I know that Neil covered this in passing, but I wanted to highlight this situation. Background: last year Illinois (read, Illinois Democrats, led by Democratic Governor Pat Quinn) decided to try to force Amazon.com to start collecting sales tax on purchases made by Illinois residents*. Arguments were made at the time that this was a futile gesture, given that Amazon.com would simply end its affiliate | Read More »
The can has been kicked for another year. Lawmakers on Friday sent Gov. Jerry Brown a compromise bill that delays California’s effort to force online retailers such as Amazon.com to collect the state’s sales taxes while retailers lobby Congress for national rules governing online sales taxes. Essentially, California legislators passed a bill earlier this year that ‘exploited’ a loophole in federal case law that would | Read More »
(Full disclosure: I am an Amazon.com Affiliate for Maryland.) Glenn Reynolds noted this apparent contradiction in what Tennessee Governor Bill Haslam’s position actually is with regard to having Amazon.com collect sales tax: is the Republican Governor for it, or against it? I say ‘apparent’ because there isn’t one, really; there’s just not enough context. Basically, the position that Haslam is taking is that the state | Read More »
(Full disclosure: I am an Amazon.com Affiliate for Maryland.) It’s still in the early stages – the Governor has started the paperwork process and Comptroller for Maryland Peter Franchot supports the idea – but the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result, and goodness knows that the Democrats keep doing precisely that when it comes | Read More »
It got overshadowed by recent events both foreign and domestic, but last week Governor Pat Quinn (D, IL) signed legislation declaring that in-state affiliates for online sellers count as ‘a physical presence’ in Illinois, thus theoretically allowing the state to require those online sellers to collect sales tax information. This is usually called the ‘Amazon tax*,’ as it is largely aimed at Amazon.com**. This is | Read More »
[UPDATE: 'Amazon tax laws,' for those who are wondering, represent attempts to get around a Supreme Court ruling regarding out-of-state transactions. Residents of states who have a sales tax are theoretically expected to pay sales tax on all transactions, not just ones that take place in-state: however, vendors with out-of-state customers have long taken the position that trying to keep track of every jurisdiction's sales | Read More »
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