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Amazon Fights Back Against NY Online Sales Tax
The New York Times is reporting on Amazon's lawsuit contesting the recently enacted New York state law which requires online retail outlets to collect sales tax on items sold to the state's residents. Amazon disagrees that it should be required to collect such tax without a physical presence in the state. We discussed the 'Amazon Tax' last month. Quoting:
"The new law is based on a novel definition of what constitutes a presence in the state: It includes any Web site based in the state that earns a referral fee for sending customers to an online retailer. Amazon has hundreds of thousands of affiliates--from big publishers to tiny blogs--that feature links to its products. It says thousands of those have given an address in New York State, although it does not verify the addresses. The state law says that if even one of those affiliates is in New York, Amazon must collect sales tax on everything sold in the state, even if it is not sold through the affiliate."
Doesn't the antidote to this seem clearer than day on this one? All Amazon has to do is ban publishers with payment addresses in NY... those big enough to care can simply reincorperate in a more tax-friendly state, those small enough not to matter will simply just go away.
Congress needs to act, since this is an interstate issue.
I don't think New York has the authority to do this. But I sure would like to see the supreme Court act.
One problem with sales tax is the complexity of the code. What states need to do is to create an out-of-state seller tax rate, which retailers could voluntarily choose to pay (instead of trying to figure out the specific taxing locale). It might be equal to the highest taxing rate in the state, and would be paid to the state with no locale attached to the revenue sent there. Then the state would divide the revenue up amongst their localities based on some sort of formula (perhaps based on in-state sales, for example, for percentages).
It's time people faced the fact that they should be paying taxes on their internet purchases like anything else they buy. I don't want to, but I know I should. Taxes go towards all services you receive from your State, and when you don't pay them, they have to be made up another way. It's the irony of robbing Peter to pay Paul - People that avoid paying taxes are actually stealing from everyone else in the State that now has to make up for the shortfall. Like it or not, it all comes down to one word - GREED. It's the only thing that's been driving the US for the last 12 years and more - And it's the reason the US has sunk to the status of a 2nd rate Nation (I'd use "Banana Republic" but we don't grow enough bananas here.) I'm sure we'll see hundreds of posts here on how this or that is illegal or unconstitutional, but like I said - it still all boils down to GREED - gimme, gimme, gimme - In money we trust!
Firstly
The question is whether the vendors must collect those taxes on behalf of the state. Generally, only those companies that have a physical presence, such as an office or store, in the state of the purchase are required to collect the taxes.
By have a physical presence in NY, I'm deriving benefits from the state; Amazon without a physical presence in NY receives no state benefits and should not have to work as the states agent withput consideration.
Secondly
Amazon's legal obligations are dependent on the actions of a third party over which it has no contract or control. It would be like the county tax assessor telling your your property taxes will increase 25% on sunny days!
Thirdly
NY is the poster child for it's mishmash of sales tax laws, my understanding is that you can be liable for state, county, and municipal sales taxes in some places of NY, the chief obstruction to a coherrent, unified national state sales tax system is NY
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
It's called the Constitution of the United States.
In section 10...
And when we look back to section 9...
Now I'm no constitutional scholar - but I interpret the above to mean the states can't tax each other's exports. This will be challenged and it will end up in the Supreme Court.
"Services" are taxable under state laws. That would include e-files served to your Ipod or PC.
As a seller (on ebay and amazon), here is my argument against paying NY Sales Tax:
- I am not a resident of New York.
- Therefore I am not under the jurisdiction of that government (same as I am not under jurisdiction to France or Canada)
- Thus I am not an NY citizen; governments can not tax non-citizens.
So I owe the New York government absolutely nothing for my ebay/amazon sales, and I'd like to see them try to cross the border and come get me. I don't think Pennsylvania would accept NY soldiers/officers marching across its territory in order to reach me in Maryland. Neither the PA nor the MD government is going to stand for an invasion from the NY government.
So basically, the NY Tax Form is going in my Maryland trash can. (Along with any French or Canadian tax forms.) A foreign government can not tax non-residents. The NY government is foreign to this Maryland citizen, so the NY Legislators can go fuck themselves.
(Note that the same reasoning applies to Amazon - Amazon is a citizen of California(?) and therefore can not be taxed by foreign governments.)
The government is not your daddy. Its purpose is not to raid middle-class neighbors' wallets and give it to you.
Yes, cities often put an extra tax on to cover their expenses. Food and medicine is often exempted*. NY is known for 'tax holidays' where they'll make clothing under a certain dollar amount tax free. It can get ugly.
I don't read AC A human right
It wounds like there's alot of greed flowing around here... you alls wants no taxes, and the "evil" state is going to end the party.
Frankly, New York State is in the hole. Most of its industry went overseas within the last two decades (no more glass from Corning, film from Rochester, shoes from Binghamton, etc.) and at times it seems like the entire economy of the state has shifted to New York City. Much of that work (and a nice chunk of the state's revenues) comes from the financial sector. Which is now in the toilet. So you not only have an ongoing economic collapse in NYC, but the rest of the state's economy got "shanghaied" long ago.
The truth is, the State of New York is facing record deficits this year and needs to make up for the difference (it does not expect to be able to). And while the governor is recommending that municipalities consolidate to reduce costs, taxing internet retailers on sales in NYS is another way to get there.
An enlightenment painter would paint a grand house on a lawn; A romantic painter would paint it on fire.
I am a citizen of California first, then of the United States second. Yes I have duel citizenship. Look back at what people called themselves back in at the turn of the 19th century.
I would see the use tax as a lot more Constitutionally valid if it applied to all products used in the state. By prejudicially applying it only to imported goods, it is, in effect, nothing more than a thinly disguised way to apply sales tax on interstate commerce. While I realize a few appellate courts have upheld these blatantly unconstitutional laws, that's because of how many strict constructionalists the Republicans have packed into the courts in question. That doesn't make it remotely the right decision from any remotely sane perspective.
Allowing use taxes is tantamount to saying the government can arbitrarily restrict speech on the Internet because it is neither spoken word nor published with a printing press. The government saying "oh, but we're not really taxing the import; we're charging a one-time tax on the use of products that were imported," as though there were some difference between the two, is plainly silly on its face, and just gets sillier the deeper you examine it.... And before you say "Yes, but you could reexport it and not pay the tax," the same would be true of sales tax, as only the end user of a product pays sales tax, not someone purchasing it for resale. The only possible exception would be a purchase as a gift for someone, but then the recipient's state would claim that the recipient owes use tax, so in effect, again, it is just like sales tax. If it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, walks like a duck, and smells like a duck, calling it a chicken does not make it so, and it's time the courts woke up and recognized this.
Put it this way, I guarantee if they get to the point where they can track this stuff, if someone sets up a mutual exchange program where people can buy identical products and cross ship them each other in other states as mutual gifts, I guarantee they will see those gifts as tantamount to having bought the products for themselves. How, then, can the courts turn around and in the same breath say that this is not a sales tax on interstate commerce, since the products clearly would not, then, have been used in the state of purchase as use taxes require?
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