4 ms·

I suspect if you tried to do it federally it would be a violation of States' rights and thus unconstitutional.

chc 13y ago
There's always a way around that. Most likely you'd just do it like many other federal carrots — "This tax is levied on all online purchases and will be distributed to the state of the recipient provided that state does not impose any additional taxes on the purchase." You're not depriving the states of their right to tax the purchases, but it will be onerous to their residents if they don't go along with the federal plan.
- justinsb 13y ago
  That sounds like it could work - nice hack!
- mzs 13y ago
  Clever but why should this sales tax go to the state I live in instead of say the community where the item was shipped from? It's really more of a duty or use tax in such a case, like in the old days where I would order something from a catalog not in the state I live in, I was supposed to pay a use tax to this state of the difference between the sales tax here and what I might have paid in taxes when ordering when I did my state income taxes. They really should not call it a sales tax, it potentially gets collected by a state that has nothing to do with the sale at all and the cities and states that had to do with it did not collect any of it.
sbierwagen 13y ago
Lots of things are violations of states' rights. (nationwide drinking age, enforced by revoking federal highway money; national handgun ownership age, etc) The actual question is if there's enough political capital to get it through congress, in the face of united opposition from the low tax states and the republican caucus.
- justinsb 13y ago
  Fair point (particularly in view of the sibling suggestion). I do think this answers the OP though - it's probably just not important enough to be worth the fight!
kudu 13y ago
The federal government has a broad power to regulate commerce under the Commerce Clause.

chc 13y ago

There's always a way around that. Most likely you'd just do it like many other federal carrots — "This tax is levied on all online purchases and will be distributed to the state of the recipient provided that state does not impose any additional taxes on the purchase." You're not depriving the states of their right to tax the purchases, but it will be onerous to their residents if they don't go along with the federal plan.

justinsb 13y ago
That sounds like it could work - nice hack!
mzs 13y ago
Clever but why should this sales tax go to the state I live in instead of say the community where the item was shipped from? It's really more of a duty or use tax in such a case, like in the old days where I would order something from a catalog not in the state I live in, I was supposed to pay a use tax to this state of the difference between the sales tax here and what I might have paid in taxes when ordering when I did my state income taxes. They really should not call it a sales tax, it potentially gets collected by a state that has nothing to do with the sale at all and the cities and states that had to do with it did not collect any of it.

sbierwagen 13y ago

Lots of things are violations of states' rights. (nationwide drinking age, enforced by revoking federal highway money; national handgun ownership age, etc) The actual question is if there's enough political capital to get it through congress, in the face of united opposition from the low tax states and the republican caucus.

justinsb 13y ago
Fair point (particularly in view of the sibling suggestion). I do think this answers the OP though - it's probably just not important enough to be worth the fight!

kudu 13y ago

The federal government has a broad power to regulate commerce under the Commerce Clause.