Higher taxes: one more repercussion of the 2006 election.
No sooner are Democrats elected than the talk of taxing everything under the sun begins in earnest. It seems that there isn’t anything which can’t be made better with a tax attached to it…
The era of tax-free e-mail, Internet shopping and broadband connections could end this fall, if recent proposals in the U.S. Congress prove successful.
State and local governments this week resumed a push to lobby Congress for far-reaching changes on two different fronts: gaining the ability to impose sales taxes on Net shopping, and being able to levy new monthly taxes on DSL and other connections. One senator is even predicting taxes on e-mail. ~zdnet.com
Democrats believe that taxing something is akin to sanctifying it. Pro-tax advocates seek to make the land holy through the baptism of taxation.
But with Democrats now in control of both chambers of Congress, the political dynamic appears to have shifted in favor of the pro-tax advocates and their allies on Capitol Hill. The NetChoice coalition, which counts as members eBay, Yahoo and the Electronic Retailing Association and opposes the sales tax plan, fears that the partisan shift will spell trouble. ~zdnet.com
The biggest corporation of them all
I find it amusing to note that liberals castigate corporations for having only one goal: profits. Supposedly companies who focus on making a profit through selling goods and services are exploiting workers and customers. Demonizing corporations is an essential plank of the leftist platform and yet according to their own definition of why corporations are bad government is the biggest corporation of all.
In pursuit of profits, the government and it’s pro-tax allies, see every activity as an opportunity to meddle and ‘improve’.
New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine, a Democrat, proposed in his budget (click here for PDF) that “downloaded music and videos” be taxed starting Oct. 1. The state tax agency expects legislation to be introduced in June. ~
There’s nothing more aggravating than do-gooder know-nothings having the power of law to enact complex systems of taxation and regulation on activities they know nothing and care nothing about except for the money it will bring them.
These particular politicians have been at it for some time. This article from 2001 discusses Enzi (R) and Dorgan’s (D) tax scheme to bring yet another area of commerce under the rigid thumb of the tax man. I can’t think of any more onerous way to go about interfering with interstate commerce than what these guys have put together.
There are basically two ways to deal with taxation of Internet sales in a reasonably consistent way: make them essentially tax-exempt like catalog sales, or create a level playing field where all sales are taxed equally, with the consumer’s residence being treated as the point of sale.
The Dorgan-Enzi bill points in the latter direction. It calls on states to develop a centralized, multi-state reporting, submission and payment system that relies on software that sellers can use to efficiently determine sales and use tax rates and taxability, as well as collect and remit the taxes (as recommended by the Progressive Policy Institute in 1999). In addition, it calls on states to develop uniform definitions of goods and services and one rate for each state (prohibiting separate additional local rates) to simplify the process. ~dlc.org
The two points here that concern me the most are in bold:
- …the consumer’s residence being treated as the point of sale.
- Â …a centralized, multi-state reporting, submission and payment system that relies on software that sellers can use…
Do we seriously want the government treating our residence as a point of sale? Since we have no constitutional protections when it comes to commerce, in the minds of liberals, the home is no sanctuary is it? Secondly, what stupid fool would believe that the government will come up with a ‘centralized software system’ that all online sellers will be forced to use that will not screw up entirely the process of buying anything online? Imagine for a moment what this might mean…
Everyone seller online would be required to use government software, either developed or approved, which would treat your residence as a point of sale for the purpose of taxing whatever you buy, download, or perhaps just use… and who says that only sales will be involved here? Online advocacy is already being treated as campaign contributions by the the campaign police, who’s to say that other activity which benefit you but for which you do not necessarily pay shouldn’t also be taxed?
Some taxing quotes:
- “When there’s a single thief, it’s robbery. When there are a thousand thieves, it’s taxation.” ~Vanya Cohen
- “It is a good thing that we do not get as much government as we pay for.” ~Will Rogers
- “The point to remember is that what the government gives it must first take away.” ~John Coleman