Amazon Sales Take a Hit in States With Online Tax • Hacker News Board

Re: Amazon Sales Take a Hit in States With Online Tax

#21

Post by justinsb » Tue, Apr 22, 2014, 4:48 AM UTC

adventured wrote: post #16

bbq wrote: post #10

> Amazon supports federal legislation that would explicitly let states require tax collections by all online retailers above a certain size. This would give Amazon a huge competitive advantage (given their existing infrastructure). Of course they support this.

They get hit with flack coming or going. If they're against online taxes, then they're accused of not doing their fair share to support government coffers, or they're accused of getting an unfair competitive advantage (per offline retailers). It's similar to Walmart's minimum wage support. If Walmart were against minimum wage increases, their opponents would lambast them for it. If they're in favor of it, they get ac…

Amazon fought tooth and nail against paying sales tax, even in states where they clearly had a presence (California in particular).

Now that they agreed to start paying sales tax going forward (in return for no back-penalties), they are lobbying for their competitors to have to pay sales tax as well.

They are also building warehouses in-state now and trying to compete on speed of delivery, which is a more respectable way to compete against out-of-state rivals.

Re: Amazon Sales Take a Hit in States With Online Tax

#22

Post by AnthonyMouse » Tue, Apr 22, 2014, 4:49 AM UTC

wycx wrote: post #15

A straightforward solution would be for the US to have a uniform online sales tax, distributed to the state of the shipping address. Is this intractable?

All it would take is an Act of Congress, but it's political. Birmingham, Alabama has a sales tax of 10%. New Hampshire has no sales tax. How do you set the rate nationally without making enemies?

Re: Amazon Sales Take a Hit in States With Online Tax

#23

Post by ja27 » Tue, Apr 22, 2014, 4:52 AM UTC

WalterBright wrote: post #14

gtaylor wrote: post #8

I'll gladly pay an additional 6-10% to keep avoiding Wal-mart or Target or even Home Depot. There are people like me who just really hate having to suit up and go shopping. I don't like the traffic, I don't like getting ripped off, and I don't find in-store shopping a fun or magical experience like some do. I can pull up Amazon and read ratings/reviews, see what kind of problems people ran into with products, and mak…

That's right. Going to the mall to buy something is a 2-3 hour time sink, plus gas. Buying online is about 5 minutes, no gas.

The "no gas" part is big. I don't think many people realize how much they spend on gas to run errands. A quick run to Target for something is about a 10 mile round trip from my house or about $2 in gas for a typical minivan. A Home Depot or Lowes is more like $4 from here, $5 with tolls.

Re: Amazon Sales Take a Hit in States With Online Tax

#24

Post by gph » Tue, Apr 22, 2014, 4:53 AM UTC

minouye wrote: post #12

From the report: Our data consist of daily transactions for 2,807,476 households from January 1, 2012 to December 31, 2013, and include both banking (i.e., checking, savings, and debit card) and credit card transactions. We observe the date, amount, and description of each transaction. I'm a little disturbed that they had access to complete transaction information for roughly 2% of American households. Is it common p…

Not to defend the banks, but in what situation could date/amount/description become personally identifiable? I guess it sort of depends on how descriptive the description field is, but if it just lists the product(s) then I don't really know how you'd ever be able to verifiably match it with a name.

Re: Amazon Sales Take a Hit in States With Online Tax

#25

Post by justinsb » Tue, Apr 22, 2014, 4:55 AM UTC

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #22

wycx wrote: post #15

A straightforward solution would be for the US to have a uniform online sales tax, distributed to the state of the shipping address. Is this intractable?

All it would take is an Act of Congress, but it's political. Birmingham, Alabama has a sales tax of 10%. New Hampshire has no sales tax. How do you set the rate nationally without making enemies?

I suspect if you tried to do it federally it would be a violation of States' rights and thus unconstitutional.

