Posted on 08/29/2011 12:36:49 AM PDT by LibWhacker
When it comes to avoiding the requirement of collecting sales tax from its consumers, Amazon is not afraid to open its wallet.
More than nine months before a proposed June 2012 referendum asking that California’s new Internet sales tax law be overturned, Amazon, the Seattle-based online retailer, has already spent $5.25 million, state records show, more than any company has spent in California this far from a vote in at least a decade.
“The initiative and referendum process have been hijacked,” said Loni Hancock, a state senator from Berkeley, who wrote the law Amazon is trying to overturn and who is now pushing legislation that could block Amazon’s referendum effort.
Even by California’s expensive campaign standards, the company’s early contributions are causing observers to take note.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
I live in the Socialist State of New York. My daughter has lived in Nevada for about 10 years. She started college 4 years ago there, and 2 years ago her laptop PC died. I told her to pick one out and we’d put it on my credit card. She went to the Dell store and picked one out and I paid for it with a credit card. Somehow New York State tracked down the sale and added 8-7/8% sales tax to it. This is on a PC that was manufactured in Nevada, sold through a store in Nevada and possessed by a resident of Nevada. The PC has never been out of the State of Nevada. There is nothing that New York State will not stoop to. Allowing states to do this is criminal.
Hang on. It’s not that simple.
You owe the tax regardless of whether or not the state can require the vendor to collect and remit the tax.
What Amazon and Overstock and, in some cases, Cabella are doing is asserting that they cannot be forced to collect and remit the tax the consumer owes and has owed for a long time. It’s called a compensating use tax.
BTW, the states aren’t “losing” tax revenues because of internet sales. They are getting mega taxes in the telecom services (think about all the new and taxable telecom services you buy every month) they never had before the advent of online shopping.
I would happily support sales tax enforcement of online purchases as soon as the states give up ridiculous telecom taxes.
Really great post.. very well said. States basically are nothing more than organized crime families, with the federals government, being the god father.
“What Amazon and Overstock and, in some cases, Cabella are doing is asserting that they cannot be forced to collect and remit the tax the consumer owes and has owed for a long time.”
Some people miss that fact - the sales tax is owed by the purchaser, not the company selling the goods. The states want to force companies to be their agent, without paying compensation. I don’t know what the definition of slavery is, but if I forced you, with threats and at the point of a gun, to tend my garden without your consent and without paying you, that seems like slavery to me.
She is married with children and grandchildren.
You both should not be calling her bull dyke, mealy mouthed bitch, talking about a woman's back end.
You two are nasty, foul, vulgar.
Shame
Makes me ashamed that I ever voted republican.
PDS is pretty contagious. Maybe one of your posts shared some electrons with another poster.
Wrap that rascal to prevent the spread of the disease.
Typical Slimes spin too. “If they have millions to spend lobbying against this, why don’t they just pay the tax for the good of the American People?”
Can I condemn her for using government force (backed up with guns) to extract money so she doesn’t miss her fix of spending other peoples money?
So that makes her a thug with enforcers. Is that a softer more compassionate analysis of her?
All we are asking is that they collect and remit their fair share of taxes, like everyone else.
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“FAIR SHARE.” The new code word for communism. Notice over the past 2 years all we hear is sharing, fair share, fairness, etc.
“From each according to their ability to each according to their needs.”
Kind of sounds like Socialism/Communism doesn’t it?
I ordered a Dell laptop 2 years ago, and the Texas guy on the other line charged me a $25 “green environmental” fee for being in mexifornia. I asked what the heck was that idiotic fee and he explained that all SCREENS’ on a TV et al are subject to this tax. You could hear it on his voice that he felt sorry for being in this state. I even asked him if it’s possible to waive the stupid fee.
Yee Gods! I hope you wrote that as sarcasm, because I Do Not OWE anyone any tax. This run away government and states are putting taxes on top of taxes on top of taxes.
I voted. I did not buy from them. There are other ways. I still got my goods, I just got it from a different place and I did not pay tax, and I paid a lower price, and I paid less shipping. I voted with my check book.
If there is a way around taxes I will find it, and so will anyone else that makes their own money. The new and blooming economy in the US is the underground economy, it is flourishing, and will continue to do so. There are many options to doing business than with a tax supervised store. Much of the economy in this area is barter. I trade garden product for things I want.
I will mow and bale the road side grass then sell it to a horse person for cash. I gave a guy $200 for an old truck he had. I fixed it, now it runs. I will trade it to someone else for guns or something I want. He will have to tag it and insure it, not me. But I will gain and there will be no tax. Thats the way we roll.
“The initiative and referendum process have been hijacked by a company that hasn't paid us protection money,” howled Loni Hancock, a state senator government thug and shakedown artist from Berkeley, who wrote the law revenue-theft language Amazon is trying to overturn...
When I want some government criminal's opinion about something, I'll beat it out of them with a baseball bat.
She misspelled "Repeal of Tax Theft Referendum"....
Isn't the State of California a "multi-billion dollar Fascist protection racket & RICO conspiracy"?
That's "commie thug bull dyke, mealy mouthed Fascist bitch who won't bother to familiarize her stupid Fascist ass with the First Amendment and Declaration of Independence PRECISELY because she's a totalitarian Big Government Statist who loves ripping off the peasants and companies who won't pay 'government protection money' at gunpoint" to you, Esther Ruth.
I’ve been an indirect tax specialist for 15+ years, and your elected representatives (apparently, since I don’t know what state you’re in) voted in a sales and use tax scheme. I don’t know what state you’re in, but if your purchase would have been subject to sales tax had it been transacted in your state, if you knowingly do not file a use tax return to report the tax on items you imported or had imported into the state and on which you have not paid a sales or use tax to another jurisdiction, you legally owe the tax.
The same is true for barter. Just because you bartered for a transaction does not mean there are no tax consequences, although your state may have an exemption for an “occasional” sale.
What you are describing is using cash and the internet to *evade* taxation. Evade = illegal.
While I am 100% behind tax reduction, I am not for violating the law to evade paying what is legally due. I am for the legalization of some controlled substances. That doesn’t mean I support criminals who sell the stuff illegally.
Lol, thank you.
Sheesh, I’ve been gored by a RINO. Will somebody tell it that Hillary is also married with children, but that doesn’t stop her being the biggest bulldozer on the block?
I wonder if individuals will be next? Our tax preparer first asked us about our internet purchases last year. Told us that Kalifornia law now requires her to ask her clients about them, declare what they've bought and pay the sales taxes on them, which we did.
Exactly! The Founding Fathers were 100% in favor of paying legally due taxes to whatever lawless, Despotic thug or Fascistic government happened to have the whip hand at the time...
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