Suppliers (wholesalers) and manufacturers do not collect sales taxes. They only sell to holders of resale certificates.
Sales taxes apply only to retail sales.
Correct.
And when I buy “wholesale” from a for-real wholesaler who doesn’t want to collect sales tax, I have to show my retail sales tax cert #, or go find a retailer who will do the collection of the sales tax.
There’s a plumbing supply place in town where I do a lot of business. They’ll sell to homeowners and DIY repair folks, but the actual sale of the parts has to go through a plumber. My plumbing shop calls over to the wholesaler, tells them I’m coming over, I pick up the part, the plumber bills me their wholesale price on the item, plus sales tax, and I do the plumbing.
Didn’t mean to ignore your reply. What you are saying in consumer goods does apply but many major markets that have expanded reach by the internet do supply items through wholesale and manufacturing outlets that do require tax be applied by the wholesaler — my industry, construction, is a good example. To avoid tax being applied to the entire cost of a finished structure, most or the time sales tax has to be paid by all suppliers for every material purchase.
When this was an extension of what was done for the mail-order business, which made up 3/4 of one percent of the retail market sales, it was a good thing to get a new market segment underway, but now internet sales make up 5.2% of all retail sales and when you balance that against cars, gas, groceries and other items that don’t have a significant market on the interstate internet, you have a much bigger percentage in the true examination.
My big concern is to eliminate excuses for new taxe types and new tax rates, this modest change for something that never had an official exemption and keeps the tax at the State level meets that concern for me.