Impending CA Sales Tax Sparks Amazon Buying Frenzy

New submitter payola writes "On September 15, Amazon will begin adding in sales tax for purchases made in California. This is sparking a buying frenzy among California residents who are rushing to buy consumer electronics and other expensive items on the site before the deadline. Of course, consumers are supposed to pay sales taxes on their online purchases anyway, but few actually do. 'Amazon is not the only Internet merchant affected by the new law. But as the nation's largest online retailer, it has been the main target. More than 200 other out-of-state companies with major business in California may also be on the hook to collect sales taxes on items shipped to the state. The tax revenue from these online sales is being lauded as a win for the debt-ridden state, which estimates it will see an additional $317 million annually as a result; more than $83 million of that is expected to come from Amazon alone.'"

Comments

Jerks

[Anonymous Coward]

Am I really the only person in the country who doesn't evade taxes?

Re:Jerks

[Cute Fuzzy Bunny]

I don't avoid taxes when I feel that my money is well spent. But its been a long time since I felt that way.

Near my small California town, I can count about 20 million spent on the 32nd park in my small town, a roadside beautification project that is far from beautiful, new road signs made by the company that does them for Rodeo Drive (the old road signs were fine), a pedestrian overpass that absolutely nobody uses because its 10x longer than just running across the street, etc.

Don't even get me started on the Federal governments waste of my tax dollars.

I can spend my money in way more useful ways than they can, and I'm sure I've created more jobs than the entirety of the government, on every level. Hell, I have at least 4 different delivery people come to my house almost every day.

Re:Jerks

[ackthpt]

Biggest problem I have with government is it spends whatever it likes, regardless how much I pay in taxes. Watching it go from $1 trillion debt in 1980 to $16 trillion these days, tells me the act of collecting taxes is largely done to pay interest on the debt, nothing more.

Re:Jerks

[twotacocombo]

Biggest problem I have with government is it spends whatever it likes, regardless how much I pay in taxes.

This. Why should we feel morally compelled to offer up MORE of our hard earned money to a group of people who are completely unable to responsibly handle what we already give them? Even if we turned over our entire yearly incomes and lived off the land, they'd still find a way to utterly piss it all away and we'd be in the same boat. Blaming *us* for the state's financial woes is blaming the victim. The state needs to get its own shit straight before they go pointing the finger at anybody else.

Re:Jerks

[Cute Fuzzy Bunny]

And for those against taxes, how do you think the roads get built and repaired, bridges built, libraries funded, oversight to make sure our water, food, and medical care are safe, even trains and other public transportation (when you need it you appreciate it), fire departments, emergency response, kids educated, streets and roadways cleaned, etc. etc. etc. No taxes - and we will just end up with new fees from other sources.

I wish they'd spend money on those things. We've had our school budgets cut so far I had to spend $250 on school supplies for my kids room. Real exotic stuff like staplers and marker pens for the white board. I also have to routinely fix school computers as it appears they cut everyone who can fix anything. My wife and I spend time daily in the classroom, because there are too many students and the teachers can't even perform class management, let alone teach them.

We spend more on education and health care, yet get among the worst results.

All of the county fire departments and state resources are all isolated now and won't help each other without being paid for the pleasure. Can't wait until the next time we have a huge fire near a county line and everyone on the other side is sitting on their hands, waiting to get paid.

I live in a wealthy town, yet my roads suck. Most of the roads around here do. 15 miles from the state capital, so it aint like Jerry doesn't see it.

We cut our library staffs so much, many of them closed or are only open limited hours.

We're currently spending billions on a high speed rail that starts in the middle of nowhere and ends in the middle of nowhere, which nobody will ride.

But we spent $400k to put up new rodeo drive quality signs in my town.

My friend Jerry says he's asking for a tax increase, and if we don't give into it, he'll cut the schools, healthcare and state welfare budgets. I seem to have missed how they're going to cut back on unnecessary spending, like any sane person would do when they're spending more than they're taking in.

Sounds a lot like extortion to me.

I'd be Buffet-like and write a check for extra, if they actually put the money to good use. But they don't. If they spent most of it in the areas you mentioned, I'd be all for it. But that stuff is in last place when it comes time to write a check. The politicians know most of us are too stupid to think it through and will just buckle and pay more.

But if they raise taxes, I'm packed and ready to leave. We already pay high income, sales and property taxes. I'm not getting my moneys worth. Nevada or New Mexico or Oregon are alllll calling...

Re:Jerks

[frosty_tsm]

I don't avoid taxes when I feel that my money is well spent.

Sorry but this is a bit of a cop-out.

