AUGUSTA, Maine — Gov. Paul LePage is urging passage of a bill in Congress that would allow states to collect tax on sales over the Internet, but 1st District Rep. Chellie Pingree is the only member of Maine’s delegation that supports the bill.
The rest of the delegation says they are not convinced.
“I signed on to the bill,” Pingree said. “It’s really a reflection of what is going on with Internet sales. I think it provides some equity for Main Street businesses.”
The legislation, called the Marketplace Fairness Act, was endorsed by LePage in March and he urged members of Maine’s congressional delegation to give the measure “strong support” because it would mean the state would be able to collect sales taxes from big online retailers such as Amazon.com.
“A damaging inequity exists in the retail marketplace because some online retailers are not required to collect Maine sales tax, but Maine retailers are,” LePage said. “Not only does this hurt Maine businesses, it hurts the state.”
LePage is convinced if local retailers could compete on an equal playing field when it comes to sales taxes, it would bolster the state economy and increase tax revenue. He stressed the measure would not mean new taxes but better enforcement of existing tax law.
“All I am proposing here is collecting taxes that are already owed the state,” he said.
That is because the sales tax is defined in law as a sales and use tax. You owe the 5 percent tax for either buying that new television online or for using it in Maine.
A University of Kentucky study estimates Maine will lose at least $32 million this year from sales and use taxes because of Internet sales on which no taxes are collected. That may be a low estimate with Internet sales up 15 percent nationally this last holiday season.
“There is no denying that passing the bill would give thousands of small Maine businesses a real boost,” LePage said.
But while Pingree agrees with LePage, his arguments have not convinced the other three members of the delegation to support the measure.
“Now that this bill has been rewritten to exempt very small businesses that are mainly home-based businesses, I am more open to this bill,” said Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, “but I still want to take a further look at it.”
Collins said she has met with Maine business owners and agrees with the goal of the legislation but wants to hold further meetings with Senate sponsors of the bill and have her staff further analyze the measure before she is ready to endorse it.
“I met with store owners from Maine that have given me several examples of unfair competition they are facing,” she said.
Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, said she is still uncertain about the bill. She said although the sales tax should be paid by consumers now, the facts are that the tax is not being collected.
“It could present a problem to the overall economy,” she said. “I have a concern about what amounts to a tax increase overall at this point in time.”
Snowe said she understands the fairness argument by retailers but she also is hearing from some that the exemption for small companies, with sales of less than $500,000 a year, is not enough and that it should be a higher amount.
“I will continue to work on these issues and consider what changes might be proposed,” she said.
Rep. Mike Michaud said he has not taken a position on the bill and is still reviewing its provisions. He said he will devote more time to the issue if it looks like it will be considered by the House this summer but he doubts that will happen.
“I have been focused on other pieces of legislation that will be on the floor for a vote,” he said. “I don’t see the House leadership bringing this up for a vote.”
Michaud said he understands the fairness issues that have been raised by Maine retailers but he is not ready to support the measure.
The issue is a high priority for some Maine lawmakers who backed a measure similar to one adopted by other states that asserts the state’s right to collect sales tax from companies that have no physical presence such as a store or warehouse in the state. Those measures are being challenged in federal courts.
The Maine legislation passed the Senate in the closing days of the session but failed in the House.
Go ahead, pick a Clown !!
The two top choices(?) are pictured above.
In case these two are too unpalatable , there are more in the wings.
Just waiting to pounce.
Worse than Zombies or punks in hoodys.
So much for Mr. LePage being against tax increases. Boooo.
Taxes on the rich are a sin. Taxes on the rest of us are always justified. Politicians have to make up for the revenue not coming out of their friends’ pockets.
That man is nothing but a liar. He has proved it time and time again.
They are ALL liars!
We keep hearing the Tea Party Parrots screaming about tax and spend Liberals. All one has to do is look at LePage’s budget to see that he actually is spending more then Baldacci did. And now he is in favor of another tax. Could it be that LePage has become a tax and spend Tea Party Parrot?
But he needs to raise the money to pay for his buddy Poliquins Ocean Front Tree Farm and Vigues East West Highway Study!
Agreed Dlbrt. Where else is planning on getting the $300 K for that supposed ‘Feasibility Study’ ?
How about this: get rid of the sales tax! NH does fine without it…
So you’d rather pay property taxes? That’s what they do in NH.
Sure, that would be fine: as long as we can keep more locally, which is how it works in NH. The high property taxes in NH are also a result of having no income tax as well. Either way, the total tax is much less, which means we in Maine should be thinking about how to spend less, not collect more.
NH also has less expenses as a smaller state by area, with fewer roads, less area to cover for various services, and better economies of scale to provide them to the population. They also are closer to Boston and it’s economy.
If you want to spend less, that is a policy decision- but property taxes are some of the most unfair because they do not account for people’s ability to pay them, unlike sales taxes.
I don’t think our budget crisis and high tax burden is due to an astronomical highway department cost…
There are a LOT of people who work in MA and live in NH.Boston Globe went into parking lots of MA companies and tracked out of state plates.Incredible but 100% legal.
Unfair taxes-what about the tax breaks for people who have gigantic families?My brother is childless and works a nonunion job.He pays through the nose while his neighbor with 5 kids has plenty of toys(expensive toys like a boat and a few ATVs, etc.not kid’s toys)
And your childless brother pays for his neighbors children’s education through his property taxes
Geez, I pay property taxes AND sales tax
Income tax… Don’t foget the income tax… that one REALLY miffs me.
You could always not work and just invest. Capital gains are taxed at a much lower rate. So much for “hard work pays off” right?
I tried that once. After a day or two I got pretty hungry waiting for my investments to pay off.
You went about it wrong,
You need to buy up Companies , put them into debt ,pocket the cash and run like h311!
my point too Dlbrt..we can make up a great deal more that that piddling $32 million per year wth a few tax code revisions that penalize profiteers and exploiters instead of rewarding them…by not giving tax credit to those who promise and donn’t actually provide any jobs.
Where does Donald Sussman’s private plane live? Where does Donald live? Did he pay a use tax on that plane? Does Chellie stand up for and enforce use tax reporting on who can imagine what luxury items they bring back to Maine from their exotic travel and life style. Who knows maybe we could make up a good part of that lost $32 million out of the Sussman Pinngree household alone.
Oh. You must not have invested enough in a politician who could get some earmarks for you.
Tax the rich. Leave the rest of us alone.
Is that your answer for everything? Tax $1M-plus earners at 85% and you still wont fix the budget. The only revenue solution is the middle class, or cut programs. I vote for the latter, but it will have to be a little of both…
Since our country has lost its democracy due to legalized bribery called “lobbying” which is primarily perpetrated by the ultra-rich, and because the ultra-rich have quadrupled their wealth while the rest of us are sinking (a sign of a sick non-free-market economy), and because they will continue to put hundreds of millions of dollars into propaganda, not to mention owning their own international media conglomerates (for example, Rupert Murdoch owns Fox and scores of other media–he was recently ruled “unfit” to manage by Great Britain, did you know?), and because people like you will fall for their propaganda and continue to be attack dogs, blaming your fellow citizens, especially the poor–for all these reasons and a great many more, yes, we should tax the rich. It will be the first step toward breaking the plutocracy that is strangling our once great country.
Since when have I attacked anyone? By suggesting taxing the rich is no solution? Raise taxes on the rich, fine. It won’t solve anything. Just a punitive measure to make you feel better, but it won’t change a thing…
By the way, I’ve voted Democrat in every election since I turned 18, so keep your generalizations to yourself. I’m an atheist, social liberal. But I’m also a fiscal moderate and a realist. If that makes me an evil enabler of the “plutocracy”, so be it.
