US Internet Tax Committee Squabbles 118
There's increasing reports coming about the state of US Government's Internet Tax Committee. The committee, which stopped meeting about six months because of squabbling is back talking again about a way to acheive "tax-neutrality", meaning that all those nice tax free sales may be gone in the next few years.
Doesn't work, really... (Score:1)
Besides, all the examples you give are not analogous. The federal government doesn't pay for that traffic. The Companies using the air freight DO pay for the use of the system.
Re:Tax are good and necessary (yes) (Score:1)
Show me a big organization (governement, company, non profit organization) that doesn't waste money somewhere...
Re:Doesn't work, really... (Score:2)
But, as I've said elsewhere, I don't agree with the every-taxation-must-have-a-purpose-that-directly-
This explains nothing (Score:1)
"...you are taking money your state would usually get from sales tax."
Nonsense. The state collects sales tax because they have sales related costs (zoning, road maintenance, etc). The question is: What Internet sales related costs does the state have? Answering "well, we've always gotten this money therefore we are entitled to it" is not an answer.
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Put Hemos through English 101!
Money (Score:1)
They better have the best damn doughnuts in the world for that kind of money.
not entirly... (Score:1)
( yea, it would be more compicated then this but if taxes make it profitable it will, mostlikely happen )
nmarshall
#include "standard_disclaimer.h"
R.U. SIRIUS: THE ONLY POSSIBLE RESPONSE
No taxation without representation (Score:2)
>in person, as opposed to through the mail or over the internet.Suppose I live in CA and buy from NY over the 'net. I have no voice in the NY state gov't affairs. Why should they tax me?Also, how do 'net purchases differ taxwise from phone orders, mail orders? Why should they? Why are new laws needed? As it is, sales tax is collected if the company resides or has operations in my home state. Otherwise, no tax is collected. Of course I'm still supposed to pay sales tax to my local state on out of state purchases, it's just that that some other state has no authority to collect taxes on bahalf of another state in which it has no business. No one pays this tax, hence the urban legend that mail orders (now extended to the net) from out of state are 'tax free'. They never were. It's just that no one can enforce the rules.
not Libertarian, revolutionary... (off topic) (Score:1)
nmarshall
#include "standard_disclaimer.h"
R.U. SIRIUS: THE ONLY POSSIBLE RESPONSE
Re:Intarnatiolizing the system... (Score:1)
I DON'T RESIDE IN YOUR STATE SO YOU CAN'T TAX ME!! (Score:1)
I'll repeat it because it's one of the reasons Americans fought for independence from the English.
No taxation without representation.
This is a very fundamental and core basis of the US constitution.
If I like in San Francisco, CA and mail order something from Clearwater, Florida. I had better not be charged any sales tax. Why? Because I don't live in Florida. I don't use their state services. I don't drive on their roads. I don't send my kids to their schools. I DON'T VOTE IN THEIR ELECTIONS. In short, I have zero say in Florida's affairs, so there had better be a zero % tax imposed upon me by Florida.
Get it?
Re:Tax are good and necessary (yes) (Score:1)
Nonsense.
The problem is that there are so many hands in the cookie jar, and all of them have their own vested interest in keeping (and increasing) their share as much as possible. Just how MUCH do we have to spend on education before we finally realize that we can pay incompetent teachers ANY amount and STILL end up with students who are functionally illiterate? Having attended a private religious high school, it always amazed me how they could accomplish so much more with so much less.
While CEOs do work for shareholders, at least THEY are accountable to someone. The government has proven, in many instances, that it is accountable to no one. What happens when a program is deemed unprofitable for a private sector company? They scrap the program. The government, on the other hand, often keeps right on throwing money at it. Since every new program creates a new special interest, it behooves every American citizen to see that these programs are kept to a MINIMUM.
Why the fuck should I pay for your roads? (Score:1)
I thinks it's quite clear that one thing slashdot has done well WITHOUT moderating is DEBUNKING big business plants posting on the site. They still don't get it. Only
Thank god^H^H^HRob this isn't like WalMart's suggestion box or USENET's junkyard.
"What authority?" said to ICANN (Score:1)
Now weather or not you agree with the ICANN tax, who is there to ask the US Government where it gets its authority to tax the Internet?
I for one view the Internet as basically a seperate country free of government interfereance AND taxes. It's kind of like a place of refuge from politics in my mind.
Re:2c (analogy) (Score:1)
Malachi
Re:Tax are good and necessary - normally (Score:2)
That is a very good point - often it is difficult or impossible to track exactly where your taxes go. I certainly don't think that we should only pay taxes for exactly the roads, colleges, etc. that we use - obviously most people should pay taxes into a common pool at the state and federal levels, and this entire pool of money will be divided between roads, schools, and so on. I have no argument with this.
