

[Viva_La_Revolution]

1. I live in Oregon - No Sales tax!

If I go shopping in Washington, all I have to do is show my drivers license and they don't charge sales tax. It would be very cool if we didn't make up for it by paying outrageous State tax every year. :(

[acmejack]

4. Comes close to having your cake & eating it too!

Not that I don't relate. We don't have income tax but we have outrageous property taxes and sales taxes-and our schools suck, while we trail the civilized States in every other imaginable category (except executions, something we are just so very proud of!).

[awoke_in_2003]

7. " we have outrageous property taxes and sales taxes-and our schools suck"

well, you must be a fellow Texan :)

[acmejack]

8. Indeed...

Sad but true!

[awoke_in_2003]

13. Well, i must say

Howdy pardner, and god bless Molly Ivins. P.S. Go Kinky

On edit: How hard can it be?

[rurallib]

2. Sorry to maybe be a downer here, but I believe that sales taxes

should be collected. The reasoning for a long time was that programming could not handle 50+ state sales tax setup. Pretty bogus. Sales tax won't kill e-commerce, but it may help fill some gaps in state budgets, such as the medicaid tab that states will be forced to pick up thanks to W and Jim Nussle.

[SoCalDem]

5. e-shopping has removed a lot of cars from roadways

and tax-free ,free-shipping is what attracted me to e-shopping in the first place. I bought a lot of stuff that I will just not shop for online or in the real world when things change..

I bought BIG stuff.. like furniture and saved HUNDREDS of dollars.. someone made money from my purchases.

I'll just save money if they start charging tax.. That was my incentive to buy some of the stuff in the first place:)

[HereSince1628]

9. How did they deliver the furniture over the wire?

You weren't on the road, but your goods were. I don't know how much is going on but if States are policing online retail fraud or other crimes the online activity generates costs that need to be covered somehow.

[SoCalDem]

11. Those goods would have been delivered to a store via roadway

I just would not have bought them :) UPS was paid by someone..and the price of the items I bought, probably had those costs built in..

[pinto]

3. Playing devil's advocate: Why should e commerce be any different

than brick and mortar sales? The paperwork burden for the seller seems a specious argument, since the buyer could add appropriate State sales tax when ordering a product over the internet. Reimbursement to the States could be handled as efficiently via the same process - the internet.

And, to push the point further, tax free internet sales could be said to unfairly exempt credit card holders from State sales tax while cash customers, who buy locally, routinely ante-up.

[China_cat]

6. There's an easy way to get around it.

If you're producing a product, pay the sales tax on the raw materials...even if you don't HAVE to. Your products have then already been taxed and it's been paid and taxing the same product twice is against the law in all states.

[GrumpyGreg]

10. I don't know about that "against the law" thing.

In Massachusetts they tax a tax on cigarettes. Of course that's typical of Massachusetts ---they just make up the rules as they go along.

[China_cat]

14. Check your state law about the taxability of 'service'

I haven't found a state yet that taxes services. If the tax is paid on the materials used, producing an item becomes a service.

[BuyingThyme]

12. We didn't have to tax sales made via 1-800 numbers and we

don't have to tax sales made via the internet.