Okay, I changed “attacking” to “blaming” in the above entry–but Republicans blame the poor when the poor are actually fallout from the real problem: the rich have greedily accumulated a huge share of the wealth of this country. You could double their taxes right now and it would still leave them with double their income from a decade ago.
When the Republicans blame the poor–many of whom are ex-middle class people who work very hard and yet can’t afford a doctor (because of Greedy Hospitals, Insurance companies and Big Pharma) they are so wrong and unfair that it is the equivalent of an attack. It’s like punching someone who has already been knocked down.
Meanwhile the rich own ten mansion apiece, a couple yachts, a private plane or two, and they want more and more and more. And they are not ethical about it. Although Fox News tells you democrats are to blame, the fact is that Wall Street destroyed our economy in 2008 through deceptive and reckless trading. They were bailed out with our taxpayer money, which is basically socialism for the rich.
Tax ’em. Even eliminating the Bush tax cuts (remember W, under whose policies our country sunk down down down?) would save trillions of dollars. Use the extra money to create jobs. Even communist China has a better transportation system than us, a superfast monorail, the equivalent of New York to Texas in a few hours.
America is becoming a dinosaur in terms of infrastructure, energy grid configuration, education for its youth, social mobility (far worse than Europe) and so on and on and on. We have the wealth distribution of an African dictatorship and similar corruption.
One in four people can’t afford a doctor in America. I know people with cancer who can’t afford, and I know people going blind who can’t afford and they worked hard all their lives and I hear Republicans clap and laugh when someone in their GOP rally audience says something like, “They deserve it, let ’em die, the welfare bums.”
Reading your comments is like looking at Soviet-era art and being lectured to about the wonders of dialectic materialism.
Spot on…
You start with taxing the rich but then advocate eliminating the Bush tax cuts. Eliminating the Bush tax cuts would raise income tax on a family of four making $40,000 by $4,447.
math is not posters strength.
I start off by saying Tax the rich and no one else. Is it impossible for you to even grasp the concept? I’ll say it again:
“TAX THE RICH. LEAVE THE REST OF US ALONE.”
Eliminating the Bush tax cuts, FOR THE RICH, will save us trillions of dollars.
Assuming no effect on the economy (questionable), eliminating the Bush tax cuts for the “rich” (those making $250K+/joint) will yield ~$110B/year. Eliminating cuts for the middle class as well will yield an additional $220B/year.
No, the middle class prime the economy with their spending. The rich don’t spend their surplus, they hoard it or take it overseas. There is also the corruption factor, which you continue to ignore. We live in a plutocracy. Again, the rich have quadrupled their wealth, and democracy has been lost to legalized bribery. Also, I recommend the book, “Winner Take All Politics.” And also the Oscar-winning documentary, “Inside Job.”
I’m just stating the facts: not sure what the “corruption” comment has to do with Bush tax cuts and how much revenue will be gained by rolling them back. I was simply responding to your claim that it will save “trillions”. Maybe: over decades.
By the way, I favor rolling back the Bush tax cuts simply because we need to get the budget under control. Either that or drastic cuts to social services. The facts are clear: you can’t solve our problems by taxing the rich alone.
Supposedly, we have a graduated income tax, which should mean that the more that someone earns, the more that they pay within the framework of the tax brackets. That, though, is not what really happens.
The “effective tax rate” is what is actually paid and in that respect, my wife and I pay a much greater proportion of our middle class income (which is eroding lower, not relatively rising) than the very wealthy.
President Obama campaigned in 2008 to rescind the Bush tax cuts on income over $250,000.00 and then offered a compromise to the Congressional Republicans that elimination would apply to income earned after the first million, but that was rejected. A deal was made to temporarily extend the Bush tax cuts, but now the GOP is promoting that they be “permanently” extended.
I do not advocate taxing the very wealthy ($1,000,000.00 plus) at 60%, 70%, 80%, etc., if they have earned their money honestly and ethically (on that score we should be jailing and fining into bankruptcy a lot of financial and business operatives, as well as their political allies in both parties). In fact I am not certain what is the appropriate tax rate.
What I do know is that the very wealthy are not paying their fair share, that the income gap between wealthy and middle class has been and continues to exponentially widen, that the so-called benefits of the increasing movement toward laissez-faire capitalism have not “trickled down” (think of the definition of trickle) to working class and mid-income professionals, and that the truly poor and needy are being made scapegoats for the worsening plight of the middle class, and many middle class are buying into the propaganda.
Good to see you, please visit us more!
“the Oscar-winning documentary, “Inside Job.” That is almost as meaningful as Obama’s pre-anything Nobel prize.
Is it impossible for you to even grasp the concept? I’ll say it again: “TAKE 100% OF WHAT THE RICH MAKE AND WE WOULD STILL BE BROKE’
Once you have done that, who then would you blame for your failed thinking and predictably failing social experiment ?
yup, it’s clear you wish someone else to pay your way.
the Bush tax cuts were primary for the rich and if you don’t see that…………..go back to reading the history of that administration.
not true.
Thus the $4,447 cut for a family of four making $40,000?
Republicans do not blame the poor for anything so you have now resorted to lying to make your point. Let me do the same – democrats blame the rich for everything and they want to confiscate all of their assets and throw them in jail. Makes about as much sense as you do.
“You know, people are poor in America … not
because they lack money; they’re poor because they lack values, morals and ethics. And if government can’t teach and instill that, we’re wasting our time simply giving poor people money.”
first we need an admin with values,morals and ethics.Stealing from producers to give to non producers is non of the above.
Foe one who fancy them self so bright, you really are dense.
take all that the rich make and own and we would still be broke, then what would you do old wise one?
Let me tell you what the democrats and liberals have done for you larry, because you obviously do not understand economics, lets go with truths.
The GI Bill
Endangered Species Act
Environmental Laws
The Space Program
The Peace Corps
Americorps
The Civil Rights Movement
Earned Income Tax Credit
Family & Medical Leave Act
Consumer Product Safety Commission
Americans With Disabilities Act
Freedom of Information Act
Women’s right to control their reproductive future
Allowing citizens to view their own credit records
The Internet
Balancing the federal budget
The Brady Bill (5-day wait on handgun purchases for background checks)
Lobbying Disclosure Act
“Motor-Voter” Act
The Voting Rights Act
Unemployment Insurance
Medicare/Medicaid
Food Stamps/WIC
Social Security
Peace between Israel and Egypt
Peace between Israel and Jordan
The Department of Education
The Department of Energy
The Department of Transportation
The Department of Housing and Urban Development
Labor Laws
The Marshall Plan
Winning World War II
Food Safety Laws
Workplace Safety Laws
The Tennessee Valley Project
The Civilian Conservation Corps
The Securites and Exchange Commission
Women’s Right to Vote
Universal Public Education
National Weather Service
Product Labeling Laws
Truth in Advertising Laws
Morrill Land Grant Act
Rural Electrification
Public Universities
Bank Deposit Insurance (FDIC)
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Public Broadcasting
Supporting the establishment of Israel
The United Nations
NATOI am sure I am missing something. Feel free to add to the list. But it goes without saying, every single leap forward over the last century has been the result of Democratic, Liberal and Progressive policies, positions and goals. Every step backward is most assuredly the result of Republican and Conservative policies, positions and goals.So yes, everyone, the Republicans are right. The Democrats have no plans for the future and have done nothing in the past, aside from protecting people from pollution, racial discrimination, barriers to the handicapped, dangerous products, poisonous food, bank failure, hazardous workplaces, overwork, unemployment, handguns, extreme poverty, hunger, and deadly diseases; and aside from providing public education, money for college, balanced budgets, the right to vote, a decent retirement, electricity, the Internet, time off for family, access to government and credit records, and the best examples of peace and diplomacy in our time.What have the liberals ever done for us?Everything.
