The Patrick administration is pressing Amazon.com Inc. to begin collecting sales taxes from Massachusetts customers as early as next year, arguing it is no longer exempt under federal law from charging the tax.
Under federal law, online retailers do not have to collect sales taxes from Massachusetts buyers unless the company has a physical presence, such as an office or store, in the state. But officials in the administration of Governor Deval Patrick contend that Amazon’s purchase of a North Reading technology firm, Kiva Systems, earlier this year, as well as its ongoing efforts to recruit engineers for a new office in Cambridge, establish the kind of physical presence necessary to collect the 6.25 percent sales tax.
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Deval wants more sales taxes to help pay for illegal immigrant state college tuition. When that provrs insufficient, h will raise general sales taxes, the state income tax, gas taxes, and increase highway tolls. Just tax the poor and the middle class.
All that means is i shift my camera purchases from Amazon to B&H photo, and there is always tax free New Hampshire, or in my case Delaware.
You still owe the tax, it's just not enforceable since there is no practical way to pursue every consumer.
Massachusetts prods Amazon to collect sales taxes and kill affiliate program
http://offonatangent.blogspot.com/2012/11/massachusetts-prods-amazon-to-collect.html
USE TAX: Honest tax paying citizens already pay
WHAT ABOUT SMALL BUSINESS: Amazon Tax Will Hurt Small Business
If Stevegarfeild makes money as an affiliate for Amazon and is worried about losing business, then he should disclose this and give us a real argument about why all states shouldn't be banning together to collect sales tax that people owe when they purchase goods. Companies and their affiliates who sell goods online facilitate people' ability and willingness to evade taxes. Its not OK to evade taxes and not pay your share to help the community. If you buy something, you gotta pay tax. You don't have to like it. But, it's necessary. There might even be another fairness argument because people who are poor and don't have access to credit cards or computers can't get their goods online, tax free and, thus, can't get the same deals as others. So the poorest people can't get the tax break that relatively wealthier people don't pay. And why is CUSTOMER BASE not used as a basis for established business?
Patrick, like most Democrats never saw a tax he didn't like. Now if he said that it would be used to pay down the state debt a lot of people could get on board.
Term Limits NOW!!!!! Time to get rid of these career political hacks.
Spend and tax thats all they are good for. Deval decides to educate the illegals at the real or eventual expense of the tax payer and then tries to collect from Amazon.
So let me get this straight Deval screw the citizens that belong here as well as a multi billion dollar company and reward the ILLEGAL immigrants that are VIOLATING the law. Way to go stupid!
Why don't I just give my paycheck to an ILLEGAL immigrant in person. Atleast then I can know the person I am supporting.
One more thought Deval. If you insist on getting taxes from Amazon, I insist on adopting PAYGO in Massachusetts.
How are term limits relevant to this discussion?
sorry deval...not going to happen. Perhaps if this contributed to the state debt like someone said below. However, Amazon....I buy books through you....do not comply with this tax crap. Otherwise, you will not see me any more.
The figure cited for lost taxes, $387 million, is presposterous. If you do the math, that means there are $6.2 billion (with a "B") of untaxed online sales in MA. No way - many online merchants do collect sales tax. So the $6.2B would have to be from only those online merchants who don't. It's not a credible figure, but it's reported as if it is.
What is next ? Custom Houses at the borders to collect taxes for out of state purchases ? IF Amazon or another Internet company collects any taxes, it ought to be a national sales tax of 2 or 3% to reduce the deficit.
Dell already collects sales taxes for their online transactions. Indiana and Pennsylvania already have passed laws to enforce collection of sales taxes for online transactions, citing (correctly) that the tax is owed and they are seeking a means to enforce compliance with existing law. Eventually the Supreme Court will revisit this issue. Border inspections are unlikely not because there isn't a desire to thwart going out of state to make purchases but because there is no budget to fund such an operation. Food and clothing in MA are tax-exempt, so you might want to make those purchases in MA, and hope that there are no border guards in VT waiting for you. Sales taxes have always been the domain of the states, so I don't expect a national VAT to fly anytime soon. If anything, we might see large blocks of states agreeing to a standard sales tax rate so as to simplify cross-border (including internet) transactions.
This is another reminder of what we should remember when Patrick leaves office; Tell your congressman not to vote for any nomination for a federal position. This man has done everything to leave constituents here in Ma. with a disrespect and bad feelings about his pathetic decision making abilities.Ya get what ya deserve when ya vote stupidly.
The state is suffering with a serious deficit situation, particularly with roads and the T. The can was kicked down the road by "no tax" administrations and money was borrowed to cover costs, resulting in higher debt. As for immigrants, its pay now or pay more later for welfare and healthcare or prisons due to the complete failure and inadequacy of the federal immigration system.
Amazon should not comply. There is no need for any more taxes. Patrick only needs more taxes to pay for his incompetence and mismanagment of this State. He should pay the cost of mismanagment out of his own pocket. An administration run by bozos.
I hope Amazon moves there office out of Massachussetts and tells the Governor they will not be billing for the usurious taxes charged by this state.
Or rate was supposed to be no higher than 5% and our brilliant legislators and Governors decided they needed to make us even less competitive by tacking on another point and a quarter.
Fight this Amazon.
"Fair"? This isn't about fairness. It's about confiscation of a private company's earnings in exchange for nothing whatsoever. Patrick and this so-called Main Street group claim Amazon is now a Massachusetts presence because they bought a company. Fine, they'll just sell the company, or else relocate it to New Hampshire--done.
Let's try encouraging businesses to come here instead of pouncing on them like mosquitoes hungry for blood. More jobs and general prosperity are reasonable goals-- why is it so hard for these Democrats to understand?
"confiscation of a private company's earnings"? Huh? No, they add the tax price onto the price of the sales item. The tax amount ten goes to the individual state. It doesn't come out of the company's earnings, just the way it doesn't come out of the local bricks and mortar company's earnings. Will adding the tax amount drive away some business? Maybe, but I think Amazon will do just fine. They still have very low prices, so people will still shop there. It's only a matter of time until every state gets on board with this relatively new taxing issue.
If the state is successful in efforts to collect sales tax from out-of-state internet retailers, will we see a reduction in the "safe harbor" amount of use tax charged on our tax returns?
I wish the Patrick administration put as much diligence into how money is being spent, and how agencies are overseen, as they do in looking for new revenue streams. This would never work in the private sector where continually raising prices to cover up for poor management and inefficiencies would lead to a company eventually going out of business. Only in the public sector, which is tantamount to a monopoly with no competition for service providers, can you get away with this. It's just a flat out lazy way to manage. Deval's a bright, charismatic speaker but I don't think he has any interest in the inner workings of his administration.
So the State has finally realized that most of the residents are buying goods on line and they are losing revenue? So if I understand this correctly MA wants to collect more revenue and is also talking about raising taxes once again. In the interim the state is not bringing in as much dollars it once was and to make up the deficit they raise the sales tax 20%, they raise other fees, charge the businesses that are located in MA more to do business. The brick and mortar businesses have been screaming about this for years. The problem is it's not just amazon it's many other internet businesses that are sucking the dollars from the state because the people that actually work for a living are tired of the state continuosly reaching deeeper and deeper into their pockets while the state funds ebt and welfare fraud and patronage hires like the MA Highway Safety Director for $87k per year. I am appalled at what my State has become.