States and local governments will lose up to about $12 billion in 2012 from uncollected sales taxes.
That’s a snipit from a very good WSJ article about a proposed plan for all online businesses to start collecting state and local taxes. First, the problem with that comment above is that gov’t has the notion that it’s “their” money they are loosing. Nothing is farther from the truth.
I’m noticing a pattern here. Gov’t, at all levels, needs revenue. Not to serve the public interest in providing services, but to empower themselves by collecting revenue, and redistributing it in exchange for votes. Votes from people they claim to help, by keeping them in a perpetual state of dependency. “Look what I did for you…re-elect me”.
But in the process of proposing this new law of online taxation, several studies from political independent research centers estimate and explain how that would further damage small businesses. These small businesses that sell online is hte only place where they can effectively compete against the worlds largest online store, Amazon. No wonder Amazon supports this proposal. They’re fully aware that it would damage small online retailers, essentially having the gov’t reduce their competition online. Follow the money trail and you’ll probably see that bills sponsor probably enjoys a recent campaign contribution.
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