Wow ,another one.
You,also, have managed to avoid the topic of stealing all the wealth the “Rich” make or possess ,and how little it would do to solve our woes. It would temporarily assuage your feelings of inadequacy and jealousy ,but only support our bloated Gov. for a short period of time.I dont really blame you, but delaying might give you a chance for all to forget that you have no rebuttal.
Since you went through all the effort ,why not.
You bring up a couple big ones and they show how simple you are, lets talk about them.
The right to vote and Civil rights.
Go look at the truth of the Dem’s/Lib/Progressives record on Suffrage and slavery/Civil rights. Not the watered down altered public School version of history, but actual history. then get back to us.
As for your list, I would encourage the continued use of this, obviously well thought out , list of Liberal/progressive accomplishments in attempts to further the liberal cause. The silly misrepresentations are grand, but it is the actual “accomplishments” I would be most happy to see progressives use as a base for their platform.
Please hold out,as shinning examples of your accomplishments things like The Department of Education ,The Department of Energy,The Department of Transportation,The Department of Housing and Urban Development,The United Nations,Public Broadcasting.
Please oh pretty please use these.
Nothing funnier than giving and “educated” fool a forum. You have not disappointed.
I’m sure that RF won’t look up and find that it was LBJ who said,
“We will have them n*$$ers voting Democrats for 200 years!” That was the start of our decay. In the 50’s, blacks had less out of wedlock births and more single mothers than whites.
Great list! Thanks for sharing. I hope you bring this list up again sometime in other forums. People need to see it.
“Thank you for sharing.”
Sounds like something a kindergarten teacher would say to each child after “Show & Tell”.
I think this is the first time I’ve seen some called-out for being polite! Funny that “sharing” should be something just for kindergarteners.
I guess I always considered that more condescending than polite.
A large part of this list did not NEED to be done by governmet, if at all. Much of it could have been, would have been, should have been done by private enterprise in a free market and we all would have been better off if it was or if were done so in the future. Good examples of this are: The Space program, rural electrification, the national weather service and deposit insurance.
And the internet? Seriously? That is based on a government research project and military technology that was given up to the private sector, where innovative producers and creative individuals took it to heights of utilization and innovation that could never have been achieved had the government not stepped back. Not to mention that the Internet as we know it only exists because an enlightened judge shattered a government maintained “natural monopoly” by breaking up AT&T -much to the horror and outrage of liberals- creating a (reletively) unregulated market that fostered innovation and new technologies.
If the DOD had not created ARPANET, there is little question that in a free market environment the internet or something very much like it would have still come into existance.
The United Nations? You seriously consider that a “win”? Balancing the federal budget? What? Stripped of accounting gimmicks, there hasn’t been a balanced federal budget since the 1920’s. Claiming World War II as a liberal “win” is sort of Hubris, don’t you think? The woman’s right to vote was oposed by as many progressives and liberals as supported it for the longest time. Public broadcasting, if it ever served a public good, which is debatable, has certainly become beside the point in the age of a billion media choices. The GI Bill has as many conservatives to thank for its’ existance as liberals and let’s not forget that it was Liberals who GUTTED the program in the sixties and seventies due to their hatred of anything having to do with the military. As I recall, it was REPUBLICAN senators who made passage of the voting rights act and other sixties era civil rights laws possible. Southern Democrats worked aggressively to block their passage. Public universities are a requirement of statehood and have been for centuries. Hardly a liberal accomplishment. Look at the Obama administrations record, or any other administrations record on FOIA and tell me that liberals really believe in it.
As for the rest of your list, lets see what it looks like when you remove all the genuinely bad ideas and the things the government didn’t need to do…
Women’s right to control their reproductive future
Lobbying Disclosure Act
Unemployment Insurance
Peace between Israel and Egypt
Peace between Israel and Jordan
Labor Laws
The Marshall Plan
Food Safety Laws
Workplace Safety Laws
Universal Public Education
Product Labeling Laws
Truth in Advertising Laws
Bank Deposit Insurance (FDIC)
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Not as impressive as you made it seem, it seems.
100% in agreement with you Spruce!!!!
There are 25 lobbyists for each member of congress. Wouldn’t it be nice if you and I had that kind of access to our s0-called elected officials?
Wouldn’t it be nice if congress worked for America and not for those legalized bribers otherwise known as lobbyists handing out “campaign contributions”? Who lobbies for us if not congress?
It’s not just the elected official’s that’s the problem. Congress combined has 435 member’s. That’s nothing compared to the huge number of Federal Official’s that are bombarded everyday by Special Interest lobbyist’s that masquerade as vendor’s who ply DC’s corridor’s, not so subtly ‘negotiating’ for Gov’t contract’s, all the while slipping private payment’s to these same Official’s in return for their Contracting Official’s signature on purchase order’s and production contract’s. The recent GSA mooseroping was only the most graphic example of this type. DoD is far worse in potential since most of this is kept quiet under the guise of ‘National Security’. If the public ever got a hold of the severity of this, well, there isin’t enough rope in the Country for the ole` West necktie party that would be called for ! And that it goes on at all is more than shame since the various Inspector’s General are out there to put a specific stop to this nonsense. Make me wonder just what they are doing ?
Hooray..we need more and more and more plutocracy breakers..I am with you all the way SpruceDweller!!!
Chellie, it seems likes the lifestyle of the plutocracy..and wants to protect it.
See how you managed to not address the point, which was that we could confiscate 100% of the income from “the rich” and we would still be screwed. In fact you could confiscate everything that “the rich” own and we still would be screwed. No more rich people and no one would ever be rich , ever again and we would run the Government with all of that money for almost 2 full years. Great idea you have their All knowing One.
Who’s a brain washed attack dog now. so many times you are shown the error of your thinking yet you still consider yourself so clever.
The problem comes from government colluding with private business. That’s corporatism, not capitalism. As far as the special favors, bailouts, etc. I’m with you, but we shouldn’t begrudge those who are wealthy for that alone.
Governor LePage is getting WAY OFF HIS ORIGINAL MESSAGE.
This is NOT about cutting the size of government, the number of state employees, or, making government work better for all of us by reducing the burden of government.
THIS IS GOVERNOR LEPAGE LOOKING FOR MORE TAX REVENUE, WHICH MEANS INCREASING TAXES.
I supported this guy for governor? What happened?
I still see the road crews hanging around in bunches of four to six, with no one doing any work.
I still see the Maine Arts Commission -that gave us that $60,000 labor mural everyone liked so much- I see they’re still getting the public money to pay their commissioner $100k a year plus benefits.
I still see LURC has SIX COMMISSIONERS!
AND GOVERNOR LEPAGE WANTS TO RAISE TAXES????
Is that you Grover?
Get over it!
Yep. He wants to raise taxes. One more lie from a politician who claims to be different from the “bought and paid for” politicos. And the sad part: some of the people still think he’s not just like Baldacci, or Michaud, or Snowe or Collins.
The Koch brothers bought him when they saw him at Marden’s . . . a little shop-worn, but in their eyes, a real bargain.
