The US has sales taxes in most places, and there's a bewildering number of them, e.g. in my home town that I've retired to, I could be paying the state sales ta

The US has sales taxes in most places, and there's a bewildering number of them, e.g. in my home town that I've retired to, I could be paying the state sales tax, I'm sure some states allow counties to do it, the city sales tax (and my city spans two counties), and a special tax for the shopping area, each of decreasing size. There's also exemptions or lower rates for things like food, and even sales tax "holidays" when certain classes of items are free of sales tax for a few days. All of this complexity is one reason Internet companies don't want to collect it. If we have a VAT, no one's told me about it (a general one, anyway)! The concept does get mooted every once in a while.