However, I do have a problem with contributing to a tax pool which is specifically excludes me from benefiting from it - local taxes in another state, in this particular issue. If I buy something online, it will likely be from a store in CA, and I don't live in that state so let's use that as an example. Local sales tax in CA is specifically earmarked for the use of the town and possibly the state government. None of that benefit will return to me back in my state.
So yes, the government sells services as a package, but under our federal system there are several quasi-self-contained service pools. Tax money directed into one of those areas (like the state of CA, for example) won't provide any benefit to those who aren't a part of the CA benefit pool - people and companies who exist or visit CA. I have no problems paying a federal tax and the benefit going to another state, because all states are in the federal benefits pool. But any taxes I pay to CA won't benefit me at all if I never live in that state and never visit it.
Re:better off (Score:2)
2. I know. I thought I mentioned earlier (I may not have) that this should be the federal government, not the state. Of course, everyone has their own opinions on whether or not this is justified too.
3. But you can look at it from the other side too. Any moron with a few bucks can open up a store and compete with WalMart (poorly, though). It takes some brains and knowhow(not much, I'll admit!) to compete with Amazon and buy.com. The problem is that not only can the little guy sell directly, but the big corporation can do that too. Bye-bye boutiques. Bye-bye independent bookstores.
And I really think mailorder should be taxed too (subject to previous disclaimer!)
Re:better off (Score:1)
Actually the reverse is true. You can buy books from wholesalers in quantities of 5 and get the same price that Amazon pays for them. UPS will charge your customers the same amount they charge Amazon's customers. It doesn't take much of an operation to compete with Amazon on price. WalMart gets such huge volume discounts from its suppliers, plus its economies of scale, that no single store is going to be able to break even charging WalMart prices.
Disclaimer: I work for Target. I do not speak for them.
No taxation without representation (Score:1)
I can see why you wouldn't want an Englishman like me voting for your president, or even governor. But it irks me when I can't vote for city council or school board. Why would my vote be different from someone who just moved in from Wisconsin, or who spends 5 months of the year in Florida (and registers their car there).
There was the Boston Tea Party. And not one decent cup of tea has been made in America since.
Re:Internet Taxation. (Score:1)
It's unlikely you'd be able to make an order by internet and then drive to potentially another state, or across country, to pick up the goods yourself. Any savings in tax would be more than offset in travel costs.
Hope I haven't given anyone an idea here.
Re:It really needs a tax (Score:1)
Basically the core of our argument is whether online commerce should be taxed. I feel that it shouldn't; as long as the only way people are looking at this issue is the same way they look at Joe going to Mike's store and buying something. I would reconsider if it meant repaying for the Internet I have so been addicted to for years. You see online-purchasing as something that should not be treated differently simply because of how it is done, making it taxable like the rest of purchases.
As to UPS, I couldn't tell you the specifics, but I know they get no preferential treatment (i hope), therefore they pay taxes like the rest of us. Moving a package to them is moving a package. The government sees it the same way.
-Clump
Re:It really needs a tax (Score:1)
Soem states have warehousing taxes. Do UPS distribution centers count as warehouses?
Some states have tighter rules on commercial fuel usage than others. While not exactly a transactional tax, it does affect interstate trucking. And each state a truck regularly goes through generally needs a "license" from that state, lots of state-specific paperwork, etc., and they do have to stop at the commercial truck scales and sometimes pay weight taxes there.
Then there are people from states w/o sales taxes, who don't pay sales taxes in neighboring states w/ sales taxes, etc. (used to see this a lot in Washington, Oregon people buying in WA and not paying sales tax. Of course, we saved enough to justify going to Portland for a weekend to not pay sales tax on our toys, also...)
Commercial truck taxes are generally higher because one loaded semi does some insane amount of road wear compared to cars per mile. So there is that sense of a "pay for what you get (or use)" tax for commercial trucks.
Re:What are the taxes FOR? (Score:1)
What consumers tend to not know, consumers tend to not think about...
Uppity consumers are bad for business.
Re:Internet Taxation. (Score:1)
This isn't a big market now, but it could be real soon now. how does one then distinguish between bitware and data (you can't tell by looking at the bits). If the tax was levied by each router, should I have to pay one tax one night because of one route, and a different one the other, because of some other, over which I had no control over?
that's why I think the "micropayment" stuff is bogus. There is nothing to stop a company from routing data in a way that most increases their transaction revenue, and it leaves the users with no way to choose, ultimately.
Would long distance be very useful if instead of end-to-end taxes & fees, it was per-switch/node?
No.
Re:What are the taxes FOR? (Score:1)
That's nuts.... (Score:1)
This is one issue that gets to me. Why do people LIKE to pay taxes to a government that is so OBVIOUSLY corrupt and wasteful?
Wouldn't it make much more sense for us to choose where we use our own money?