Re: Amazon Sales Take a Hit in States With Online Tax

#26

Post by ekianjo » Tue, Apr 22, 2014, 4:57 AM UTC

justinsb wrote: post #6

mrcharles wrote: post #3

Honestly, Amazon has a lot to offer even beyond "No Tax". And I say this as a Canadian who has had to pay taxes and duties on amazon orders since day 1. People may gripe about it for a bit... but amazon is still the best way to shop, and also has the best selection and prices.

I agree that Amazon is often the most convenient option. But their prices simply aren't the best any more (at least for things other than books). Try a price comparison next time and see if you agree! (Another change is that Google Shopping has improved a lot over the last few years, so price comparison is less painful as well.) One thing Amazon still does best: their deliveries arrive on time, and seem a lot less li…

Yeah, even in Japan, they are not the cheapest option anymore, there are usually smaller retailers for specific items that get you better deals, but think about the following cost: - cost to register on a different website - cost to "trust" a minor player you have never used before - cost of time lost because of delay in delivery - cost of how they handle returns

Most of the time, I think a few seconds about the difference in price between amazon and that minor retailer, and unless the difference is huge (which is usually not the case), I'll go for Amazon. Even when I had issues with what I got from Amazon they sent me the replacement item BEFORE I even send back the defectuous item. Who else does that?

Re: Amazon Sales Take a Hit in States With Online Tax

#27

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Apr 22, 2014, 4:57 AM UTC

colinbartlett wrote: post #13

mrcharles wrote: post #3

Honestly, Amazon has a lot to offer even beyond "No Tax". And I say this as a Canadian who has had to pay taxes and duties on amazon orders since day 1. People may gripe about it for a bit... but amazon is still the best way to shop, and also has the best selection and prices.

The biggest issue for me is that I need to do a lot of price comparison now. Especially with Prime, it's too easy to filter to Prime-only results and order the first one. But if I take the time to shop around, I can often find a much better price and that diminishes the value of Prime and Amazon to me.

[deleted]

Re: Amazon Sales Take a Hit in States With Online Tax

#28

Post by d23 » Tue, Apr 22, 2014, 4:57 AM UTC

mrcharles wrote: post #3

Honestly, Amazon has a lot to offer even beyond "No Tax". And I say this as a Canadian who has had to pay taxes and duties on amazon orders since day 1. People may gripe about it for a bit... but amazon is still the best way to shop, and also has the best selection and prices.

Seriously, what a bunch of dorks. We had a good run. I knew for the longest time it was inevitable. The convenience factor outweighs the negligible sales tax that I would have to pay elsewhere anyway.

Re: Amazon Sales Take a Hit in States With Online Tax

#29

Post by chc » Tue, Apr 22, 2014, 5:03 AM UTC

justinsb wrote: post #25

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All it would take is an Act of Congress, but it's political. Birmingham, Alabama has a sales tax of 10%. New Hampshire has no sales tax. How do you set the rate nationally without making enemies?

I suspect if you tried to do it federally it would be a violation of States' rights and thus unconstitutional.

There's always a way around that. Most likely you'd just do it like many other federal carrots — "This tax is levied on all online purchases and will be distributed to the state of the recipient provided that state does not impose any additional taxes on the purchase." You're not depriving the states of their right to tax the purchases, but it will be onerous to their residents if they don't go along with the federal plan.

Re: Amazon Sales Take a Hit in States With Online Tax

#30

Post by sbierwagen » Tue, Apr 22, 2014, 5:05 AM UTC

justinsb wrote: post #25

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All it would take is an Act of Congress, but it's political. Birmingham, Alabama has a sales tax of 10%. New Hampshire has no sales tax. How do you set the rate nationally without making enemies?

I suspect if you tried to do it federally it would be a violation of States' rights and thus unconstitutional.

Lots of things are violations of states' rights. (nationwide drinking age, enforced by revoking federal highway money; national handgun ownership age, etc)

The actual question is if there's enough political capital to get it through congress, in the face of united opposition from the low tax states and the republican caucus.