Chicago successfully taxes streaming services • Hacker News Board

Re: Chicago successfully taxes streaming services

#121

Post by tzs » Sun, May 19, 2019, 12:42 AM UTC

mindslight wrote: post #34

Maybe instead of putting on a show in court, Netflix et al should simply stop asking people for their physical addresses ? I mean, that is the underlying vulnerability that will allow this push to succeed. We were so excited for the promise of the Internet to overturn all this legacy bullshit. Then the legacy bullshitters got here, built a bunch of proprietary services on top of HTTP, marketed them as progress, and a…

> Maybe instead of putting on a show in court, Netflix et al should simply stop asking people for their physical addresses? I mean, that is the underlying vulnerability that will allow this push to succeed.

> We were so excited for the promise of the Internet to overturn all this legacy bullshit. Then the legacy bullshitters got here, built a bunch of proprietary services on top of HTTP, marketed them as progress, and are slowly reimplementing the status quo!

I don't understand your point. The tax Chicago is trying to impose has nothing to do with Netflix's service being proprietary. The tax would still be charged even if their service were built entirely out of free software and all they streamed was public domain material, as long as they charged for the service.

Re: Chicago successfully taxes streaming services

#122

Post by tzs » Sun, May 19, 2019, 12:56 AM UTC

So how does a business actually deal with collecting and remitting this? Is it a special case they have to deal with separately from sales taxes, or is it treated like a sales tax? If it is a sales tax, do the sales tax service companies like Avalara and TaxCloud and Savos handle it for you as long as you set the right tax code [1] for the item?

[1] Sales taxes often vary depending on the type of good. E.g., some states might charge a different rate for food ingredients than they do for prepared food, or for food sold through a vending machine. The tax service companies assign a code to each category of goods that might have a different tax rate so that when you ask them to computer tax on an order you can supply the appropriate codes for each line item so they can compute the right tax.

Re: Chicago successfully taxes streaming services

#123

Post by patrick5415 » Sun, May 19, 2019, 1:10 AM UTC

RhodesianHunter wrote: post #108

prepend wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think the fix is removing pensions from old people, but rather drastically reforming pensions for future retirees entering the workforce now. Cutting pensions now would be like cutting someone’s salary and would likely lead to skilled people quitting.

So cut compensation for current already underpaid employees to shore up retirement for the people who voted for the politicians who caused this? That doesn't taste right to me.

The aarp is a powerful propaganda machine.

Re: Chicago successfully taxes streaming services

#124

Post by conanbatt » Sun, May 19, 2019, 1:12 AM UTC

sokoloff wrote: post #115

x0x0 wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I tend to agree, but there's a limit. Accepting a job where the payout promised requires an almost 50% property tax raise ? You can't possibly claim surprise when those promises are reneged on.

The current pensioners didn’t recently accept their job. They accepted it decades ago and it’s on the municipality to manage the funding.

And apparently on the tax payer to eat it up.

Re: Chicago successfully taxes streaming services

#125

Post by ip26 » Sun, May 19, 2019, 1:14 AM UTC

bscphil wrote: post #99

jazzyjackson wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A free service probably isn't going to get sued into compliance if you accept sign ups from EU, but if you accept payment from EU that definitely counts as 'doing business' and you should expect to comply with local regulations.

I think the question everyone here is interested in having answered is "what if you don't?" The EU has no jurisdiction here (in my country); the law applies to the citizens of those countries. Sure, some countries might be willing to extradite you to the EU for breaking laws that apply there, but that seems rather extraordinary (in the case of a law that applies to internet sites), not to mention an outrageous abuse…

Presumably the main consequence is they shut down your business in their country, and if you dodge fines etc they don't let you come back.

Extradition would be quite reasonable if you were conducting a very large business, and/or ignoring significant laws, e.g. prohibition on human trafficking. But they aren't going to extradite you for failing to be GDPR compliant on $10 of app sales.