Re:Doesn't work, really... (Score:1)
People, Americans especially, _loathe_ taxes. We usually hate anything where we can't see an immediate effect. Small wonder why welfare is such a big issue--on a side note, the welfare issue is retarded as welfare accounts for about 1% of the budget while medical costs account for much more and are skyrocketing.
So in order to get Joe American to agree to pay something, it has to be proved that what he is paying is valid. I tend to see that as good. If people are concerned where their money goes it creates a good system of checks and balances.
-Clump
Progressive vs. Regressive taxation (Score:1)
Instead, poorer people spend a greater percentage of their income at retail, and end up putting a larger portion of their income into sales taxes.
That's the hazard of having a broad-based, untargeted tax like this panel is contemplating.
Media Hype (Score:1)
Malachi
Daily Feed spoof (Score:1)
Re:I DON'T RESIDE IN YOUR STATE SO YOU CAN'T TAX M (Score:1)
Missing something (Score:1)
And you live in what parallel-universe San Francisco in which the California state and San Francisco city sales taxes don't apply?
This has nothing to do with living in California and paying a bunch of schmoes in Florida for your purchases -- and everything to do with living in California and paying California regardless of where your purchase is made. This is something you are obligated to do in any case, even on snail-mail or telephone based transactions, even though you don't do it now. Nobody does. It's a law just about everyone breaks because it's utterly unenforcable.
Unfortunately, more legislation doesn't solve the problem. One of the greatest attractions to retail interstate commerce is the unenforcability of that extra 8.75% (or what have you) state sales tax. Take that incentive away and you are simply left paying extra for shipping, in which case you might as well just drive on down to WidgetCo and get your greasy paws on your purchase with instant gratification.
Additional taxation on interstate commerce is not necessary. Existing laws and taxes suffice.
Re:What are the taxes FOR? (Score:1)
Subsidising all of The Malls that no one is going to because they buy stuff online.
HS education taxes? School buildings are obsolete (Score:1)
Internet tax, Sounds like a poll fucking tax to me.
Intarnatiolizing the system... (Score:1)
In my (H) opinion, there should be no difference if you by a product from another country by phone, fax, by visiting that country, or by filling a HTML Form. In the US of A, there would (as it appears to me) be use of a national systems, that contols some state-wide systems, which in urn contol the taxation in the individual cities/municipalities.
My 20 mEuro.
What tax-free sales? (Score:1)
Re:It really needs a tax (Score:2)
Re:I DON'T RESIDE IN YOUR STATE SO YOU CAN'T TAX M (Score:1)
>exchange rate is with no surcharge, so no loss
>here)
You might want to check your Visa card agreement. Most credit card companies *do* impose a surcharge over the then-current conversion rate. Generally it's only about 1%, but if you're making a large purchase that can get to be alotta bucks.
slight clarification (Score:2)
Re:"What authority?" said to ICANN (Score:1)
Absent the rest of the world, rationalization of
sales tax as applied to the internet would most
likely be a good thing --- one standard rule
would make it much easier for vendors who
right now are legally required to provide
sales tax when purchases are made by residents
of certain states, and not others. And it will
prevent the day when some local bookstore, say,
decides to sue the _state_ government on the
grounds that it's a deprivation of equal
protection under the fourteenth amendment
for sales in retail stores to be taxed
while sales online are not taxed.
That said, this misses the fundamental problem:
if I buy $500 a month in books from amazon.com,
and am not now paying sales tax, and the
US government adopts rules that would require me
to, what keeps me from transferring my $500/month
to amazon.uk, in which case I wouldn't have to
pay sales tax (again)?
I think probably in 4-5 years we'll see a massive
movement among the governments of the industrialized world to bring their policies
regarding on-line commerce into synch --- which
will just mean that people who don't want to
follow those rules move to places like
Tonga. Still, since shipping from Tonga is
expensive
Re:I DON'T RESIDE IN YOUR STATE SO YOU CAN'T TAX M (Score:1)
A workable scheme would be this: each vendor
collects sales tax and keeps a record of what
percentage goes to which state. They pay the
taxes to their local state, and pass along
the information about how its supposed to be
distributed, and then once a year or so
there are massive interstate transfers to make
sure the money ends up in the hands of the
right state government.
[This is essentially what happens now,
as residents of certain states have to
pay sales tax on things purchased from
catalogs, etc, from outside of their states ---
it would just get standardized across the
entire country, which would reduce the
costs to businesses.]
Re:What are the taxes FOR? (Score:1)
A symptom of systems which do work is direct payments for services rendered, in which case taxes are unnecessary.
Re:Tax are good and necessary (yes) (Score:1)
Not always... look Microsoft. You can't push Bill Gates out... but you can change your president every 4 year if you don't like it. You can switch AS LONG AS a governement is there to stop big monopolies.
When you get government involved in things like schools where the budget has tripled in the past 20 years (so it's getting more money, not less) and the service is getting worse, what do you do?
