California warns companies they may owe use tax

LA Times ^ | 12/29/08 | Marc Lifsher

[clamper1797]

Give it a couple of years and there won’t be any businesses in Calif to audit

[facedown]

California Board of Equalization

Downright Orwellian.

[rjsimmon]

Board of Equalization

Que?

Is there any wonder why this state is bankrupt?

[Lurker]

There's nothing "scary" about the letters, other than they come from a government tax agency, said Board of Equalization Chairwoman Betty Yee.

Nothing scary about a friendly letter from the Government backed up by the threat of force and imprisonment. Nothing scary at all.

L

[griswold3]

Maybe Kalifornia will do what Uncle Ted suggests here in OHio, use the Federal government to destroy business.
At least Uncle Ted understands ‘flight’!

[princess leah]

California has undercut itself on so many levels...All they need to do is DRILL HERE, DRILL NOW and start collecting the revenues that the oil off their shores would bring them! Stupid, Stupid politicians...SOmeone needs to run in California who would step up and call out the liberals and tell the PAYING PUBLIC how they can save their state!

[CodeToad]

In other words, it seems Kalifornia wants to collect taxes for purchases made in other States and brought into Kali for use there. This would seem to be violating federal law.

[jim_trent]

I wonder how e-Bay is going to handle this?

[N. Theknow]

Give it a couple of years and there won’t be any businesses in Calif to audit

Last recession, brought on once again by excessive government spending and taxes and someone who broke a certain promise about his lips, my company got a letter from the State of Connecticut congratulating us on surviving the "downturn" in the economy and advising us that our unemployment, business fee and workers' comp "contributions" were going up.

Moved the company at my first opportunity.

[Travis T. OJustice]

In other words, it seems Kalifornia wants to collect taxes for purchases made in other States and brought into Kali for use there. This would seem to be violating federal law.

Many states have similar provisions.

[savedbygrace]

California’s Use Tax is probably unConstitutional, violating Art I Sec 9. “No tax or Duty shall be laid on Articles exported from any State.”

But who has the resources to fight it?

[cicero2k]

I implemented a financial system for a publicly traded company in CA this year and yes, they set up a “use tax” feature called “self assessed tax” for vendors who fail to collect it. It’s then up to the Accounts Payable department to identify these invoices on a case by case. Forget anything paid with a company credit card. I doubt many small businesses are set up to do this. Yes they should fear the Board of Equalization. Love the name for that department.

C2K

[Aria]

You’d think there would be a lot more businesses moving to Oregon - no sales tax!

[Mr. Jeeves]

SOmeone needs to run in California who would step up and call out the liberals and tell the PAYING PUBLIC how they can save their state!

They have - and the paying public remains emphatically opposed to offshore drilling.

[mathurine]

I suppose the constitutionality of these “use taxes” which many states impose has been upheld, but it is, IMHO, no more than a disguised effort to restrain trade and unconstitutional on the face of it.

[Myrddin]

Just wait until they go after Amazon sales to residents of California. Amazon doesn't collect sales tax. Borders and Barnes & Noble have a "bricks and mortar" presence, so they are required to collect the tax.

[tvdog12345]

Ohio does that too. You pay the use tax on your state income tax return. You declare how much you bought over the Internet during the year and pay tax on it. Or else you don’t ;-).

[Myrddin]

Some states in the northeast have attempted to collect use taxes from shoppers who travel to an adjacent state, purchase clothing (paying sales tax in the state where the goods were sold) and returned to their home state. The bozos don't care that such commerce goes both ways.

[Mr. Lucky]

A friend of mine received a ticket from one of those automated traffic light camera thingies for running a traffic light in Long Beach. The notice essentially stated that he had failed to respond to prior summonses, that he had waived his right to appeal and he was obligated to fork over about $260, or else.

He had last been in California when he mustered out of the service about 40 years ago, but was terrified that the "ticket' would be given the same presumption of validity as if it had been written by a real live policeman.