Now paying taxes on eBay in US

[roadrunner]

 

 

[+GoldenWheels]

10 hours ago, Defender II said:

 If a company is doing business in a country that country has a right to tax them. If a company is doing business in a state that state has a right to tax them. Income and/or sales. It's a part of why Americans fought and died for independence from being taxed without representation.

 

 

Now that they changed the law, yes they do. But it goes directly against the idea of having representation.

 

Doing business in a state used to mean actually being in the state (having a physical presence, actual residents with a congressman and a senator, which likely also meant you could vote and lobby for relief). Now it doesn't. I can't go and vote in any of these states taxing my business for income. Just the home state of my business (where we have ALWAYS paid our income taxes), which doesn't affect those other states at all. So now it really IS taxation without representation.

 

I have no ability to vote in Washington State to not have to pay a "Business and Occupation Tax" (income tax), or in Texas with the franchise tax (another income tax), or in Hawaii or anywhere else that is trying to tax my income based on sales from their state. That's taxation without representation. And it stinks.

 

Just like the politician in the article above said:

 

“When I talked to one state official, I said ‘you’re a CPA.’ ‘Yes, sir. I am.’ ‘You’re a business owner.’ ‘Yes.’ ‘You’re an entrepreneur.’ ‘Yes, sir.’ ‘You’re also a state senator.’ ‘Yes, sir. I am.’ ‘And you understand how disruptive this is?’ ‘Yes, I do.’ ‘Why are you doing this to us?’ ‘Because you don’t vote for me.’

 

NO REPRESENTATION.

 

BTW so far as the refund between years, if you bought from a store they should refund your full amount if they allow the refund at all. How they account for the tax after the fact is their issue. Almost all state returns I have seen allow for credits/returns, and it's the companies job to file correctly. They'll just deduct it from a future return. If you're talking about money you sent in voluntarily to your state, well, good luck.

 

 

[Defender II]

On 1/12/2020 at 8:59 AM, GoldenWheels said:

Now that they changed the law, yes they do. But it goes directly against the idea of having representation.

 

Doing business in a state used to mean actually being in the state (having a physical presence, actual residents with a congressman and a senator, which likely also meant you could vote and lobby for relief). Now it doesn't. I can't go and vote in any of these states taxing my business for income. Just the home state of my business (where we have ALWAYS paid our income taxes), which doesn't affect those other states at all. So now it really IS taxation without representation.

 

I have no ability to vote in Washington State to not have to pay a "Business and Occupation Tax" (income tax), or in Texas with the franchise tax (another income tax), or in Hawaii or anywhere else that is trying to tax my income based on sales from their state. That's taxation without representation. And it stinks.

 

Just like the politician in the article above said:

 

“When I talked to one state official, I said ‘you’re a CPA.’ ‘Yes, sir. I am.’ ‘You’re a business owner.’ ‘Yes.’ ‘You’re an entrepreneur.’ ‘Yes, sir.’ ‘You’re also a state senator.’ ‘Yes, sir. I am.’ ‘And you understand how disruptive this is?’ ‘Yes, I do.’ ‘Why are you doing this to us?’ ‘Because you don’t vote for me.’

 

NO REPRESENTATION.

 

BTW so far as the refund between years, if you bought from a store they should refund your full amount if they allow the refund at all. How they account for the tax after the fact is their issue. Almost all state returns I have seen allow for credits/returns, and it's the companies job to file correctly. They'll just deduct it from a future return. If you're talking about money you sent in voluntarily to your state, well, good luck.

 

 

I don't like all of these taxes either but that's how we pay for our government. International trade and interstate commerce are controlled federally so you do have representation. If your representatives don't vote the way you want, you can work to vote them out or run for office yourself (not an easy thing to do). You can refuse to do business in any state that collects sales tax or income tax when you don't live there.

[+GoldenWheels]

19 hours ago, Defender II said:

I don't like all of these taxes either but that's how we pay for our government. International trade and interstate commerce are controlled federally so you do have representation. If your representatives don't vote the way you want, you can work to vote them out or run for office yourself (not an easy thing to do). You can refuse to do business in any state that collects sales tax or income tax when you don't live there.

"That's how we pay for our government". You seem to misunderstand those other states are not MY government, and that is the POINT (They're not mine, so I have NO representation). And maybe they shouldn't be getting so much, considering how much they piss away. I know, I know, 'roads and hospitals'. None goes to politicians who support their supporters with our cash, bad programs, pointless initiatives, crony deals, and waste. It's all those roads and hospitals we have.