Sounds more like a cultural problem to me... people want their diploma without studying, they want to go to school and HAVE FUN instead of learning something.
The purpose of government is to protect it's people from other governments.
Sounds like a paranoid definition to me... a governement would rather be an organisation whole goal is to manage common properties and services for a whole nation.
If you reduce competition (like government does) you reduce quality (see Microsoft)
The DOJ vs Microsoft trial sounds like a good counter-example. There is no competition between Bill Gates and somebody who grew in LA South Central, because they are born in different famillies. Education and welfare are here to level the competition by giving a chance to the poor to compete with the rich. If you think putting a lion and a deer in a cage is "competition", then yes, governement is against competetion. Justice is about giving everyone a chance, and that mean giving everyone education and healthcare. It is helping REAL competition.
Re:Tax atoms based on point-of-delivery. (Score:1)
With Internet and catalog sales untaxed, towns have a different quandary, that they can't afford the infrastructure that makes people happy and safe while people buy from whatever source is cheap this year (greenfield big-box stores, catalogs, the Internet...).
Taxing all *atoms* equally removes a big free-rider problem while leaving decisions about the right rate of taxation local.
Not taxing *bits* rewards people who sensibly desire the only luxury there's always enough of.
Almost the whole budget is "Crap" (Score:1)
Lets see...
1) Federal funding for schools? There's a nice graph showing standardized scores decreasing the moment that federal funding was introduced. The National Education Association has 2 main interests: 1) Being in bed with all the teachers Unions, who obviously have no interest in increasing the quality of education, and 2) advancing Outcome Based Education programs as a natural outgrowth of its liberal and big government ideology.
Hmm..sounds like Federal Funding for schools is Crap.
2) Medicare/aid? The same program that 1) makes it affordable for 14 yr olds to have children that they would have aborted/put up for adoption before? 2) A program that gives MORE benefits then a normal entry level job, giving people no incentive to get off it? 3) A program which has taken over 51% of the healthcare system, increasing health care costs to everyone based on the time that doctors have to fill out federal healthcare forms? 4) A program that totally demoralizes and dehumanizes everybody who is on it, telling them that they can't survive without the government?
Sounds like crap to me as well.
3) Science grants? Run by the government, they tend to be given to the people running the most politically popular experiments, not necessarly the people who are running the most beneficial experiments. Grants are good, run by the government is bad, therefore crap.
4) NASA has been productive because they have worked with many members of the private sector and are much more public minded then other government agencies. Why not spin them off into the private sector, where the gifted people who are responsible for their success can work even more productively and make their own decisions?
and finally,
5) If you want a more reasonable military budget, then we need to change our foreign policy, which currently consists of "Lets stick our nose into every other countries affairs." Of COURSE our military budget is outragious! We're trying to fight wars for 20 different countries! And in the meantime, we're pissing everybody off because we DON'T MIND OUR OWN BUSINESS! All our military needs to do is make sure that WE don't get invaded and that WE can't get nuked. All we need are troops that will fight in case of invasion and a ballistic missile defense so we don't have to worry about every damn dictator that gets a nuclear missile.
MOST of the current budget is crap. All we need is a government that protects our life, liberty, and property. If we want the government to do anything else, it will eventually enslave us.
Tax neutrality makes sense... (Score:1)
Of course, the rational thing to do would be to have flat taxes for everything and abolish all sales taxes. Then its just a matter of some simple payroll deducations. No tax forms, etc...
Re:Tax neutrality makes sense... (Score:1)
logan
Say Good-Bye to the Good Life... (Score:1)
The tax issue back then (1994ish) was a big enough issue for me to change my intended purchase. If all future purchases are going to be taxed, will it have any effect on e-commerce? Will e-comm lose its glamour? Can I order from Dell Germany without paying taxes? I suppose not
If I suddenly have to pay sales tax on my purchases from Amazon, the prices are no longer competitve (especially when shipping charges are added in).
Internet Taxation. (Score:3)
1. Tracking things on the internet can be a pain in the arse. Just ask the NSA - even echelon can't keep up (and that's only searching for *very* specific things).
2. The US cannot dictate international law. The internet is a *global communications network*. Almost a billion people world-wide have access to it. Unless you can convince every country that uses the internet to follow your law, you're leaving a gaping-huge-i-can-drive-a-mac-truck-through-this hole in any legislation on the subject.
3. Two words: Tax Evasion.
4.
--
Re:Internet Taxation. (Score:2)
I know it's more than 2 things listed up there, so don't flame me about it. I was kinda rushed.
4. Enforceability. There aren't any technical ways to track usage across the entire internet. The only way this would be feasible would be by forcing ISPs to disclose personal information, and/or taxing them directly with their monthly bill. You can't do it individually, there's just too much overhead.
