Midway now charging sales tax.

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If an online retailer charges you state taxes, its its your state thats the problem. As stated Midway is just following the law. I have no sales tax here, I pay no additional taxes at checkout...

I agree - its unfair to local brick and mortar businesses if online sales escape taxes... but regardless when it comes to most gun things online retailers like Midway absolutely are waaay below them on price and Midway makes huge donations to the NRA and is a great company to buy from generally.
 
Businesses collecting sales tax simplifies things for me at tax time. Had to tally all the out of state purchases anyway and figure the applicable tax be tax compliant. Most people never bothered (and were "cheating" on their taxes unawares) since the code wasn't enforced.
 
reddotlight said:
In any case, i will categorize this as extortion, A lot of these companies tax their Customers and use that Money to pay tax they are suppose to pay. i know a lot of people that don't check their purchase receipts. they don't even know.
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Could you clarify what you're trying to say? Are you saying that you think the vendors are supposed to absorb the sales tax out of their advertised prices? That's what I think you're saying and, if so, I think you are incorrect.

If I go into Walmart down the road from me and I pick up an item that's marked $10, when I take that to the register I pay $10.60. The extra 60 cents is the state sales tax -- Walmart doesn't absorb it, I pay it. That's how sales tax works.

Once in awhile the owner of my friendly local range and gun shop will round off and just charge me a round number, such as $25, for something that should cost me a total of $25.xx or $26.xx. In such instances, he is absorbing the tax, and somewhere down the road he has to go back and recalculate the "selling price" so that it works out to the correct total with tax. That's an accommodation on his part. He doesn't have to do it, he doesn't do it every time, and I don't expect him to do it.

I certainly wouldn't expect Midway or Brownells to do it.
 
Should have always been the case but online shopping has slipped through the cracks.
You should be paying sales tax for your state if applicable.
Just like driving across state lines to avoid sales tax is a no-no if you are taking the item to a sales tax state... just not really enforced.
You should eventually see all Internet sales taxed as required soon.
 
I have a friend who bought a fairly expensive item - a high-end camera, if I recall correctly - and had the state contact him about paying the sales tax. They did some kind of audit that turned him up, and he had to pay the tax and a penalty for not having volunteered it.

Not collecting and paying sales tax gives an unfair advantage to an online seller over a local brick and mortar shop. As internet sales continue to increase, I expect to see state revenue agencies become more aggressive about enforcement; if they don't they are going to have to increase taxes somewhere else or become, horrors!, more efficient in their expenditures.
 
The best thing Bill Clinton did was leave the internet alone and not make it a source of revenue. It probably really helped the net (along with porn) get established and grow at a rapid pace. Alas, it had to happen eventually. Hope you enjoyed it while it lasted.
 
In any case, i will categorize this as extortion, A lot of these companies tax their Customers and use that Money to pay tax they are suppose to pay. i know a lot of people that don't check their purchase receipts. they don't even know.
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Seriously? Sorry, but how old are you? You really do not seem to have any grasp on what is involved with a business and the dealings with government. Do you thing that your employer (I'm assuming you have a job) only has employee costs equal to your hourly wage?
It is absolutely amazing how some folks have no idea how any of this works.
 
Mr. Elkins, they do not represent me. They are supposed to represent me but they don't. It's still taxation without representation.
 
In any case, i will categorize this as extortion,
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In case no one ever told you this before, TAXES are extortion.

When the government does it, its called taxation and it is legal. So legal that if you don't pay, YOU are the criminal.

If a private individual or group does it, they call it extortion, and the government says it is illegal.
 
44_AMP said:
In any case, i will categorize this as extortion,
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In case no one ever told you this before, TAXES are extortion.

When the government does it, its called taxation and it is legal. So legal that if you don't pay, YOU are the criminal.

If a private individual or group does it, they call it extortion, and the government says it is illegal.
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In the case of Midway collecting sales tax on internet sales, however, it's important to note that Midway is not the extortionist. The government is doing the extorting. The government has simply delegated to merchants the role of collecting sales tax on behalf of the state(s). Midway doesn't get anything out of it -- they have to turn around and send the money to the various states who demand that Midway act as their collection agent.

As others have already commented, we were always supposed to pay sales tax in mail order purchases, but there was no mechanism to enforce it, so the government let it slide. The free ride has ended, that's all.
 
Get use to it, it will be the norm. Besides, it's a bit fairer when it comes to competition with the local mom & pop stores.
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This^^^. (bold is my own emphasis.)

Please consider, before cutting ties with Midway USA is the literally $millions they have put in to direct NRA donations and their unforgiving attempts to urge customers to donate and the pioneering efforts they've made for this cause with their ingenious NRA Round-Up program
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And this^^^.

Not doing business with Midway would be cutting off my nose to spite my face.
 
The SCOTUS ruling on internet sales tax:

The highest U.S. court made the decision after South Dakota in 2016 filed a lawsuit against major pure-play online retailers Wayfair W +0% , Overstock.com and Newegg regarding state tax collection. Thursday's ruling in effect overturned a prior court decision in 1992 that had given a sales tax advantage to online retailers.


In the majority opinion written by Justice Anthony Kennedy, the Supreme Court said times have changed to such a degree that online retailers no longer qualify for “an arbitrary advantage over their competitors who collect state sales taxes” by claiming they don’t have a physical presence in a state.

“The internet’s prevalence and power have changed the dynamics of the national economy,” Justice Kennedy wrote. He added that internet players not collecting sales tax have cost states as much as $33 billion in sales tax revenue each year.
 
BarryLee said:
Amazon charges sales tax and their business seems to be doing fine. If you oppose more taxation don't blame your fellow citizens blame your elected officials.
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I order a lot of stuff from Amazon and whether they charge sales tax or not depends on who is supplying the product and their location. I pay sales tax on some items and don't on others. You don't know until you go to checkout.
 
Great. I'm fully in favor of online sales being charged sales tax at the local rate. It was totally unreasonable and self destructive to give out of state sales an automatic price advantage equal to the local sales tax amount
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The problem for businesses is determining what that rate is and what is applies to. There are over 20,000 different sales tax rates across the country. I used to work for the software vendor of the largest sales and use tax software in the country. Determining exactly what tax to collect and how properly remit it is a huge (and costly) undertaking.

Add to that the issue of "what" is taxable. Granted, with shooting stuff the answer is probably going to be "everything" but with other types of merchandise the answer is "depends". For example: If a person walks into a Florida grocery store and buys a box of breakfast bars that would be an exempt transaction because Fl doesn't tax groceries. However, if a person walks into a convenience store and buys just ONE breakfast bar then that is a taxable transaction because FL taxes snack items. You multiply that kind of political whimsy across all the taxing jurisdictions and you have a complete mess on your hands.

The true solution to all of this would be for Congress to step in and create a uniform system of rules that would apply uniformly to all out-of-state sales (which Congress could legally due because the Constitution gives the federal government the power to regulate interstate commerce).
 
Well if the old taxes were collected then we might not need new taxes. I’m not in favor of many of the taxes we have; but if we have them, might as well collect them.

I just live my life like I’m gonna get taxed and then if I don’t great.
 
Well if the old taxes were collected then we might not need new taxes.
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If the old laws were enforced we might not need new ones??

Good luck convincing current politicians of that..:D

Collecting tax newly being required by LAW (court order, etc.) is not the fault of the business. They don't have a choice.

This is a much different situation than the "Hazmat Charges" added some years ago. Those are a case of the industry voluntarily sticking the consumer with an additional fee and blaming the Government.

If you didn't boycott your supplier for that, you shouldn't, for this.
 
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