We all want the money to be spent well. We all want to have say in how it's used. But the reality is that sometimes the money is going to be spent on things we don't like (e.g. Iraq or TSA). And people who do like these things don't want money going to, say, ACORN or Planned Parenthood (I'm making some generalizations here). And someone who lives in Northern California might not like that $200 of his taxes are going towards widening a freeway in San Diego. But this is how government (even an efficient and trim one, which CA is not) works.

If you want to fix government and how it spends your money, get involved. Hold your representatives accountable for how they vote (not what they say in speeches). Don't use the fact that government does many things (some you like, some you don't) as an excuse to skip taxes. Despite what some politicians are saying, tax evasion is NOT patriotic.

Re:Jerks

[hawguy]

And then there's the MTC in the San Francisco Bay Area (funded through sales tax and bridge tolls among other sources) that purchased an entire building in downtown San Francisco and is renovating it to become offices for $170M. It's not clear why they couldn't stay in Oakland where office space is much cheaper than downtown San Francisco. Well, it is clear -- they have unlimited funding since residents are forced to fund them, if they need more money they can just raise tolls and/or taxes.

http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_21418357/mtcs-san-francisco-office-building-purchase-bridge-tolls
http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/matier-ross/article/MTC-project-may-cost-Bay-Area-drivers-more-3822760.php

When confronted with the fact that their purchase may not have been cost effective, the MTC rep said:

a San Mateo County supervisor who chairs the commission, insisted that the agency's goal was never to make money - or even necessarily to break even.
"We're not looking at it as investment per se," Tissier said. "We look at it as moving into your own home."

That's the problem with government agencies - what incentive do they have to spend money wisely?

Re:Jerks

[Cute Fuzzy Bunny]

I don't even care that much, so long as I get a say in how it's spent.

It'd be easy to do. Put a list of projects and costs on the internet and let people vote for them. Top votes win and we keep going down the list until we're out of money. Anyone or any entity that wants to private fund a project can whip out their checkbook.

Once you fix the unique online identify situation, you've also got all voting online capable.

Of course, none of this will ever happen. Not because of technology issues, but because polticians take the job for power and the ability to spend other peoples money with impunity. They sure as shoot don't want us voting online, because then everyone would do it and they'd have lots of available information to make their decisions. Politicians like people who do what they're told, when they're told.

Hell, we aren't even allowed to vote for candidates in the primaries unless we state a party affiliation and then we're only allowed to vote for candidates from that party. The republicans wont even send you a ballot if you ask for it, unless you register republican. They're uncomfortable with non-sheeple independent voters who might upset their preprogrammed apple cart.

Re:Jerks

[Seumas]

I don't even care that much, so long as I get a say in how it's spent.

It'd be easy to do. Put a list of projects and costs on the internet and let people vote for them. Top votes win and we keep going down the list until we're out of money.

That is a TERRIBLE idea. We'd have massive statues of dicks and giant pudding-filled swimming pools. You can't trust this shit to the internet and you sure as hell can't trust the wisdom of mob-rule.

Re:Jerks

[Anonymous Coward]

The government doesn't need my money. We are sixteen trillion dollars in debt. Actually, far worse than that. But if you just go off the typical "national debt clock" numbers, it's only sixteen trillion. That's $16,000,000,000,000.00. That's up six trillion from four years ago and up eleven trillion from twelve years ago. Taking a thousand dollars out of my pocket has a real meaningful impact on my life and the life of people I care about. It means very little to my government, who has absolutely no concern for the value of money. They don't need my thousand dollars (or tens of thousands of dollars per year, actually). How do I know they don't need it? Because no matter how much we give them, they spend trillions more that don't actually exist. I don't have the luxury of spending money I don't have, so the money actually means something to me when they take it away. If they don't take it away, they would have no problem just magically inventing that money and throwing it onto the spent pile of "money we'll owe forever".

The system is broken and "getting involved" will accomplish nothing. It's fixed and its broken and the concept of "participation" is there not so that you can accomplish anything, but for the same bullshit reason we tell people it's important to "get out and vote". Because it placates you. It has ZERO real impact. It just makes you feel like you're a better (if meaningless) person.

Re:Jerks

[_8553454222834292266]

The platoon taking fire for you somewhere in the mountains of Afghanistan.

Wait, are you trying to say that's not wasted money, and lives?

Re:Jerks

[fozzy1015]

Biggest problem I have with government is it spends whatever it likes, regardless how much I pay in taxes.

This. Why should we feel morally compelled to offer up MORE of our hard earned money to a group of people who are completely unable to responsibly handle what we already give them? Even if we turned over our entire yearly incomes and lived off the land, they'd still find a way to utterly piss it all away and we'd be in the same boat. Blaming *us* for the state's financial woes is blaming the victim. The state needs to get its own shit straight before they go pointing the finger at anybody else.