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It really needs a tax (Score:2)
A lot of people say "But you have to pay shipping! That makes it even!" and they'll probably say it now, so I'll dispell that right now. It's not the same thing. Suppose there were no taxes on anything. In this case, online shopping would not have this advantage. Then say a government comes along and decides they want to tax stuff. A brand new tax. Should they not tax online and mailorder retailers because they have to pay shipping? No, that would be stupid, because you'd essentially be subsidizing retailers who ship out of state and hurting brick-and-mortar stores. Shipping represents a real cost--the amount of effort and resources that go into producing and procuring whatever thingie you bought from buy.com is higher because they have to ship it. That's not true of the sales tax you pay at WalMart. That's an external cost. But I expect we'll see lots of this argument anyway.
That's not to say it's easy to have a tax or that we should have one right now. There is still some truth to the argument that it's a fledgling industry and might need protection till it gets on its feet (though this sort of protection tends to go on way longer than it's usually needed). Also, it would be pretty difficult to implement this kind of tax. It's only interstate commerce that we're concerned with, so Congress could do it, but that's a really big deal. It would take time. What rate do you charge? What counts as a taxable product? (the distinction between product and service is very fuzzy on the Internet).
Ok, just my musings. Feel free to shoot me down.
Re:Tax neutrality makes sense... (Score:1)
Re:Tax neutrality makes sense... (Score:2)
First let them collect sales taxes from LL Bean phone orders, and then I will gladly pay sales taxes on Amazon.
Re:Tax neutrality makes sense... (Score:1)
Re:Internet Taxation. (Score:2)
Well, it's not like it's some big mystery who the internet retailers are. If you want to keep your business a great big secret, you aren't going to owe much in taxes anyway, because your sales will be minimal.
2. The US cannot dictate international law. The internet is a *global communications network*. Almost a billion people world-wide have access to it. Unless you can convince every country that uses the internet to follow your law, you're leaving a gaping-huge-i-can-drive-a-mac-truck-through-this hole in any legislation on the subject.
Irrelevant. If you buy an item from overseas, it has to come in through Customs, at which point the government can hold it up at will.
3. Two words: Tax Evasion.
Jeff Bezos, call your office. We may have a winner here. You'll be able to completely avoid paying sales taxes despite [whatever the forthcoming legislation ends up being called], and all you'll need to do is to enmesh your company in a massive criminal conspiracy.
Internet Sales Tax? Eek. (Or maybe not). (Score:2)
But in the version we live in, sadly, this Tax is frowned upon because it would inevitably be used to fund more great things like a War on Everything, programs to support One-Legged Women With Attention-Deficit-Disorder Who Fear Elevators and therefore cannot ever be expected to work, etc etc.
Bottom line: broken, grossly bloated governments will never convince reasonable people to accept a new tax voluntarily regardless of its potential.
What are the taxes FOR? (Score:3)
Here's a breakdown of what taxes are used for currently in the US:
Sales taxes - supplying motorists with roads, parking lots, and ambulance service so they can get to The Mall.
Property taxes - supplying homeowners with police and fire protection, so no one will steal the cars that people need to get to The Mall.
Income taxes - paying for a huge army to keep gas cheap so people can get to The Mall
Internet taxes - ?
As far as I can tell from reading articles on this panel, the main impetus seems to be to raise taxes so that internet shopping will not be cheaper than going to The Mall.
Out of line (Score:1)
Fine, but what the government fails to realize is that "in person" transactions are exactly that. You appear in person and pay for the item as well as the tax _in person_. Therefore, you drive on roads, walk through cities, and send your kids to school--All things legitimate for taxes. When you buy online, you are not there. You may be buying from "Littletown" California, but you are not there. You are not using that place's resources, and most of all, not using anything that requires tax dollars.
Keeping this in mind, it is arrogant and greedy for people to feel entitled to tax those transactions. For what reasons? Because localities need the revenue? A fine and legitimate argument formulated during a time when the only way to buy was in person. Therefore, taxing a budding industry with no just cause is outlandish. What is funding this panel? Tax Dollars. Has the panel been able to accomplish anything other than squabbling? No. How about giving the wasted "tax committee" money to some localities that say they are starving for it?
-Clump
Re:It really needs a tax (Score:2)
As I stated before, this matter is being looked at by the same standards an "in person" transaction is looked at. The two are not the same, one requires tax dollars to work and the other does not, and no good justification for online taxes has yet been presented.
-Clump
Re:Internet Taxation. (Score:1)
Of course, this only makes sense (as pointed out elsewhere on this thread) if they can define product vs. service and the associated tax rates AND make the code consistent across the telephone and mail-order industries as well.
Re:What are the taxes FOR? (Score:1)
Remember that in most states, you're supposed to pay a "usage tax" on items ordered via mail or phone from another state equal to the sales tax you would have paid in your home state. Not that anyone ever does this, but that's the way the laws are written.
