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Would this be it? https://nypost.com/2018/06/21/what-the-supreme-court-sales-tax-ruling-means-for-new-yorkers/
Lots of states have a sales tax (mine is 6%). And internet commerce has been avoiding paying sales tax for like 25 years. Frankly I'm shocked it took that long for states to get it together. At some point you had to consider that states aren't going to leave millions of dollars in tax revenue on the table because Internet...
Personally I like paying taxes, because I'm a contrarian. But also because I like the conveniences of a modern civilization, even if I don't always agree how every cent is spent.
As a fellow New Yorker, you're not alone. I hate this sales tax we're having. That means I have to have an extra bit amount of money in my funds if I wanted to buy a game that is worth 10 bucks.
Well. That's life for you, honestly.
For quite some time, buying goods on the internet was treated as the same as making mail order purchases. States are not allowed to require the collection of taxes on out-of-state mail order purchases; they can only do so for businesses that have a physical presence within the state. When state governments tried to pass laws requiring such out of state collections, the US court systems tended to strike them down on the grounds that they interfered with commerce. Even when states tried to take advantage of the "physical presence" part to grab taxes because a company might have a warehouse in their state, courts might side with companies.
However, there was one really big difference between traditional mail order and internet commerce. Mail order was never seen as a big deal, while internet commerce was constantly growing. Physical stores weren't threatened by mail order, which was viewed as inconvenient and slow. But they felt real pressure from internet commerce, which could undercut them on price and not charge taxes. While physical stores could offer their own online storefronts, they were still physical stores, and chains like Wal-Mart and Target that had real physical stores in every state were required to charge taxes in a way that stores like Amazon didn't.
That lobbying, arguing that untaxed internet commerce was itself unfair, helped open the door for states to start charging sales tax on the internet. It still took time for many states to catch up on the idea that internet commerce was even a thing, and they were stuck with trying to figure out ways to actually collect the tax as well (like "honor system" sections on state tax forms), but in recent years more companies have started willingly collecting taxes for states.
And it doesn't take a rocket surgeon to see that 500 billion in sales in just the U.S. in just 2018 and a lot of that isn't having sales tax collected in whatever state and tax payers aren't paying use tax. It's just millions and millions of dollars being left on the table for any state. It was only ever a matter of time before states did something about that.
Once e-commerce got big enough that outdated tax laws weren't a good fit anymore, this sort of change was inevitable. And most states that have a sales tax have a use tax for out of state purchases anyway. And if anyone had been paying that, they wouldn't be put out about Steam collecting it now. And what is a state going to do when like 99% of it's citizens are clearly lying on their taxes and avoiding paying taxes? Change things up and put the burden on the very successful system of having retailers collect taxes.
I guess I'm more likely to say "well it was a good run", than I am to complain that the run is over. Problem is I'm a weirdo contrarian with a minority point of view.
NY, #3 taxed state in the US I think it was and striving to become #1 apparently :P
This is because California DOES NOT charge sales tax for digital goods of ANY KIND -- including digitally downloaded software. Oklahoma is the same way.
Yet, being the operative term. There's always tomorrow, but until then, wheeee!
the tax should be on steam's part not the consumer.
Hell you already pay a tax for things (especially on the steam market) why would you pay another tax?
This is basically what started or at least for the most part fueled the uprising that lead to the american revolution b/c of the taxes put on things.
rip all the NY gamers.