Friday, November 25, 2011

Making Online Retailers Pay Taxes

As you know, the state of California is facing some serious fiscal challenges in its budget. One item the state government decided to go after was online retailers such as Amazon. Why? Those companies have not been paying state sales taxes for purchases made online. Some predictions put the amount of uncollected taxes on e-commerce around this country at $12 billion! Many states are pushing e-commerce companies to pony up. Other states are opting not to do much about it.

Would you support a federal law on e-commerce companies? Do you believe that e-commerce companies should pay sales taxes at all? You do understand who will probably pay higher prices as a result of states enforcing these tax rules, right?

4 comments:

  1. Alex Abbott
    p.2

    I think that paying taxes on online goods is a good idea to help lower California's debt. i would support it. We already pay sales tax on the same goods that we would buy at the store so i do not see a problem with having to do it online for the same products.

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  2. hey bauer its Olivia period2..
    i dont really care much much about the issue personally because i do not shop on line. but i agree with Alex, that you should even pay sales tax online if companies require it at a regular store. however, those people who do shop online, which is a lot due to online supply of medicine, groceries, and other essentials,will be paying even a higher amount on what they already are paying so much for. i guess if its that much more convenient for them, customers wouldn't mind spending a little more.

    Olivia French

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  3. I am completely against the sales tax for online stores. As an online consumer, shipping costs is already an issue, why add sales tax to that? Some internet retailers have already done so and it affects business. Retailers like Amazon and eBay also have individual sellers who sell through their websites. It would be much too hard to tax everything going through those websites and would devastate the businesses and lose consumers as well as providers of goods through individual sale. Believe me when I say online consumers mind paying an extra dollar for shipping, how well do you think it would go over with a full 8% sales tax? The reason why these companies don't participate in sales tax is because it will be bad for their businesses. I fully support them for that and will gladly continue using their services.

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  4. Even though i don't buy things online often, i have before and the prices are not surprisingly lower. The only difference is that when you order things online, the shipping is what sets it overboard. However, if the company was to give a share of what they earn from the shipping costs then wouldn't that be similar to the tax. I'm not against it, but i do think that consumers would mind. On the other hand, it shouldn't be an exception because things are being purchased online, your buying the same brands that are sold at the store the only difference is you don't pay taxes and that's not fair to the economy. If it will help lower the debt, WHY NOT? After all, aren't we on some sort of crisis in California?

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