 

My federal representatives have no influence on how other individual states conceive of, develop, and implement these types of taxes. It was a STATE (South Dakota) that started this with the Supreme Court case....a state I have no voting representation in, and in which I could only represent my self in by counter-suing ($$$) . It was not a federally mandated process through congress or anything similar where I could lobby my congress people (which, I in fact did anyway, advising them what an asinine regressive law it is). Good for Wayfair for fighting...and look at all the good it did them. A big lawyer bill and nothing else. Representation is not supposed to be defined as having enough money to hire a lawyer.

 

And yes, I could cut off my nose to spite my face, and refuse to do business in any state who does this. That would limit my business from 50 states to less than 10,and lessen it significantly, putting people out of work. All of this over a a longstanding precedent the court flipped off like a light switch, so state governments can get their hands on more of their citizen's cash. But I guess I should have dropped our war chest on a law case like Wayfair did. I sure would have been "represented".

[krslam]

I've never heard of Washington charging a B&O tax to someone who's just an ebay seller from another state.  There must be something more to your story.

[R.Cade]

I think this does level the playing field with online vs local seales. However I am against punitive and excessive taxation. I believe that taxing sales of used items is wrong. The tax has already been paid. The way the system works now, every dolllar is taxed over and over again whenever it is exchanged, and I think that is wrong.

 

Edited January 25, 2020 by R.Cade

[+GoldenWheels]

2 hours ago, krslam said:

I've never heard of Washington charging a B&O tax to someone who's just an ebay seller from another state.  There must be something more to your story.

I never claimed to be an ebayer, and I wrote quite a story on the previous page, so I am trying not to overdo it but I lost an entire year to this bullshit so it is very hard for me not to vent. But the ebayers are very likely being affected by the same law my business was.

 

The Wayfair decision that was passed is what gives Washington state a good case to, theoretically, send the lawyers after you and have a case on the B&O. While B&O was the law previously, they had absolutely no legal standing AFAIK to actually enforce the nexus of it on a business from outside the state. The Wayfair case actually established the "nexus" that now gives them legal backing. Nexus for Wayfair gave their WA state's "nexus" law for B&O far legal legitimacy. Because remote nexus is now a federally recognized thing.

 

And beyond that, now that businesses with over 100k (the WA state nexus limit) must register there to collect and remit tax, WA state has leverage on those business. If they don't pay the B&O and are required to (and they are lowering the B&O value to $100k annually to match the economic nexus law as of 2020), they can revoke your sales tax license.

 

EDIT: removed a bit about WA state using 200 transactions as part of the nexus law as well...they removed that this year. Another good example of the confusion Wayfair made as states SCRAMBLED to write laws fast JUST to get them dollars....for 3/4 year businesses doing biz in WA state had to file if they had 200 transaction OR 100k in sales. Now it is just 100k in sales. That law was on the book for 3/4 year. So for that period, if you had more than 200 sales, you had to register your business to collect and remit tax. Now you don't. But those small businesses (some ebayers?)had to either register, or be a scofflaw. Now some of them maybe are collecting taxes they don't HAVE TO. Good on the state for realizing the 200 transactions was silly and likely to only hurt small businesses and ebay type sellers. But it would have been great if they THOUGHT about that before they passed them.

 

[+GoldenWheels]

And I am sorry if I come off salty guys. This is something I just shouldn't talk about, I've just spent so much time dealing with the process this year. I normally have no problem paying my fair share, and even when I feel it's a little unfair, I understand the idea and appreciate some of the goals. But the states and feds can't often even make laws that are clear, consistent, or easy to comply with, so I can do that. Every state has unique tax rates, tax systems, and laws. it's nuts!

 

If there's an everywhere sales tax now, ok, fine. Businesses have to adapt. But jeez could it be one flat rate for the country and remitted to a central system? It would have been so easy that way.

[Defender II]

On 1/25/2020 at 3:00 PM, GoldenWheels said:

And I am sorry if I come off salty guys. This is something I just shouldn't talk about, I've just spent so much time dealing with the process this year. I normally have no problem paying my fair share, and even when I feel it's a little unfair, I understand the idea and appreciate some of the goals. But the states and feds can't often even make laws that are clear, consistent, or easy to comply with, so I can do that. Every state has unique tax rates, tax systems, and laws. it's nuts!

 

If there's an everywhere sales tax now, ok, fine. Businesses have to adapt. But jeez could it be one flat rate for the country and remitted to a central system? It would have been so easy that way.

The more tax laws the Fed & State have the more inconsistencies that are created. Some states have it set up to just default follow federal law to reduce rewriting tax code for every Federal change. I fully support removing as many taxes as possible. Keep as much money local. I would love to see a flat tax on sales and income, but so many incentives are built into Federal and State tax laws to encourage this or that.