This is not about a new tax or raising taxes … this is about a more effective way of collecting an existing tax. Sometimes i wonder if people know how to read.
Your argument: This is already an existing tax as established by law.
Counterargument: LePage is asking Congress to pass a new law that is required to collect these taxes.
Therefore, you are wrong.
Incredibly moronic statement. The taxes are already collected, unless you foolishly and illegally don’t pay them. They are just putting the onus on business to collect them. Instead of you paying the state directly.
You do pay your taxes don’t you?
Cheese cake..the existing and long standing law of the land is that a state may not regulate or impose its laws on businesses not present in that state. It may only regulate or impose its laws on buisnesses doing business within the state. This thing Chellie is supporting at Le Page’s request is a dramatic and unwise change in existing law and sets a very bad precedent ( I doubt that it will go any where and Chellie must know that too..can’t imagine what she is up to in publicly associating herself with such nonsense).
The use tax is an existing law. http://www.state.me.us/revenue/salesuse/use%20tax.htm#indhow
That is a within state tax applying to citizens under Maine’s jurisdiction.
It has just ocurred to me this can’t be good for big Maine employers and old line businesses like LL Beans.. Their nation wide internet sales which make whatever jobs they still provide in Maine possible will be impaired by the adminsitrative costs of collecting others states taxes and remitting them. They will have to reduce profits or raise the price of goods to absorb this cost. Is that good for “main Street” It has to cost quite a bit for company like Beans to track sales taxes collected on its items delivered to other states. That’s what this ridculous bill is proposing.
Well put. Thank you!
The state already collects these taxes.
It can however regulate what the person does. You either pay them directly or pay them through the purchase. You choose to live here. We have a high tax structure. You either live with it, change it or move.
Your comment misses the point on this cheesecake..my issue , the issue with many legal scholars on this, is that we should not chnage the existing law which states tat a state can only regulaye businesses within its boundaroes. I don’t it is wise to change that and icertianly thik Chellie has missed the possibley drastic impact this would have on Maine businesses who are themselves internet sellers employing many people in local comunities throughout Maine.
I agree with you as to what is law..”live with it change or move.”.you said. Well that is exactly what I am doing, actively here and in contact with legsilators, seeking to chnage the use tax to apply only to prchases of items under $200 and to aggressibely pursue use tax due on high end luxury items.
The law isn’t regulating business it is just a vehicle to collect taxes owed by their customers. Some people here seem to think its a new tax. It isn’t. If the state so wishes they can compel someone like Amazon to provide an excel spreadsheet of all sales to people in Maine and go after them individually for tax evasion.
Requiring the collection seems to be far less invasive to that more punitive approach.
I am not a big tax guy… really I’m not. I would welcome a law stating that when I cross the borders to make a purchase I am not required to pay State of Maine taxes.
Maine does collect sales taxes on items purchased in other states that is brought here and stays. A private plane for instance purchased in a no tax state under Baldacci was subject to state of Maine sales tax. This is no longer done.. Thanks to Gov LePage.
http://bangor-launch.newspackstaging.com/2011/06/22/business/maine-does-away-with-taxes-on-aircraft-sales-parts/
Cheesecake,
In the united states, there is a scope of state authority and a scope of federal authority.
Sales taxes are a matter of Sate Law and policy and under our consiution the feds don’t interefre with state business. But state imposed sales taxes apply only to wiyhin state transactions and only to businesses domciled within the stae.
A state cannot impose its state laws on businesses in other jursidctions.
Complellinng them by federal law to collect, report and forward state sales taxes would set a dangerous precent on the separation of state and federalpowers.
Under the the existing law, Cheeseake, Maine has no jurisdiction over businesses in another state. It cannot order a company in California, for example, to comply with Maines state laws on sales tax. A sale in California to some one here is not a Maine sale” under law.
That is the issue here Cheesecake
Jursdiction.
And think about the implications of setting this precedent. Let’s say California passed a law requirng that all wood products use trees of only certain species and origin and a Maine company shipped na item unaware of that law. Should california be able to bring the Mainne company under the scooe of its law or should the customer, the erson who lives in Claifrnia, knows the law and ordered the table be responsble.
That’s what is at issue here Cheesecake.
Great posts! I hope you post these thoughts again in future forums. The person you’re talking to is known to be annoying and always seems to miss the point (while insisting s/he is right).
You have important things to say and I recommend posting soon after the forums first go up. The longer you wait, the less people see what you say–and then you also have to deal with people like this poster who lurk in the shadows, waiting to engage someone when the main discussion has moved on to another forum.
Thank you again for your intelligent words, don’t be disheartened!
Spruce Dweller..You are very kind and I value your posts as well. I am here though not just compete for top billing or who gets to see what I say but also do what I am doing with Cheesecalke..taking time to make sure we are all dealing from the same facts and information..from there we most likely will still have very different ideas about what to do with that information but if we start with the same set of facts an dinformtaion we are more likely to find really consensus..not compromise and not polarity.
Working with folk like Cheesecake here is very much a a part of what I am here to do .
I think hese forums are very important..our exchanges with one another complete the story often giving details and facts that were not included and somehow we learn from each other..certain ideas are like seeds..they plant, they replicate.. I see many good seeds we have planted together flowering in lots of places. It is important work we do here.
All right. That is extremely noble. Carry on.
But if you plant your seeds early in the season (right after the forums are posted) more of them will grow! ;)
:>)))
I understand what you are saying but that is not what is happening.
There are all sorts of laws regulating commerce. For instance you cannot purchase large amounts of alcohol in New Hampshire to avoid paying sales tax. You will need to either pay the tax or go get charged with smuggling. You avoid that by paying Maine sales tax on it. (if the amount is large enough) Same with cigarettes imported from a non tax state. It happens all the time.
Why should I have to pay Maine sales tax if I buy over a certain dollar amount? I’m not happy about it but it is one of the laws.
It may not be right but it exists.
Another thing. Maine does make companies in other states comply with state sales tax laws. I recently purchased a piece of equipment valued at $147k from a vendor HQ’d in Georgia, by the terms of the agreement if I were not using it for manufacturing I would have to pay sales tax on it. ($7,350) As part of the agreement however I am required to pay property tax to the City of Bangor requires of that company. I pay the tax to them directly and that company forwards it to the city. That is a second way that Maine forces other companies outside of Maine to comply with tax laws. If they choose not to Maine could ban them from doing business here.
Cheesecake..we are nearly on the same page ..I am very interested in both your examples, but this is not Maine regulating other states.. thsi is in the first instance the use tax at work and I think yor equipment example, of I understand it correctly, is that it is taxed as property ??? I am not sure I understand all of the siutaion you are explaining, but it definitely is not an eample of Maine imposing its laws and regulations on businesses not domiciled in Maine.
Be that as it may..I feel we are approaching common ground. Thanks again Cheesecake.
On this issue we really never were all that far apart.
The law is not regulating other states but regulates companies from other sates that do business in Maine through the tax laws.
Maine imposes sales tax on the purchase of equipment purchased in another state. In this case the State of Georgia. If I were not using the equipment for manufacture I would have to pay sales tax on it. Maine has a sales tax exemption on equipment for business that manufacture product. I do so I qualify for the exemption. Otherwise I would have to pay for it.
However the city (and the state) are involved in collecting property tax for it. The out of state company is responsible according to state tax law to pay property tax on it. As part of my agreement with them I pay it to them and they forward it to the City of Bangor.
I hope this helps.
Thanks Cheesecak, got it..The company that owed the property tax must be “domiciled” via some sort of business presence that makes them accountabl to local law (Bangor’s tax) . And it is you, by virtue of your business/personal in Maine that brings you under Maine’s Sales and se tax.