Why? Because it would be a heavy burden on the merchant to collect taxes at 50+ different rates and then send timely payments and proper forms to all of the states (and in some cases, counties or cities) that want the tax revenue. Hence, the merchant is only required to collect taxes in states where they have a physical presence.
Re:What are the taxes FOR? (Score:1)
Mail order wasn't taxed this way because it simply didn't generate enough business and current Internet sales still aren't very big, but it's growing by leaps and bounds.
--
Tax are good and necessary (yes) (Score:1)
Now the common answer is "but state services are loosy, and cost so much". That's wrong : they are loosy because you don't pay enough tax. You get what you pay for. The loosiest the service is, the more people whine at tax and the lower the tax are, and the loosier the service becomes because of budget shortage, and so on... up to the point where the US are : low tax (yes people : look in Europe before complaining), loosy state service, private company payed by citizen to do the governement job (private school, militia, etc...). Instead of tax, you receive bills - but in the end you end up paying for the sames services again. You still loose something : democracy. CEOs are NOT elected, they don't work for the customers, they work for the shareholders.
Re:It really needs a tax (Score:3)
So many Libertarians on Slashdot! (you are a libertarian, right?) Sometimes they tax things just so that they can increase the big-pile-of-money-that-disappears-every-year.
Re:What are the taxes FOR? (Score:1)
-Bruce
Greedy bureaucrats... (Score:1)
Can't you see it ?
"Gee , we have to move to Aruba, they're going to start taxing us here."
Re:"Mail order" vs. "Internet Purchases" (Score:1)
However, I do agree with your final statement regarding taxing interstate transactions. The states clearly can't tax this type of thing (constitution explicitly prohibits states taxing trade across their borders). As you said,
The very nature of the internet resists regulation, restriction, and censorship. Any attempt at any of these will have to fight a very up hill battle. If a government is going to operate at all, it does have to collect some taxes and tariffs, but taxing everything is not the right thing. Other ahenglanderhem countries have gone down the road of taxing anything and everything to the point of ridiculousness ahemciderahem before, and shit came down. Any person who has some common sense and does not have a vested interest in government getting bigger can tell you that it is better and more reasonable to work on cutting crap out of the current budget[1] than it is to just keep on taxing things more and more. If you think about it a bit, taxes are probably (I am in no way an economist...) a significant cost of inflation. Tax goods, their price goes up, so people need to be paid more so that they can afford things. Tax incomes more, same result. Tax businesses more and they need to raise the price of their goods to maintain their profit margin. Tax property, and people need more income to pay for it. Etc. ad nauseam.
[1] 'crap' not including funding for schools, medicare/aid, sceience grants, NASA, etc., but most definitely including making the military budget more reasonable. While multi-billion dollar NASA projects are a bit excessive, NASA has shown that it can make things more economical wit ha smaller budget. Now give them their money back and watch them flourish! I would wager that the vast majority of technological advancements in the last 30 years or so have been greatly affected (positively) by NASA, if not driven entirely by them.
Wow, that rant diverged from where it started a long ways!
Re:Out of line (Score:1)
1. a tax on all internet purchases, at the same rate, regardless of weight, distance, size, or speed of delivery?
2. A tax on brown uniform shirts
3. A tax on fuel, or a road toll that charges for each mile that UPS drives, adjusted for vehicle size. Taxes on aviation fuel, and landing fees to pay for airports if overnight shipping is used. Taxes on property where goods are stored, going to local police forces and fire protection.
(hint: if in doubt, choose the longest answer)
Time to move (Score:1)
Would a VAT make more sense? (Score:1)
You don't have to dig too deeply (Score:1)
Re:Tax are good and necessary (yes) (Score:1)
The difference is with a private company, if their service is lousy I can switch to a different company. When you get government involved in things like schools where the budget has tripled in the past 20 years (so it's getting more money, not less) and the service is getting worse, what do you do? Pay your tax on a school you won't use and have to pay for a private school or should we have a choice to pay for one or the other? The purpose of government is to protect it's people from other governments. Therefore, we should support things like the military but not things like welfare, schooling, etc. If you reduce competition (like government does) you reduce quality (see Microsoft)
Taxes are bad. Period. (Score:1)
So even if a 1/3 tax is low, it is still *way* too high of a tax. You want money to build roads, charge a toll. Don't go taxing something else for it. You want money to improve the internet, then tax the internet. But if you're not buying routers and pipelines, leave the system alone.
--TANSTAAFL
better off (Score:1)
1) taxes aren't supposed to be about equality, nor about fairness per se.. They're supposed to be about funding the government's actions. Now, taxes should be levied fairly, naturally...
2) Current taxes *are* levied fairly... it's just that a state has questionable authority to levy sales tax on a transaction that doesn't clearly occur between two people/bodies within the state. After all.. it's not a business that's being taxed, it's a transaction. The state just collects from the business when the time comes...
