Internet Sales Tax Vote This Week In US Senate

SonicSpike excerpts from CNet's coverage of the latest in the seemingly inevitable path toward consistently applied Internet sales taxes for U.S citizens: "Internet tax supporters are hoping that a vote in the U.S. Senate as early as today will finally give them enough political leverage to require Americans to pay sales taxes when shopping online. Sens. Mike Enzi (R-Wy.) and Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) are expected to offer an amendment to a Democratic budget resolution this week that, by allowing states to 'collect taxes on remote sales,' is intended to usher in the first national Internet sales tax." There goes one of the best ways to vote with your dollars.

Comments

Re:NOOOOOOO

[noh8rz10]

I'm cool with the tax. Itthe current system puts brick and mortar at an enormous disadvantage, especially with commodities such as TVs with really thin margins. It used to be that sales tax balanced with shipping costs, but amazon effectively solved thee shipping cost problem. It's time to play on level playing field!

To be fair...

[Junta]

The 'no sales tax' scenario is generally enticement to commit tax fraud.

Usually, a 'no sales tax' purchase has an obligation to pay a 'use tax' equal to the amount the sales tax would have been. People saving money due to sales tax are almost always committing tax fraud.

So this isn't levelling by force, it's correcting a 'loophole'. In my mind, abolish use tax, if you *must* enact sales tax to do that, oh well, it's easier than sales tax to keep track of.

Re:To be fair...

[mabhatter654]

This whole thing still shows even Congress doesn't grasp the basic laws at work.

Sales Tax is almost always owed by the PURCHASER. That's why all the stores in my state have a LICENSE to COLLECT that tax and sent it on your behalf to the State. So if I buy something via mail order in Michigan from a business only in Iowa THAT BUSINESS has no obligation to MICHIGAN to collect anything. I still have the obligation to PAY MICHIGAN its USE TAX because I LIVE in that state.

That's the only issue, that a state cannot tell people in OTHER STATES to follow its laws. Not to mention, complying with ONE state tax where your physical store is located is hard... Why should an online business have to collect for 50 states?

Why don't states force BUSINESSES to pay the Sales Tax on what they sell? Because taxing sales BETWEEN THE STATES is illegal for any state to do. It's illegal for Ohio to force a business shipping into Ohio to pay ANY tax to do so. It's illegal for Michigan to COLLECT any tax from Michigan business on an item sold to Ohio. That keeps states from starting trade wars with each other.

So either the FEDS need to enact a federal clearinghouse that allows Internet businesses to only file one form per customer, or they need to compel the BANKS and other financial services located IN EACH STATE to collect taxes based on their accounts mailing address. That's the closest to "constitutional" because you receive and pay your Visa at a bank licensed to your state, and you receive the bill at your postal mailing address. So each statement would only have to account for ONE sales tax per customer.

Re:NOOOOOOO

[dkleinsc]

Also relevant to this discussion: The median wage in the United States is $32,700. That means that half the country is earning less than that. If you're like a lot of /.ers and are a college-educated person working in technology, you should understand that your experience of life in America is nothing like what the majority of Americans experience. You are probably earning twice what the average American earns. You probably have quite a lot of disposable income and may have significant net worth. The average American family has negative savings and buys very little that isn't absolutely necessary to survive (food, clothing, housing, medical care, transportation, utilities).

The reasons you might not be aware of these disparities are:
- You probably live far away from the people who earn a lot less than you, so you don't see how people like that live.
- You probably don't interact with people who earn a lot less than you on a regular basis. Or if you do, you see them as (for example) "that guy behind the fast food counter" or "the woman who cleans my office", rather than as flesh-and-blood people just like you.
- Media do not regularly portray people in that economic situation.