That’s what is now..that is not the sae, I am sure you agree, as Miane subjecting other states to its laws and jursidictions.
That is the principal that is imortan not to vilate..that State’s may not through any means, compel businesses or persons for that matter not domiciled in it own state toobey any law or regulation.
In effect that is what is compelled in this Federa; Legislation. It muddies, clouds, volates the commerce principlas which have historically divideed state vs federal jurisdicton Thos eboundares should be clear to all. An extesion of the precent set her if this law passed might be for Maine to bill the seller of a large puece of equipment like you reference if you should fail to pay your use tax..that’s the kind of direcetion this bill takes us in. This is in effect what this bill does although it is at the moment limited to internet sales but once this precedent is set there is no blocking the other even more insidious applications of this precedent.
Good points. And if someone has a beef with THAT, then they should address that by itself. But yeah, we are already obligated to pay these taxes-this is nothing new.
You’re missing the whole point.
You don’t know what the point is.
Get real. It takes a tax increase (I’d suggest on capital gains) and spending decreases. No one is advocating what you claim they are, so stop lying.
Lying? Sprucedweller, in response to a post about sales tax, exclaimed “tax the rich!”. I simply explained that taxing the rich on it’s own will not solve anything. How did I lie?
Who advocated no spending decreases and taxing the rich alone? Who threw out the 85% number?
The post I replied to said only “tax the rich”. 85% was an example to argue that taxing the rich is not a viable solution.
The comment said “tax the rich.” Considering how much spending cuts we’ve made and how many more are on the way, it goes without saying. Tax increases for anyone beyond the working and middle class on the other hand? It’s not even an option it seems. No one is advocating only taxing the rich as a budgetary solution. That’s the lie.
Then the comment was unclear. If it had said “tax the rich as part of a balanced revenue increase program that includes modest increases for the middle class”, then I would have responded differently. But I can’t read minds, so I was responding to post as written, which said “tax the rich”. No lie, unless you assume I can read minds.
It goes without saying as we’ve already been cutting spending to solve our budget problems. New taxes have not been part of the equation.
By the way, check out “Sprucedweller’s” quote.
” I start off by saying Tax the rich and no one else. Is it impossible for you to even grasp the concept? I’ll say it again:
“TAX THE RICH. LEAVE THE REST OF US ALONE.”
Eliminating the Bush tax cuts, FOR THE RICH, will save us trillions of dollars.”
I guess I wasn’t lying, not that I’m expecting any response.
Letting tax cuts expire is tantamount to “only taxing the rich and no one else”? I must have missed the part of the comment that he advocated reinstating what was cut from the budget and getting rid of the income tax, sales tax, etc. tax for those making under a million. Could you point me in the right direction?
READ SPRUCEDWELLER’S COMMENT!!!!
I was responding the him/her. She/he explicitly stated that they wanted the cuts to expire “FOR THE RICH”.
I hear you, but it remains that we’ve been cutting the budget extensively and will continue to do so. There is no part of SW’s comment that indicates he/she wants that aspect removed from the equation. I’m sorry for implying that you are a liar, but I stand firm in my belief that no one is trying to argue that taxing the rich alone is the solution.
There’s a difference between “that won’t solve anything”(It will)and that the middle class needs to pay something more or not get what they want.We have 300M + people,all of who have different tax and income situations.Congress has been chomping at the bit for this to happen for years.When Borders and Circuit City folded they blamed Amazon,EBay,etc.Spending cuts are part of the issue as well but that’s already been done or is in process.
And then the rest of all the job creators will leave too. Then the rich will be you.
agree, tax them their fair share!! Unfortunately they are the ones supporting all the tax breaks. It takes money to keep coruption in government………….
But of course! People need to pay their so-called “fair share.” Well, some of us.
Spruce Dweller.. I agree with you wholheartedly. This is anti consumer and hurts the little guy .
We could easily capture more thna $32 million by having a state transfer tax on all real estate sales in excess of $1 million..we could revise our tax code for timber holdings to prevent speculative exploitaion of timberland property by taxing sales based on length of ownership and size of profit and aggressively taxing chnages in use. I say lets rebuild our reserve with a whole bunch of taxes aimed specifically at exploiters, profiteers and speculators. Let;s ear mark that for the reserve so the Governor can’t give it away as a tax break fro the rich as he did last year falsely procliming a $150 million surplus .
Why penalize or go after ordinary Mainers making ordinary and essential household and essential consumer purchases.
Chellie, shame on you.
why should someone else pay your way in life? If you do not want anything in life good.Just do not expect someone else to provide for you.Expecting a golden spoon from your neighbor is the platform of the democrats party.
I think a better philosophy would be to make the rich pay at least the same rate we regular joes pay.
what deductions do the (rich) have in payroll taxes that the regular joe does not.
They don’t pay SS over $106,800.If I make $1,068,000 a year I pay SS on 10% of that.If there are 10 people under me each earning $106,800 they pay SS on 100% of their income even though the income total is the same.There should be NO cap on SS taxes.
so everyone pays the same as best i can read your logic. rich joe earns 106,800 or poor joe both paying SS.
The guy making $1M+ evades SS taxes on 90% of his income.
I’m paying for TPers -the tax evading slime that will ruin this country.
HOW
NH does fine with out it because their property taxes are insane.
They’re high, but I’d pay a lot less in overall taxes between income and sales and reasonably high property taxes here. Mill rates are about double.
I’ve seen examples of NH property taxes not being that much more than an equivalent property in Maine. Kinda discouraging
just get rid of pingree and lepage. we did fine without them!
Well I am for getting rid of or revising the sales and use tax for all ordinary consumer goods and aggrssively enforcing the use tax onn luxury items like yachts, private planes, jewelry, luxury clotinng , No item whichs costs less than $200 shoukd be subject to any sales or use tax no matter wjere it is purchased.
Under existing law when any of us buy anything outside of Maine and bring it back here to use.we owe a use tax to Maine which we are supposed to report on our income taxes. So oif we buy a coat in NH at a discount outlet
where there is no sales tax and we use it and wear it Maine we owe Maine the sales tax due. This bill is going after that money..that unreported use tax money.
I say repeal the use tax for all ordinary consumer goods. ( if we paid a sales tax for a purchase in another tate that is less than Maine’s..we owe Maine the difference as a use tax)..
How archaic and stupid is Maine’s existing use tax??? How outrageous is this bill using Federal legislation to improve revenue to states due and unreported in use tax.
Repeal the use tax for all consuMer goods.Agressively pursue use tax for all luxury goods brought back to Maine for use..yachts, private planes etc. Do away with sales tax all together on all ordinary consumer goods and have much higher taxes on luxury goods like yachts, private airplanes, jewelry.
Under Commerce law a state can only impose a duty to collect and forward sales taxes on businesses with a presence in the State.
So the the $32 million Le Page is referencing as money lost that Maine is owed are purchases by Maine residents for all goods outside of Maine from sellers who have no place of business in Maine.
I disagree with Le Page and Chellie on this.
I say repeal the use tax in Maine for all consumer goods.
I think the commerce law is fine just the way it is..a state cannot collect sales tax on goods sold by companies that have no presence in the state.
What is Chellie thinking?
Is Chellie and LePage thinking or plotting?
I agree, to pay a state tax for any item not purchased from a business located in Maine feels wrong to me. They actually expect me to pay sales tax more than once on the same item. I all out refuse.