It's hard to have sympathy for the state's plight. When the state announced they were going to close 70 state parks private individuals donated money in an attempt to keep some of those parks open.

Then it turned out that up to $54 million was squirrelled away, for still murky reasons, that should of gone to funding the parks.

If CA finances are this much of a mess how can Californians in good conscious be asked to pay yet more in tax hikes?

http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=news/politics&id=8750455

Re:Jerks

[azadrozny]

Isn't that what California does now? Prop 123 to pay for X and Prop 456 to pay for Y. Some outrageous percentage of their budget is tied up in these "feel good" mandates. The legislature wants to increase funding for teachers, but they first have to pay out to the "orphan kitten" fund. When someone attempts to repeal the mandate, they are villainized in TV ads, saying they want to feed the kittens, and the elderly, to alligators.

Re:Jerks

[misexistentialist]

Those projects would literally be better than the many projects that produce absolutely nothing, or less than nothing. My city spent a couple million dollars replacing perfectly good lampposts with quaint-looking ones that provide less light. I wish we got a dick statue instead.

Re:Jerks

[dkleinsc]

No, they'll Prop 123 to demand X (which passes), and in the same election Prop 124 for the tax increase to pay for X (which gets voted down). Which is one of the major reasons why they're budget is in a serious mess.

Re:Jerks

[farble1670]

i can top that.

like many cities san jose was and is struggling its budget and has laid off workers, cut worker wages, cut pensions and benefits, and cut city services. that didn't stop them from building a new $400M city hall right at the peak of the economic downturn.

the old offices were *fine* (i live across the street from them), and if they needed more space there were (and still are) literally hundreds of large vacant office buildings in san jose that could have been had for cheap.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Jose_City_Hall
http://www.bizjournals.com/sanjose/stories/2002/04/29/story2.html?page=all

Re:Jerks

[Mr.CRC]

Good luck convincing the tax man with that excuse when you can easily look up every order you made on Amazon and any substantial retailer, and you have email confirmations on file of every purchase.

Great

[Quiet_Desperation]

which estimates it will see an additional $317 million annually as a result

And will be instantly pissed away on corruption and bullshit and the bond payments for the initial funding for that idiotic "high speed" train which is really just a welfare project for high paid political cronies to sit around on boards and committees.

Re:No thanks

[Cute Fuzzy Bunny]

The's another dynamic here. Imagine if you're a brick and mortar store trying to compete with amazon. Not only do they have low overhead, high volumes, etc, but they have a 10% price break from no sales taxes. How can you compete with that? this levels the playing field a little bit. Inb4 brick and mortar is a fail: remember that they provide al people jobs in California, so if we can make brick and mortar more competitive with online (at least by removing artificial barriers) then it is good for the state.

B&M stores can't compete anyhow. If I want something, chances are I'd have to go to five stores to find it, and it'd be 20% more than I could buy the item for online. After I spent $5 worth of gas looking for it. Once again, no thanks.

Why level the playing field? Amazon has a very good business going that employs a lot of people. B&M stores that only stock a slice of what I want are yesterdays old moldy news.

You have seen the story about how amazon intends to deliver about 50-70% of their items the same day as ordered? They're already working with a van service here in the southwest and I've been happy with their deliveries so far.

Oh, and all of the grocery stores near me will pull and deliver an order for free. One did it so the rest had to follow suit.

Seems like the wave is moving away from lots of stores that don't have what I want to a bunch of giant warehouses and guys that bring the stuff to my house. But lets fark that up by 'leveling the playing field', which in my experience means cutting the legs out of someone doing a good job and handing them to someone that wants to screw those legs to the top of their head.

Re:US Constitution, Section 9, Paragraph 5

[bws111]

The flaw in your logic is thinking that sales tax is a tax on goods. It is not. It is a tax on transactions. You don't owe tax because you bought a book, you owe tax because you spent $15.

Re:excessively burdensome to merchants

[bws111]

Sounds like a great business opportunity - tax clearing house. Probably already exists. Oops, just googled it, and here it is.

Re:No thanks

[Rockoon]

Not only do they have low overhead, high volumes, etc, but they have a 10% price break from no sales taxes. How can you compete with that? this levels the playing field a little bit.

Sure, lets artificially make less efficient businesses more competitive.

This is why I inserted time-wasting OS calls into my qsort() function. I want bubble sort to be able to compete with more efficient sorting algorithms, so I make sure that bubble is artificially more competitive.

I also installed the battery from the old dumb phone into my new smart phone, because it just was not right that the new phone lasted longer on a charge than the old one did.

Are you picking up what I am putting down? Maybe you should have someone else help you pick that up, even though you are perfectly capable of doing it on your own. We wouldn't want people incapable of picking it up by themselves to feel less competitive.