Write Your Congressman -- They want to Tax Your Email!!!

[MikeH]

It's included in the price of your purchases. Same as in a shop. The price advertised and that you pay include tax. All retailers have VAT systems in place for dealing with getting the VAT to the government as a consumer you don't see it.

[The Mad Monk]

Including overseas purchases?

[MikeH]

Overseas purchases are different, and the tax is different. In practice if you buy something over the net and they deliver it by post you won't have to pay the VAT but customs could make you if they had the manpower to do it.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by MikeH
We already have to pay VAT (sales tax) on internet purchases in the UK. Always have had to. You have to pay tax on whatever you buy, doesn't matter where it is.

And you have a nationalized sales (VAT) tax here in Mexico as well, but in the US it's taxed separately at the state level, with no Federal oversight at all.

[The Mad Monk]

Yep -- and as long as both buyer and seller are physically in the same state, there's no problem, but once they start taxing interstate transactions, I can just see the interstate lawsuits start to roll in.