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Having lived in other countries, the US habit of 'nickel and diming' every sale with taxes and fees that aren't fully announced until payment is one of the most

Having lived in other countries, the US habit of 'nickel and diming' every sale with taxes and fees that aren't fully announced until payment is one of the most annoying cultural failings. Even governments do it; I recently bought a tree removal permit and my city tacked on a ~15% 'technology fee'. This after I wasted a good hour dealing with the absolutely awful website for the permit application - having to enter the same information on multiple pages by hand, broken address lookup, ugliest imaginable design and layout.

kencausey 3y ago
I won't defend most of the practices but sales tax is, in at least some US states, required by law to be listed separately. example: See Kentucky Revised Statues (KRS) chapter 139 section 210 paragraph 1: (PDF) https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/law/statutes/statute.aspx?id=53525 https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/law/statutes/statute.aspx?id... edit: cited example
- kmeisthax 3y ago
  Is there any particular reason why retailers couldn't print both the total price and how much of it is sales tax on the same price tag? The legislative intent seems to me that they don't want taxes to be absorbed by retailers[0], not that they want to force people to multiply things by some percentage in their head. [0] Read: subsidized by other places with lower tax rates
- anigbrowl 3y ago
  Not to be argumentative, but: - laws are often written by lobbyists - you can list the information on the shelf price ticket/in ads, and still show the out-the-door price most prominently I don't care for sales tax/VAT as a policy matter, but even less do I like the mental overhead of having to mentally inventory it every time I go shopping. The only exception is when some stores do a 'we pay the sales tax' sale (presumably because it's easier than marking everything down individually), and for once the sticker price is what I pay at the register.

kencausey 3y ago

I won't defend most of the practices but sales tax is, in at least some US states, required by law to be listed separately. example: See Kentucky Revised Statues (KRS) chapter 139 section 210 paragraph 1: (PDF) https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/law/statutes/statute.aspx?id=53525 https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/law/statutes/statute.aspx?id... edit: cited example

kmeisthax 3y ago
Is there any particular reason why retailers couldn't print both the total price and how much of it is sales tax on the same price tag? The legislative intent seems to me that they don't want taxes to be absorbed by retailers[0], not that they want to force people to multiply things by some percentage in their head. [0] Read: subsidized by other places with lower tax rates
anigbrowl 3y ago
Not to be argumentative, but: - laws are often written by lobbyists - you can list the information on the shelf price ticket/in ads, and still show the out-the-door price most prominently I don't care for sales tax/VAT as a policy matter, but even less do I like the mental overhead of having to mentally inventory it every time I go shopping. The only exception is when some stores do a 'we pay the sales tax' sale (presumably because it's easier than marking everything down individually), and for once the sticker price is what I pay at the register.