Good lord, how I hate these people:
U.S. Senators Mike Enzi (R-Wyo.), Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), and Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) today announced that a bipartisan group of ten senators are introducing legislation today that would give states the option to collect the sales taxes they are owed under current law from out-of-state businesses, rather than rely on consumers to pay those taxes to the states—the method of tax collection to which they are now restricted.
Under the current tax loophole, while brick-and-mortar retailers collect sales taxes from customers who make purchases in their stores, many online and catalog retailers do not collect the same taxes. Under the Marketplace Fairness Act, states would have the option to collect sales and use tax revenues from out-of-state sellers through a new, simplified tax system.
Translation: fairness = there is no escaping the reach of the government, who can and will take your money, no matter where you go, no matter what you do. There is no escape.
Submit.
(thanks to Terry H)
Shorter Sen. Alexander: ALL YOUR CASH ARE BELONG TO US
I have a good idea: let’s drive that whole internet thing into the ground. That’ll learn ’em.
Translation: loophole = there’s untaxed something out there, and we’re a’gonna git it.
Hey, national problems require national solutions. A REAGAN appointee told us so.
unimpeachable moral authoriteh
On a serious note, sounds like an opening for Herman Cain and 9-9-9. A portion of the national sales tax could be returned to the states in the form of direct aid.
Of course. Or:
1. National sales tax
2. Eliminate ALL other taxes
3. Constitutional amendment enforcing such
4. Optional: Achieve this over Republican’s dead bodies, they believing in the fantastic construct that has their nicely humming economy best served by unlimited new means to tax — with their essence being to haul back entire pennies on the dollar — anchored by the sacred personal income tax. Not profit; income
Or we can keep playing this game where they take another new dollar and we spend eight years winning back a quarter while the whole damn thing repeats itself elsewhere. Like here.
Amazon recently blew out Moonbeam’s similar tax scheme. It’ll happen elsewhere, excepting that jackassery in places like Walmart and other brick and mortars will resist it.
So when a professor tries to teach economics from a not-necessarily-leftwing perspective, what do Harvard students do? Jam shit in their ears and scream Na Na Na Na Na Na Na Na.
Harvard students. If the US is the 1% world-wide, and Ivy graduates are the 1% within the US, doesn’t that make these students the .01%? Not good enough I guess, if you are going to force them to listen to … libertarians.
Obey! And Pay!
Oh, and motionview, I congratulated those students on their dedication to tolerance and intellectual curiosity. They clear cannot allow Bad Thoughts to take root in their Pwecious Wittle Minds!
Ha, Mankiew is practically a Keynesian. You know these kids are fucked when they start pulling this shit. And then they complain about the cops? The cops are their stasi. I guess they’re not “stasying” the right people, though. Again, cleaning my barrels and inspecting my ammo. This is bound to get ugly.
Taxes should be collected by the state where the product ships from, not where it goes.
That gives states incentives to court Amazon and Overstock warehouses.
See? Fixed it!
I love how they sell this bill (and similar state-level efforts) as all about the FAIRNESS for our poor brick’n’mortar stores (and the the mom’n’pop stores which don’t really exist any more), being preyed upon by the Evil Amazon Corporation.
Never mind that one of the big players pushing for this is the Sainted Walmart Corporation — otherwise known as the evil, non-union, hated Walmart Corporation at any other time; they’re just a useful ally at the moment, what with the demanding the extended reach of the government.
Anyway, in the various radio ads I’ve heard, it’s all about how terribly unfair it is that Amazon doesn’t pay sales tax, but all those real stores (which provide JOBS! in my local community) do. It’s so mean!
Leaving aside that the local stores don’t pay a sales tax either, I do (and choose not to, whenever possible), if online retailers started charging me an extra 6% (PA sales tax), it would not affect my purchasing pattern one whit. I buy nearly everything from Amazon and newegg, because they provide a service that no ‘real’ store can: the near infinite selection, and the buyer-written product reviews attached to every product. I’d pay more to buy online, rather than dick around trying to find the desired product at a local store.
Point: this isn’t going to help the “local community” in any meaningful manner. The physical stores are still largely doomed. All it’ll change is that the state will get their grubby little fingers on more of money, which they’ll use to provide lavish pensions for a bunch of cocksucking public sector employees who are already paid far more than I’ll ever see.
Not that I’m bitter.
That’s a loophole? I thought it was a feature.
@motionview, 7: oh lawd, idiots.
fairness = there is no escaping the reach-around with a glass-shard-studded glove of the government
FTFY
All it’ll change is that the state will get their grubby little fingers on more of my money, which they’ll use to provide lavish pensions for a bunch of cocksucking public sector employees who are already paid far more than I’ll ever see.
That’s poetry, right there. I’m totally
stealingre-appropriating it for personal use.Admittedly, it’s a little long for a bumper sticker…
[Sigh] I keep voting against Mike Enzi but he keeps getting reelected anyway. Biggest embarrassment since Alan Simpson.