Dear mynameis taken
The use tax ( which we already have..it is already law) doesn’t require you to pay a tax twice..if the other stae’s sales tax is higher than Maine’s no use tax is due..if it is lower or there is no sales tax where you pruchased tn the difference is due. Here is the state’s official guidance and explanation:
http://www.state.me.us/revenue/salesuse/use%20tax.htm#indhow
What this bill amounts to is aggressive collection of these use taxes, which almost all of us ignore.
The really disturbing and damaging part of the bill violates the longstanding principal of the commerce clause that a sate cannot extend its regulations and laws to a business that is not present in that state.
I think that principal should stand..common sense right?
Right now, by law you are supposed to pay the equivalent of a sales tax for any product you purchased outside of Maine and bring back here for use.
What this law would do is allow the State to force a business not located in Maine to collect and remit sales taxes on any item shipped to Maine.
I think that sets a dangerous precedent. I think it hits working people hardest.
I think Le Page should look for his needed revenue in the pockets of the rich and famous and I strongly urge a use tax audit of the Pingree Sussman household as a place to start.
Where’s the audit on the R’s?There’s no limit to the cash you could collect there.
I know..we could have paid snitches at private airports and marinas reporting how many days an expensive yacht or private plane belonging to a Maine resident or waitresses or tattle tale housekeepers who write down the names and addresses of people wearing furs and expensive jewels ..just enough info to give good cause for a use tax audit. I love it. We could deputize all volunteer snitches to demand a sales receipt and proof of use tax or maine sales tax for any expensive item of cloting spotted on any Maine resident. I think we’d get lots of volunteers.
Read the current RS article about the hedge funder who raced out of Manhattan by midnight for 182 days to avoid paying city taxes.That’s who needs to be jailed.
I have no doubt Pingree would be 100% against this if she had to follow the same rules that are being forced upon the rest of us. Perhaps it is time a tax auditor take a nice tour of her mansion and guest houses on Vinalhaven.
I know..we could pass a tipster profit sharing plan so that housekeepers and maids and caretakers whose inventory of big ticket items suspected of not having been purchased in Maine but being used in Maine. might trigger a State Use Tax Audit…the tipsters could get a cut of what is collected in a successful use tax audit.
And while we are at it we could have tipsers at banks and credit card companies..or even Amazon tell us whether Chellie is faithfully paying use tax on her amazon and mail order purchases.
If Chellie really is all for supporting Main Street I think we deserve to know if Chellie is really helping Main street in her every day life..what % of Chellie’s purchases for things that are used in Maine and subject to maine tax were purchased in Maine?. How much of what she purchased out of state and uses here did she faithfully report use tax on? How exactly is Chellie supporting Main Street Maine with her purchases? I s she really faithfully contributing to our treasury with 100% payment of sales and use tax on every single item she owns and uses in Maine? .
Chellie, Before you start chasing the unpaid .15 of use tax I should have oad on my $3.00 used book purchase..let’s chase the much more lucrative possibilty of your unpaid use taxes. I’ll publicly declare mine..if you publically declare yours.
Problem with NH is high property tax to make up for it. Cut spending on “programs ” then you can eliminate one tax without raising another
the overall tax rate in Maine is far higher than NH. As a matter of fact Maine has one of the highest total tax incomes in the nation.
I agree 100% as we the people don’t get paid the big bucks and our enjoyments are being taken away by tax tax tax
Another way to screw us. These guys are only looking for money, not looking out for the citizens. People can always cross over state lines to NH to shop with no sales tax, that will continue.
It will happen, I go hit up NH to do major shopping, such as Christmas for example, if I lived closer, I would do more.
You already owe that tax: http://www.state.me.us/revenue/salesuse/use%20tax.htm
and I don’t pay it, how much more greedy does this state need to be?
Then it’s more of a matter of you being selfish than the state being greedy.
These are items that we were buying in-state before the rise of the internet. Why should the fact that we can buy it more easily from an out-of-state company mean that we shirk our responsibility?
For the past several years, the state never cared about taxing such purchases.
What makes you say that? Is the use tax new?
Never can escape the tax man…….
People living in rural areas often don’t have a Main Street store to supply certain needs. It’s bad enough we have to fork over shipping fees. I guess if they insist on charging sales tax on top of that, that will be 2 people losing votes when they come up for re-election.
As Governor LePage said, this is money the state should be getting anyway from the people making the purchases, but is is almost impossible to enforce that part of the law. This bill would simply make sure more businesses are complying with existing sales tax law.
But the purpose of a tax increase or a new Tax is to have people spend out more money, which LePage said before he was not a fan of, therefore he is finding a crafty way to take more money out of our pockets, if he was to think he was Mr Tax Slayer, he wouldn’t support this bill.
It is not a tax increase or a new tax- people are supposed to be paying it already, but aren’t. I also suspect LePage is not interested in more spending; I would imagine he would put any additional money from internet sales taxes in the rainy day fund or apply it to lowering the income tax per the new law they passed.
Yeah….Right…….Good luck with that happening.
Exactly. We should already be paying this tax. This is just a way to shift the burden from us, the ones who should be paying it on our own, to the businesses.
http://www.state.me.us/revenue/salesuse/use%20tax.htm
We would still pay it. The businesses only collect it.
It shouldn’t be the responsibility of an out-of-state business to collect Maine state taxes.
It IS our responsibility for us to pay them ourselves.
HA HA.LePage needs to fill the hole he created by giving $Millions to the ins cos. and Richie Richs already.As if he would care about Maine enough to put $$ away in the Rainy Day fund or help real working Mainers. HA HA HA.Thanks for the laugh.
The State does not deserve this money, justifying a tax with another tax is ludicrous .
It’s not “another tax”; it’s an existing tax. From reading these message boards in the past, I would think that people would be lining up behind their buddy Governor LePage who is simply advocating more equal treatment in the tax laws. I guess I was wrong.
It’s a excuse looking for a Tax.This tax has no justification other than another tax.
These items are ordered on the net, taxes are paid on internet subscriptions. These items are shipped and taxes are already paid on the shipping/transportation.
This is just another of the taxes that is dreamed up an forced on us because they can,not because the item or action is taxed to allow the state to pay for the cost of it’s involvement, just a made up reason to take money from it’s citizens.
You are paying tax on the internet service, not on the items you order.
You are paying tax on shipping and transportation, not on the items you order.
That would be like saying you paid tax on the car, so why should you pay tax to wash it?
In any case, the law is that we should ALREADY be paying taxes on items we buy in NH or online (if we haven’t been charged the tax already).
http://www.state.me.us/revenue/salesuse/use%20tax.htm
Wash the car,really?
If I purchase an Item via the internet from Idaho and then pay for the shipping, why does Maine deserve to Tax that transaction? I’ll answer for you, they dont. As 90 % of our Taxes, this is just an an excuse to steal money from those who earn it
This” law” should be overturned not expanded.
Also, under this law, if I pay sales tax in another state, I am expected to pay it again when I bring it home. It is absurd and indeed does need to be overturned.
He can’t constitutionally require a business with no connection to Maine to collect a sales tax for Maine.
Constitutionally a state cannot require a business with no presense in that state to collect sales tax for that state so this is not making sure more businesses are complying with “existing law”. This will be taken to the Supreme court under state rights. The solution will be a national sales tax.
That’s exactly what’s been tried before and failed to pass.Internet vendors screamed how confusing complying with state and local taxes would be.Solution-5% across the board.That didn’t pass.This tax will raise billions and people will still buy what they need.
Are you not going to buy a $300 TV to save $15?
