Sales Tax

@therealjrn not just for me; I'm sure I'm not the only person who would benefit.

I'd estimate that for 95% of my purchases, I don't have to think about whether or not I have to pay sales/use tax. Not sure where you live but in PA, sales tax is the responsibility of the vendor, so that's just what I'm used to.

Is this not the case in other states? I know that some staffer who read this rolled his/her eyes and said 'no', but I'm surprised to see this reaction from others.

@brendino Use Tax is not the responsibility of the seller, it is on the buyer. You're confusing it with Sales Tax. If a retailer has a brick and mortar presence (store, offices, etc) in any given State THEN it is on them to charge Sales Tax. What "reaction" are you so surprised about?

@therealjrn I understand that use tax and sales tax are different things. But use tax doesn't exist in a vacuum; it's only applicable when sales taxes aren't present or have lower rates than your home state's sales tax, so they're very much linked. If I was charged a sales tax here I wouldn't have to pay a use tax.

Your reaction was negative, Agamemnon treated me with ridicule, with Negative Cat close behind. It surprises me that people would feel that way.

@brendino Negative? Where did you see a negative response? I offered a helpful tip and some clarification on just who's problem it was. I'm as up for a spurious internet argument as the next guy but just because somebody doesn't accept your interpretation does not make it negative. It just makes it different.

It seems you're spoiling for some sort of argument here--I'm not taking the bait. If you are refusing to accept your responsibility in filing your taxes accurately I can not help you. But I am not going to argue with you. Cheers!

@therealjrn

You need help for your six purchases? You want meh to calculate everybody's sales tax all over so you can have your six purchases' tax figured in?

I'm not sure how to interpret that statement as positive, neutral, or helpful. Text-based communication can be really bad at conveying context so I'd be happy to have some more context, but I take "You need help for your six purchases?" as belittling and "You want meh..." to be a kind of absurd take on what I'm trying to say.

I don't need help...but it'd be nice! Do I need my employer to withhold income taxes? No, but it's helpful and I appreciate it!

Would I want Meh (or any online retailer) to do everybody's sales tax for solely my benefit? Of course not! I think everyone who has to pay a use tax would benefit as well, because then they wouldn't have to pay a use tax on purchases from this site.

At this point I'm more interested in coming to a mutual understanding of what we're taking about here than arguing online for the sake of it (because I don't like doing that).

If you are refusing to accept your responsibility in filing your taxes accurately

This is what I'm not understanding. If I'm charged a sales tax, I no longer have a use tax responsibility to accept. I'm not asking Meh to fill out my use tax form for me. So, it's not about shirking responsibility, it's about transferring responsibility. It's just a feature request, that's all!

And again, possible context misinterpretation: that statement comes off as implying that I'm being either petulant or lazy, which feels negative.

Maybe I'm just too sensitive.

@narfcake love the shirt, too bad I won't shop at woot no more

@narfcake I don't think it's quite so black and white. Some of my income tax is handled for me, some I have to assemble on my own. Most sales taxes are done for me, some aren't.

Apple just improved their system this year so I get 7% (the county tax rate) instead of 6% (the state tax rate). Amazon never did sales taxes, now they do. I know it's not easy, but when I see it, it's noticed and appreciated, and I figure short of drafting and passing legislation, about all I can do is offer feedback and hope for the best.

@brendino Amazon only calculates and applies sales tax in states where it has a physical location. A list of those states can be found here.

@DaveInSoCal Interesting. Thanks for sharing.

@brendino The reality with the 45 states that collect use tax is that it's next to impossible to enforce and the best they can hope is that it's reasonably accounted/estimated for. Indeed, several states have a simpler estimated line item in lieu of having the taxpayer try to nail down use tax down to the last penny.

Unless there's something else on your returns that's so out of the norm, the odds of an audit over this is next to zero. An estimated figure will be just fine.

@narfcake I noticed on PA's form this year that they have something similar to what you are saying here. I didn't know it existed, and it's a welcome thing.

@brendino States have learned that folks are more apt to accept the estimates as it's easier to understand and there's much less work involved versus taxpayers voluntarily calculating what they owe.

@DrunkCat Penguins can fly, right?

@DrunkCat You could move to Alaska, Oregon, Montana, Delaware, or New Hampshire.

@DrunkCat @narfcake Penguins CAN fly! Underwater!

@narfcake @SoftAsFur AHHH OLD COMMENTS AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

@hollboll In California, it can vary from city to city, which in turn can even be a street to street differences because a different authority having jurisdiction.

As an example, City of Industry here has services provided by the adjacent cities or county, depending on area. At the southwestern portion, it falls under Pico Rivera, which has a different sales tax rate than the area just north, which is still City of Industry but is served by La Puente.

@hollboll Thanks for the response.

I like the idea that states and even small municipalities can have control over their sales tax, but I also like the idea of a national standard that would make this stuff easier to implement for businesses. I suppose those are fundamentally incompatible values.

It's such an interesting problem to think about though.

Technically it's a bitch to implement. I was weeping softly because people are just like "tax all the things!" never thinking about the operational cost of making taxes so complicated. That can be translated into money, which is like a tax on implementing taxes.

However, it's not like it's technically impossible. Maybe impossible to get 100% right, but not impossible to get it right enough ("good enough for government work", hah!).

The truly difficult part is figuring out how much tax to charge in the first place. As I understand it, you have to like, talk to lawyers and accountants in each state's government to sort of, come to an agreement. I know it took months to finalize the rate we charge Californians. It also varies from state to state whether you need to charge tax on shipping, and @shawn has a crazy story about having to tax Twix differently from Snickers.

These are all just theories by the way. I know very little about taxes.

@brendino National standard? Ha!

The politicians, lawyers, large corporations, wealthy individuals, and trade organizations would NEVER let that happen! As usual, there's too much money involved.

@katylava Necessitating all that is a reason why any and all attempts at a flat tax will be blocked. "Think of the accountants!"