3) Consumers are better off, at least for now, with mail/phone/internet orders being free of sales tax. This is because these kinds of transactions give much less of a competitive advantage to large corporations. The little guy can make a buck selling directly... but that might not be the case if additional taxes are levied, making internet orders more expensive than buying from the local mall. This hurts consumers because they lose choice, in two ways:
a) fewer retailers mean less competition (and more government yoke when the hounds of DOJ harass the remaining retailers. see WalMart, Barnes&Noble)
b) fewer small retailers mean less choice of product, because small retailers are more likely to have a diverse selection, especially of specialty items that big stores refuse to touch.
Tax atoms based on point-of-delivery. (Score:1)
zoning vs budget.. what a quandry for the cities!
Re:slight clarification (Score:1)
The catalog sales approach seems to be much closer to the flavor of e-commerce, and seems to be a far more suitable model of how e-commerce should be treated.
Businesses collect sales tax.. not consumers (Score:1)
(though I wouldn't mind a few of Jeb Bush's supporters replacing the voters of San Francisco
Re:Out of line (Score:1)
What? Do you think the product you've ordered from location X just vaporizes and appears on your doorstep?
Even at the most basic level - someone has to bring you your precious little gadget - probably on a truck over public roads. The police/fire/health professionals in location X still need to do their job, protecting your precious little gadget both before and after you buy it, and be compensated accordingly.
Tax atoms based on point-of-delivery. (Score:1)
Some people will live in wellfurbished communities, buy a lot of stuff, and pay for it. Some will live in poor or privatized communities; their taxes will be low. (Some people will set up delivery sites in low-tax neighborhoods; this happens with bricks-and-mortar stores too, but is usually less important than convenience.)
Some people will live in nice places but have lower loads on services. If I buy an immaterial object and have it sent over the wire, I'm making so much less load on local services that it's fair not to tax me - it would, in general, be good for many places if luxury spending weren't on physical objects. (Besides, these would be incredibly hard to track, so let's not.)
Re:It really needs a tax (Score:1)
And it's not as if UPS doesn't pay taxes for these services (airport fees, fuel taxes) and doesn't pass them along to the shipper (who in turn passes them along to guess who).
buy.com doesn't use big chunks of Internet funded by the government
Ancient history -- the bulk of Internet bandwidth is commercial these days.
The main advantage is that you could lower taxes on other things (not that this would necessarily happen).
That's an understatement! "Raise tax X so that the government can lower tax Y" has so little credibility that it makes "The check's in the mail", "I gave at the office", and "I'll still respect you in the morning" look like eternal verities.
/.
Re:It really needs a tax (Score:1)
That pile of money is going to keep disappearing, year after year, as long as it keeps getting replenished by taxation. Please do not feed the bears.
Re:Tax neutrality makes sense... (Score:1)
Certainly, expecting small-scale Internet retailers to keep track of every state and local tax system is preposterous on its face.
Prediction: If you dig, you'll find that much of the support for this notion comes from established Big Business interests, up to the old trick of using government regulations to squash competition. (Regulations favor large businesses because the relative cost of compliance is smaller for them -- and the more complex the regulations the bigger the advantage for someone who can afford to hire specialists to wade through the red tape.)
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Re:It really needs a tax (Score:1)
To that I will say very good point. I somewhat disagree about the UPS, as they pay taxes on the resources they consume regardless of how the transaction was conceived. Using the Internet that was funded by the government is a very valid point. However, it was not stated that such funding would be reimbursed through an "Internet Tax". If any political body should have a say in whether there should be a tax or not it should be the organizations that funded the Internet, not something newly-formed and unrelated to the subject.
As to me being a Libertarian or not--I am not. I have not even purchased a single thing online and not once benefited from not paying a tax. I do, however, value my rights and the rights of others. I have no problem paying taxes, however this tax is rediculous and I can see the negative implications if this were to come to fruition.
-Clump
Re:It really needs a tax (Score:2)
Re:What are the taxes FOR? (Score:1)
--Corey
Re:Tax neutrality makes sense... (Score:1)
And then there's the Trekkie's "Taste of Armegeddon" logic: If we made tax painless, people wouldn't gripe about it enough, and there would never be any hope of it ever stopping (unless Captain Kirk beamed down and refused to pay his taxes).
Re:It really needs a tax (Score:1)
2c (Score:1)
Who wants the tax (Score:1)
"The lost revenue is going to be made up by the consumer at some point," said William McCabe Jr., chairman of the International Council of Shopping Centers, a trade organization for the shopping center industry.
