81–90 of 125 posts
The US government will just mandate that any online business doing business with US citizens has to collect that tax on behalf of the IRS. Quarterly deposits will be acceptable.
The IRS is not involved in the collection of state sales taxes, and it is extremely unlikely that this will change.
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Maybe get a better accountant? I'm being serious. I definitely don't need to ask a month in advance to talk to my person accountant or our business's.
We'll obviously need one (where today this accountant meets all our needs, and has been a family friend for decades), but a small business accountant that can do what's going to be required doesn't exist yet. Only national chains have had to worry about such things.
Your point upthread was "no small business person can handle filings to 50 states". I'll stipulate that! My response is just, people with real businesses usually don't (and shouldn't) DIY their taxes anyways.
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It's the person that's paying for the product being taxed, and the merchant is merely collecting that tax. At least, that would be my interpretation.
If a foreign state I've never stepped foot in can set laws I have to obey, force me to remit money to them, and audit my accounting under penalty of imprisonment, it doesn't really matter who's doing the paying. Today, only people within the state can be forced to obey and be audited by that state. This bill gives the power for a state to create and enforce arbitrary laws on non-citizens. It's at least a sufficiently…
Single federal sales tax with distribution would result in either grotesquely complicated calculation system or some states sponsoring other states for political reasons. And, of course, all local governments blaming federal governments for the lack of funds and their inability to do anything.
Trying to make the citizens of one state liable for enforcing the laws of another seems ridiculous by itself. Making them enforce the thousands of arbitrary, convoluted, constantly changing laws of 49 other states and all of their localities is way beyond reasonable.
At least there appears to be a clause that states will have to simplify their tax rules and provide free software to manage it. Although the idea of integrating an e-commerce system with 50 separate bureaucratically-designed systems doesn't really seem that appealing either... If the states also had to pay for every integration and the maintenance of all e-commerce software, then it would be a little more reasonable.
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I don't have time to read 50 states' tax codes, file 50 tax returns and potentially be audited 50 times a year. What small business does?
Do you make over $1mm annually? If not, you're exempt from this bill already.
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We'll obviously need one (where today this accountant meets all our needs, and has been a family friend for decades), but a small business accountant that can do what's going to be required doesn't exist yet. Only national chains have had to worry about such things.
Again, and respectfully, I don't think handling sales tax filings for a small business is a huge hurdle compared to some of the craziness that even small business accountants are routinely called on to do. Your point upthread was "no small business person can handle filings to 50 states". I'll stipulate that! My response is just, people with real businesses usually don't (and shouldn't) DIY their taxes anyways.
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As an American citizen, I can assure you this guy is talking out of his ass, and America will continue to be a leader in many cutting edge fields for years to come. American economic prowess may decrease relative to the rest of the world as they finally catch up, but "the writing is on the wall" is sensationalist bullshit. I will never understand the correlation between technophiles and Libertarian pseudo-economic bu…
> American economic prowess may decrease relative to the rest of the world Not just decrease but get overtaken by. - Our public K-12 education is a pile of shit and our colleges are riding on a public dollars bubble that makes the housing crash look like spilled water. Any attempt to deal with the problem ignites fury over teachers' rights, causing policy makers to run shitting their pants to the nearest podium to ap…
I am surprised when I hear people talk of our current issues as if they will be what does us in. Think of the big picture here, do you really think America is going to get "overtaken" in the 21st century when in many ways we are leading it? And I do agree we are behind in some ways as well, but we don't have to be number 1 at everything to be successful, or at the least survive and progress as a nation.
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We'll obviously need one (where today this accountant meets all our needs, and has been a family friend for decades), but a small business accountant that can do what's going to be required doesn't exist yet. Only national chains have had to worry about such things.
Again, and respectfully, I don't think handling sales tax filings for a small business is a huge hurdle compared to some of the craziness that even small business accountants are routinely called on to do. Your point upthread was "no small business person can handle filings to 50 states". I'll stipulate that! My response is just, people with real businesses usually don't (and shouldn't) DIY their taxes anyways.
And by who's determination is my business "not real" if I do my own taxes??? At least I do my taxes more accurately than Geithner does or did AND HE got to sign our dollar bills! Was his business "not real"?
Once again, thanks to GovCo, life is getting worse, harder not easier, asinine not smart. There is absolutely NO THOUGHT WHATSOEVER put into anything coming from DC lately. None.
EasyDNS.. the company that closed my company's paid account over a month before the term ended because I informed them we didn't want to renew. If they think paying a modest sales tax is going to offset their terrible service, they are dreaming.
What you're describing isn't supposed to happen and I want to figure out how it did.