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Politics : Impeach George W. Bush -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lazarus_Long who wrote (18235)	12/25/2002 3:04:53 AM
From: jttmab	Respond to of 93284

Sales tax: Does it take place where I place an order? Where the router is located? Where the server is? The shipper? Or is it just lost in cyberspace and nobody gets to tax it? Good example. That's one of the areas where the laws were inadvertently written to be clear. As far as I can tell all the state laws governing sales tax have the same underlying reciprocity principle. If there is a 3D store in the state of the billing address then the purchase is subject to the sales tax of that state. The way the laws are written the locations of the internet components, as well as the shipper are generally ignored. If the shipper happens to be in a different country than the shipping address, the product is subject to import duties but not sales tax. If I had a choice between the two, I'd rather pay the sales tax than import duties. Sales tax laws were written in a context of point of delivery, rather than point of sale. I can't imagine that the internet was a consideration at the time those laws were written, they just stumbled into it. Is there any Constitutional reason why the States could not extend their reciprocity agreements to extend sales tax to purely internet sales? I could posit that it's an implicit tariff between states, which I think is un-Constitutional. But I don't make that claim with a lot of confidence. DAMN THE PATRIOT ACT! There doesn't seem to be any significant constituency that cares. "We" seem to be willing to toss off any intrusions into our rights as long as we're afraid. TIPS is a program that pushes the limits of Constitutional infringement. At what point does a cable installer or some other civilian become an agent of the government/law enforcement? Where ever that line is, have we willingly submitted ourselves to warrantless searches? jttmab