It’s not that impossible, unfortunately. All it would take is some tracking devices, and/or strong-arming businesses to hand over the information on their customers. I’m fairly sure the technology already exists to track and report these transactions. Remember when AT&T handed over the phone records of thousands of their customers to the Feds?
So did Verizon-and both of them have the R’s in their pockets.Notice how that story got buried in the regular media?You bring up a good point about transactions-anything the gov’t can do to track us is scary.We don’t even know what being collected or disbursed.
Cut the dam spending!
Tolls increase on the Pike too!….and they government employees make how much???
Which spending would you cut? Schools? Police? Fire? Roads? Defense? Game Wardens? Homeless shelters?
The LePage family pay checks, his Daughter is a good start….
Return all education funding to local municipalities: no more sending it to the state so they can dole it back out. This can be accomplished by local property taxes, reducing the need for sales/income. Police is local as well, as is fire. Game wardens? I think we can make this work with our income tax.
How about this?: more strict rules on travel and expenses for state employees. Dale McCormick is display item number 1…
I believe the point of sending education funding to the state is to ensure that all Maine children have access to the same level of education regardless of the wealth of the town, so that schools in Cape Elizabeth are the same as schools in Rangeley or Eastport.
How well has this worked out? From stats I’ve seen, kids in NH score better on almost every measure, despite similar income disparities. No evidence the transfer of wealth has actually benefited anyone.
The amount of money wasted in the name of education in this state and this nation is appalling. My grandfather received a better education in multi-grade one room wooden school house than most kids receive today.
its always the schools and police they use for an excuse, theres plenty of other things to cut!!!
It’s always easy to cut the other guy’s spending. I hope you’re as willing when they get to cutting services they provide to you.
Yes.
Yes
I’m guessing you have a gun to defend yourself, a fire hydrant and hose, a personal paving crew, and don’t care if poachers poach all the deer and moose? Not everyone is as fortunate.
I guess you cant fend for yourself and work for the Government or are otherwise are dependent on the Government.How unfortunate.
The police rarely defend anybody. They rarely prevent crime, only solve crimes. They seem to do a pretty good job of tasering innocent people though. We don’t have a fire hydrant, and our town doesn’t have fire hydrants, but we do have a water source and equipment to possibly save our house in the event of a fire. Wild game has always been poached. Most of the time people get away with it. The majority of hunters out there play fair and would do so if there was hardly any warden presence.
Get rid of all the high paid incompetent executive government employees and the state could operate on half of what it operates on now.
Thought Republicans were against taxes? Oh wait, it hits the working and middle class so, of course, go for it! Spread that base! Anything to make the pyramid even steeper.
Oh I didn’t know Pinigree was a R, I thought she wad a D
She’s not. So my comment wasn’t about her, obviously. It was about Republicans, obviously.
Obviously so I guess that means D’s are for more taxes, although this isn’t really about taxes because of the use tax. Amazingly so many talk about LePage but fail to mention Pinigree, or Michuad not really knowing. Almost as bad ad their caucus, they do not know what they are doing other than coasting along.
Actually both know that this will never fly in congress due to the make up of congress at the present time.
You really don’t want to talk about caucauses considering the R disaster.Nice job screwing N Maine like usual.Katherine Harris would be proud.
Why not, both parties are a mess.
The article only lists one Republican for this.
Didn’t LePage once say that he was against any new taxes? Now let’s get technical here, a new tax let’s say taxing for the number of times you say Hi to someone, the purpose is to collect money, it is not straight to say “Oh this is a tax everyone should be paying in on so it is an expansion of the current sales tax” no because that still requires people to pay more money out of their pocket.
State should go balance a budget first before taking on anymore money seeing how they can’t manage what they have now.
Finally even if LePage said it I am well aware of one of his personalities, lying
If people aren’t following the tax laws, as they aren’t now, they should be rewritten so that people do. Since virtually no one pays the Use tax as they legally are supposed to on their out-of-state purchases, the law should be changed. You can call it “people paying more money out of their pocket” but they are supposed to be doing that anyway, it is not new.
Yes it is because the law was not clear let alone remotely enforceable. The tax law was on the book before Amazon was born. This is not a shoplifter, this is the state who had plenty of chances to make this change but failed to do so, once again LePage opens his mouth and gets crooked on what he says won’t happen, supporting additional taxes, this is what he is doing.
The Maine state tax form is clear enough for you to fill out and pay what you legally owe.
Correct. This is a way to collect the taxes that the law says WE, the consumers, should ALREADY be paying.
There’s a space on your Maine state tax form for you to fill in the amount you owe. If you can’t figure it out, there’s a formula that’s used.
http://www.state.me.us/revenue/salesuse/use%20tax.htm
NOT FAIR TO CONSUMERS!!!
Not fair that you aren’t already paying the tax you legally owe on these items.
Why do people want to stiff the state and not pay sales tax anyway? Cheaters.
I wrote responding to the notion that our not paying sales tax on online items iw unfair to business. Businesses already get enough tax breaks and in that sense, it is more unfair to consumers than to business. Get it?
Do-gooder. Why do people insist on name-calling?
I will bet that regular joe is a busniness owner.
And you’ll be wrong.
I am a consumer who pays his fair share on the sales and use tax.
Are you calling me a name?
Hey chel, if you agree with paulie the corporate puppet then I have serious doubts about you.
It is a pipe dream that making internet sales more expensive will drive people to local businesses. People will not change their buying habits because of a sales tax. It is just a scam to get more tax $$
Absolutely. I shop online for selection, convenience and price. This tax increase won’t change my habits, but will affect my vote in the next election.
Pretty much. Thank you Amazon Prime
Feels to me like Pingree and LePage are supporting the previous administrations scheme to defraud me out of more money. That is why they were voted out of office. History can repeat itself.
I think this will improve state revenues, but I don’t think it is going to make more people buy locally. So long as the sales on internet items are so good combined with free shipping (which many companies do) and the better choices, I think people will still buy online more than locally.
I’d rather pay $1 a month to the state for the internet than to tax every item that is bought or sold online. The other obstacle is that we will soon use our Smartphones to cover transactions.
Even today, one can pay using PayPal at Home Depot. Figure a few million transactions per year online, and no way the state can handle the traffic let alone manage, or enforce the tax codes.
eBay items, if a person sells their old teddy bear is that taxable now? Or, the new part that didn’t fit? The deal you got on an item at Mardens’ that was sold online for a profit?With all the scams to stimulate the economy why dampen what works?
Next there will be a use tax on yard/garage sales…
There are laws already on the books about sales tax and auctions, though I don’t know offhand what they are.
Your old teddy bear is sales taxable… it is also income taxable… unless you have the original receipt of purchase. Any time money changes hands in exchange for goods it becomes income.
I agree the the governor on something.
This would just end up making the Government bigger. Who or how do you think these taxes will be collected or accounted for? A good number of businesses, right here in the state, do not pay the taxes they collect to the state how are you going to get people in 49 other states to collect and send in the sales tax they collect. Let’s get real Lepage. This idea just doesn’t make any sense. Of course maybe you have a few more relatives that need jobs as tax collectors.
Exactly! Big, bigger, busted! Layer upon layer of dysfunctional monetary charades.
Let the internet run openly, fairly, and free to commerce and learn from it. Don’t try to control what you fail to understand to begin with.
Attract new eCommerce business to the state. It makes for an ideal setting to run an eCommerce business. Businesses first. eCommerce is the new wave of business quickly displacing the ways of brick and mortar companies for which Maine’s is given way to Big Box virtuosity.
