best,

Chris O.
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In some states, different buildings on the same block are in different sales tax locations, and school redistricting can cause changes that aren't obvious. It isn't always based on ZIP code, unless that's going to somehow be enforced.

Even if you can figure out what to charge, you may not know how to pay it. If you're a small business selling to 1000 different people in the course of the year, do you really want to have to fill out a thousand different tax forms? (Not exaggerating, many counties used to require a separate sales tax form from the state form). Now, if you're ever subject to paying Virginia sales tax, you need to file a monthly return, and subject yourself to occasional sales tax audits, even if you never have another sale in Virginia or if you sell products that aren't subject to sales tax. At least you only need one sales tax form, though. You just need to break out sales by county.

On top of that, you have bizarre "Sales Tax Holidays" that are often inacted with little notice and little concern for the complexity involved. If you're a seller in Hawaii, how do you know that Virginia will have a weekend where shoes less than a hundred dollars are not subject to sales tax?

Nowadays, you can get software that handles this for you, or sell through someone else and have them figure it out and pay the taxes for you. It still ends up disincenting you from starting a small business online.

Is that a bad thing? Is it wrong to be more "fair"? Not taking a position on that, but I think there were good reasons aside from the preference of net vs. b&m to hold off on this change until now.

Luckily enough for me I live in a state with no sales tax so it is moot for me, but I have a hard time getting outraged over this.

"" This is generally only enforced when buying something requiring a title.""
In Illinois, a car requires a title.
I have heard, however that a car over 10 years old in N.Carolina, doesn't get a title for in state use. I'm sure you would have to register a 10year old car in either NC or SC though, thus triggering the tax.

If you buy a product while traveling by car into another state, they generally collect the tax at the point of purchase for that local area.

True, but interestingly enough, last year I bought a car from a NC dealership, but only had to pay sales tax in my native SC.

That's particularly nice, because SC sales tax for automobiles is capped at $300.

As much as I dread having to pay taxes on purchases made online, I’ve never really understood the rationale for exempting goods purchased online and thus giving a rather decided advantage to Internet sellers in preference to brick-and-mortar companies who invest in the community.

Plus there are the people who try things out in the physical store, and then go buy it from a virtual one. If anything, they should be taxed more.

It's one thing to monitor B & N; it's another thing entirely to try to monitor every $5M business that may do business in your state once a year.

When I buy a book from the local Barnes and Noble when on travel, they don’t send the taxes to my home jurisdiction.

And when you buy a book from B&N on-line, the money goes to its headquarters in New York, the book gets shipped from a warehouse in Kentucky, and though none of the Virginia Barnes and Nobles had anything to do with the transaction, Virginia collects a sales tax.

That's because consumption is being taxed.

Is raising taxes during a recession suddenly a prudent move?