Jeff Bezos Is John Galt
1st July 2011
The Other McCain likes the Bezos position. Watch the video.
What it is, really, is an attempt by state governments to impose a tariff on goods sold by out-of-state mail-order vendors, thus usurping the power to regulate interstate commerce, which the Constitution specifically delegates to the federal government.
Whether individual customers order by mail or over the Internet, the transaction is the same, and there is extensive legal precedent that out-of-state mail-order vendors cannot be compelled to collect state sales taxes on such transactions.
Sometimes the doctrine of pre-emption is your friend.
The Amazon links on my blog are merely advertisements, for which I collect a (small) commission based on the sales generated by readers clicking through. California’s argument is like saying that, if a magazine based in New York published an advertisment for a Texas-based mail-order company, this advertisement constitutes a basis for making the Texas company collect New York sales tax.
I’m convinced.
Rebecca Madigan, Executive Director of the Performance Marketing Association, stated, “The devastation is immediate, because the law went into effect upon signing.We tried to communicate to the Governor that this bill would only lead to dramatic income loss of small businesses and job loss, and he signed the bill anyway.”
Similar legislation has been proposed in numerous other states, only to be rejected because those elected officials recognized these proposals do not generate any additional sales tax revenue and, in fact, harm small businesses. When out-of state retailers stopped advertising on in-state websites, the states collect no new sales tax, and in fact lose income tax revenue.
Funny how that works….
Meanwhile, smart people in California are doing the only thing smart people in California can do: Get the hell out of California!
Indeed. Don’t be the last guy out, or you’ll have to turn off the lights … if there are any left.
July 1st, 2011 at 11:54
Your last comment is a good one. One of the recent bills Governor Moonbeam signed requires 1/3 of the commune’s, er, state’s electricity to come from alternative sources within the next few years. Good luck with that one, Kalifornia Komrades.