Re:Tax are good and necessary (yes) (Score:1)
-Malachi-
Re:Tax are good and necessary - normally (Score:2)
I'll agree with you - normally taxes serve a useful purpose by funding services that the community needs. I think what confuses people in the debate over sales tax on Internet purchases is that there isn't a specific service that would be funded by the tax that isn't already funded by another tax. If you look at the components of a purchase over the Internet, amazon.com pays local taxes and UPS pays local taxes as well as transport taxes (gas tax, weight penalties, etc). Your connection to amazon.com is paid for in the Internet connection fees that you and amazon.com pay. These fees are loosely related to the amount of traffic the two of you generate. If any of these components don't generate enough revenue to pay for what they use ('net backbone, local law enforcement, interstate highways) then those taxes should be increased, or the level of service lowered.
If I actually went to the amazon.com warehouse (wherever it is) to get my book I would expect roads, law enforcement, and emergency 911 services over the course of my trip. Theoretically that's what local sales tax pays for, right? So far I haven't read a better explanation. If I'm buying over the Internet, I don't need these services, so charging me a separate local sales tax doesn't make sense. Increasing the taxes on the components of my online purchase (warehousing, shipping, and 'net connection) does make sense, because even an online purchase does use resources and must be paid for. I think more people here would support the idea if it were explained that way. As it is, it seems like states are trying to replace the exact amount of money they are losing in local sales, rather than looking more closely at what happens during an online purchase.
Re:Here's why (Score:1)
-Malachi-
just tax what you use (Score:2)
It's not really the exact same transaction, though, because you didn't actually visit amazon.com (or wherever). If you had been there in person, you would have expected roads, law enforcement, etc. and you would have paid local sales tax for them. But if you aren't there, you don't need those things. So why should you pay for them?
On the other hand, you did use more bandwidth than you would have if you had gone in person. So you can eventually expect to pay more for your 'net connection, as can your online retailer. There's also shipping costs and amazon.com's local costs, which are taxed and may increase the sale price of your book. But if the 'net is the only infrastructure that you personally are using, then that is the only thing you should be taxed for.
There are costs to a transaction either way, but it would be better to slightly increase existing taxes which already pay for services, than create a new tax which isn't directly linked to a service provided to the community.
Re:Tax are good and necessary - normally (Score:1)
Re:It really needs a tax (Score:1)
Already paid for by taxes on fuel, airplane tickets and income, respectively.
The part of the Internet actually funded by the government is a small fraction of what's in use today. Not to mention that Uncle Sam got out of the Internet business a few years back, so they're not putting any more cash into it.
There is simply no good reason that Internet commerce should be taxed any differently than any other commerce.
--
Re:Out of line (Score:1)
There already exists a tax system that pays for all of what you mentioned. The people who bring me my gadget pay taxes regardless of the medium, and we all pay taxes for the roads.
My problem with this is there has been no good justification. The tax system is already in place and further taxation would be charging two times on the same product. Further, this matter is being decided by everyone but the correct authorities.
-Clump
Re:What are the taxes FOR? (Score:1)
Then what are gas taxes for? Recently, local gas stations stopped posting the amount of tax that made up the price per gallon of gas. This is worrisome, since raising this tax would be almost invisible to the average consumer - most people would assume that it's just a sporadic increase in the price of gas.
Re:It really needs a tax (Score:2)
Um, that's the point. It's not taxed like any other form of commerce.
Re:It really needs a tax (Score:2)
As I said earlier, our disagreement is probably more fundamental than can be argued out. I don't think taxes need to have a specific justification (though I certainly see the problems this creates!)
And you're probably right about those examples; they (especially the internet one) weren't that great.
But I have a question: Does UPS have to pay any kind of transactional tax that would justify it's use of the Interstates in the hypothetical pay-for-what-you-get taxation system? (i.e. something besides a corporate income tax) I can't really remember.
"Mail order" vs. "Internet Purchases" (Score:2)
Exactly how does one make the distinction? I have made numerous purchases involving the Internet, but in most case, the actual transaction involves the telephone or snail-mail.
Examples:
In each of these cases, the sale certainly involves the Internet, if only to make me aware of the existence of the company I'm doing business with. But in each case, the distinction becomes blurred as to whether it was really an "Internet sale", or merely standard mail order that took advantage of the net as an advertising medium.
Unless .gov is willing to tax all interstate transactions - period - there are simply too many exceptions and borderline cases to make this a sensible law.
Re:It really needs a tax (Score:1)
It would be far easier to just wrap a tax onto the Shipping side of things, but then UPS, FedEx et al will get all hot and bothered.
Taxing the shipping of real goods makes sense (in the historical model). Taxing the trade of bits? The sales tax I pay at my local Wal-Mart is ostensibly to pay back the municipality for the services provided to that Wal-Mart. Perhaps it needs to be done that way.
Besides, even with our funky cable modems and xDSL, our bits are already being taxed. So we, the end-user, don't see the line-item on our bill, but it's figured into our cost...
Also, shipping is where the on-line co's wrap some of their profit margin, too. Not everyone will live at the distance from the retailer where it actually does cost $5.00 to send a memory SIMM. So they charge a flat price for shipping...