Re: Chicago successfully taxes streaming services

#126

Post by selimthegrim » Sun, May 19, 2019, 1:19 AM UTC

Camillo wrote: post #119

burlesona wrote: post #5

This stuff makes sense for cities, it’s just frustrating how much more difficult it makes it to operate a “mom and pop” software business. The complexity of potentially complying with hundreds of state and municipal governments - not where you are located but where online purchases originate - is a pretty significant deterrent to setting up a small side business. Imagine if every food truck had to pay taxes based not…

That sounds like a good reason for the federal government to regulate interstate commerce, such as by preventing local governments from establishing such obstacles. Constitutional jurisprudence has discovered the most amazing powers hidden in the emanations and penumbras of that clause, but sometimes it would also be useful to look at its plain meaning.

Scalia is dead, let’s let his rhetorical style die with him

Re: Chicago successfully taxes streaming services

#127

Post by nullwasamistake » Sun, May 19, 2019, 1:30 AM UTC

Chicago is a financial disaster and it's dragging Illinois into the fire. The situation is worse than detriot before it's bankrupcy.

It's so bad that illinois is the only state in the union with a negative population growth. And, doubly, the only state to have that honor several years in a row.

The debt is unsustainable and they tax everything. Just a few years ago they started taxing soda cans, and hybrids since "they don't pay as much gas tax".

They may have successfully taxed streaming but it's just another example of how incredibly desperate they are.

Illinois is drowning under pension promises from their massively bloated government. Enough that every Illinois citizen owes something like $20,000 to the state pension systems. They're squeezing money from stones

Re: Chicago successfully taxes streaming services

#128

Post by sjy » Sun, May 19, 2019, 1:31 AM UTC

macspoofing wrote: post #21

Hate it. There's nothing wrong with taxes, but this kind of tax is onerous. It adds a shit ton of overhead if you have to maintain tax rates for every municipality in US, or the world. This is where I wish government would figure something else out. Have one state or (preferably) federal agency levy one tax, and then figure out how to disperse the collected income to municipalities - instead of each municipality crea…

It's not hard to "figure something else out"; this problem became a political issue in Australia in the 1980s and was finally solved with a federal goods and services tax in 2000, the proceeds of which are distributed back to the states by an apolitical bureaucracy. There are no more local or state sales taxes. I am sure other countries have found similar solutions. The difficulty is overcoming the political and constitutional barriers to further consolidating federal power in the United States.

Re: Chicago successfully taxes streaming services

#129

Post by Spooky23 » Sun, May 19, 2019, 1:32 AM UTC

scarface74 wrote: post #37

gfodor wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pulling or cutting the pensions of retired public service workers (many of whom who risked their lives to protect the public) would, beyond the ethical questions, eliminate the credibility of the city's promises to those who sign up for such jobs and hence would likely greatly reduce the quantity and quality of recruits.

The whole idea of policemen “risking their lives” is not statistically accurate. Only 144 policemen died in the line of duty in the entire United States last year ( https://www.npr.org/2018/12/27/680410169/more-police-officer... ) The Chicago police department isn’t exactly what most people would call “quality”.

Police and Fire work is hard on employees, reducing their overall life expectancy materially.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4734369/

Re: Chicago successfully taxes streaming services

#130

Post by sjy » Sun, May 19, 2019, 1:34 AM UTC

writepub wrote: post #82

lr4444lr wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They derive their right to tax as recognized entities from the states wherein they are incorporated. There is no limit to what they can tax according to their charter, as long as no higher jurisdiction forbids it.

That's way too broad and not how it ought to be. THIS is why you see rich cities like San Francisco and Chicago preaching ever higher taxes, while simultaneously providing worse services for it's citizens. There's a feedback loop missing where there are actual consequences to the city council when quality of service isn't delivered, but instead, city politicians indulge in emotionally appealing demagoguery, further i…

So in other words, voters continually vote against their own long-term interests? I don't see how this is going to be solved by getting the democratically-elected state legislature to pass laws restricting the cities' taxing powers.