|
|
Posted by David Sherman on Thursday, June 26, 2008 at 11:05:19 :
In Reply to: Re: O.T. Ebay charging sales tax? posted by Joe Cimoch on Thursday, June 26, 2008 at 08:30:44 :
You mean the bank bailout bill. People that the banks shouldn't have lent money to in the first place are now going to get government loans so the banks don't have to eat their mistakes. As for the mandatory reporting of all electronic transactions, they've been trying to bring that in in one guise or another several times now. I expect they'll get it through eventually. It's going to make it hard to buy anything discretely long-distance. Once it ends up in a database, lots of people who shouldn't see it will see it. Look at how easy it is to get SSI or DMV data if you know somebody who works in the department who's willing to do you a little favor. The sales tax angle is strictly about revenue, though. The states with sales taxes just hate to think they're losing a dime of it through Internet sales. I remember 30 years ago Washington (state) was trying to crack down on residents who shop in Oregon (where there's no sales tax) and on people who don't remit sales tax from their garage sales. They eventually gave up, but now they're going after Internet sales.