Sure Marden’s has seen better days, and they sell online free of sales tax. But, that margin of sales makes a profit that provides the path which generates a revenue stream, that a sales tax would diminish.
Online sales tax is a losing proposition.
Honestly, I don’t really have a big problem with paying sales tax. I don’t own property so I don’t get hit by taxes there. Sales tax sucks, but I’m more than willing to pay it. That being said, I do love shopping through Amazon. I have to make the money we get go as far as possible and I always save a ton shopping there. Not having to pay sales tax is just an bonus.
So that great tax fighter Paul Richard LePage is in favor of adding a tax that we currently do not pay. Sounds like a tax increase to me but I am sure the Tea Party Parrots will be happy to explain how it isn’t.
You don’t pay it, but you’re already supposed to. http://www.state.me.us/revenue/salesuse/use%20tax.htm
I do find it curious that no one seems to acknowledge your valid point.
It not that it isn’t being acknowledged,it’s that the same flippin’ thing has posted FIVE times.ENOUGH!
Gheeze! Then don’t read it!
I did that because I know that sometime people read only the replies to their own comments and not the whole list.
As for repeating the same point over and over again, we all do it.
That is curious. I don’t like LePage at all and I don’t think Amazon or other online-only companies should be forced to collect.
But we are obligated to pay anyway…
Many people do not pay the state income tax that they are supposed to pay. Is going after those that haven’t paid the income tax they are lawfully supposed to pay a new tax?
What ever happened to the no new taxes mantra of the Tea Bags?
This isn’t a new tax. http://www.state.me.us/revenue/salesuse/use%20tax.htm
Yeah, we get it.. we are supposed to already be paying it.. your point is made and made and made…. we got it!
Good. So what’s the problem then?
I think that when a person shops on line mainly easier when one lives in the rural area, older ,just don’t have the means to travel .if you cant get there .I use JC pennys ,Wal-Mart ,so on and on .they all charge taxes. So in some cases getting out of paying taxes is not always the reason people shop on line. If the state wants that money they should make arrangements with these company’s. why should the consumer do their work!
Doesn’t matter, I’m still going to buy my stuff online at a significantly lower price than my local store… tax or not. Local retailers will always scream unfair competition, no matter what. If they want it to be more fair, lower the in-store prices. The sales tax is not what makes me purchase more online!
In understand there is more overhead in a brick and mortar store, I’ve owned both a brick and mortar business, and an online business (before anyone starts screaming at me that I don’t understand)… but at the end of the day, I’ll happily pay 10 to 15% more to buy locally… maybe more if there was such a thing as customer service any more… but not 50 to 60%.
Offer me some “service”… with a smile perhaps, and charge me a “bit” more and I’ll gladly support local business. But put a kid behind the counter that doesn’t even speak, let alone say thank you, and charge me 40 to 45% more than I can buy it online… no thanks! I’d prefer to keep that extra money in my pocket… at least the order acknowledgement I receive via email says thank you… which is more than can be said for a lot of local businesses now-a-days!
I wish that wasn’t true but you’re right.I recently did business in Brewer with some awesomely friendly people who went out of their way to make me feel welcome and that they were happy I was there.Guess what?I posted a very good online review which has now been read by 300+ people.Old college marketing number(pre-Internet)-a happy customer will tell 3-5 people,an unhappy customer will tell 17-20.
Totally agree with your post. But I also want to mention that, although I’d prefer to shop local, if the local stores don’t carry what you want, then I will buy it online.
Case in point: Went to my local hardware store for some direct burial cable connectors. They didn’t have the size I needed (a very common size I might add, 18 gauge). They wouldn’t even order it. So what did I do? Ordered online, and for cheaper, even with shipping, then I would have paid them.
Chellie, if you support this, you’ve lost all my respect and vote.
I dont think that online marketers should be responsible for collecting taxes for any state. Also, small biz owners use the web to pettle their wares…even small biz in Maine do this. Do you want to hurt Aunt Marge who sells a few thousand dollars in Maine ceramics to Californial each year? Think of the regulatroy hurdles, accounting expenses etc…This is a play by Mardens and Wall mart to try and kill the Internet.
That’s why I pay the use tax. It’s my responsibility to pay my fair share and so I fill out the Maine state tax form to do just that. I don’t think Amazon should pay.
Also, don’t forget, that if you buy from Target, L. L. Bean, Macy’s, or Best Buy online, you’re paying sales tax. Why should it be different for Amazon or Neiman Marcus?
another way to STEAL more money from the average citizen
“You owe the 5 percent tax for either buying that new television online or for using it in Maine. ” I don’t OWE the government anything…and they OWE me nothing. Leave us alone and keep your filthy hands out of my pockets.
With the caveat that they’ll now have an electronic record of what you bought online. A new television…. Lines and lines of electronic receipts archived, year in, and year out, of every item a person has purchased online.
For an eCommerce program throwing the sales tax switch, inputting the tax number for the store and routing the accounts for the EFT is 2 minutes of work. For the state however, to receive those transactions in real time is a server farm and managed support staff, 24/7.
I still remember the day when PresO declared that the US government will now honor GM warranties. By contrast, what people hold most dear to their living in Maine, is now threatened by an electronic media that has already coursed the life that we live, to become the life that we lead.
” I think it provides some equity for Main Street businesses.” ~~~Pingree
If you are going to tax it go ahead…just do it. Don’t use it for cover.
The idea that it provides equity for street retailers is bogus.
It won’t make one bit of difference where I buy goods… If its local I buy local, if its not in the stores I buy online.
I don’t think that they should do this. I think there should be greater emphasis on educating the people on the use tax.
I also think that local businesses should do more about making their places more attractive to us.
I guess the politicians think that we don’t report it on our state returns. This way they put the onus on the business that sell on line to collect it.
I have a small ebay business and I collect sales tax on in-state purchasers but I don’t for other states. I’m grateful that most of my customers are overseas. I did purchase a specialized camera last week from a company in NJ that did not charge me sales tax. Yes it will be on my 2012 return.
No one sells this item locally.
That’s the way it should be. And when I have the choice to buy an item, say a camera, from Amazon or Best Buy and the price is the same, I’ll do pick up at Best Buy and pay the tax.
We have our responsibility to pay this tax. It’s not even a high rate and no one is asking for it to be increased.
As for eBay, I wonder where the line is drawn for sellers to charge sales tax or not…
booooooooooo!!!!!
In case anyone hasn’t noticed, this is the 1st step in a NATIONAL SALES TAX. Now, if the State’s want to give up the State Sales and Use Tax and replace it with this National Sales Tax, fine. Set it at a uniform percentage and work out the tax return reimbursement to the State’s on a monthly basis and I’d be willing to go along. But is anyone really THAT ready to see the Fed’s to make this happen ? And the fact that Paulie is so gung-ho about this makes me wonder just how the Fed’s are gonna make this happen, and reduce the size of government overall as the GOP has been calling for, when we all can see the necessity of the Fed’s needing a mechanism to collect the sales tax at the NATIONAL LEVEL. I might have been on the ‘tater truck, but I didn’t fall off it this morning. Chellie Pingree needs to go get some common sense and reality soup too. She should know better !
Can you see this flying in Congress with the majority of the members signed up with Grover Norquists Pledge to not raise taxes in any way shape or form?
I wanna see Grover’s face when, and if, these sales tax numbers are run against a comparison of current sales tax number’s. People can cry all they want but numbers have a wonderful way of being completely neutral. It’s how they’re interpreted that get’s them in trouble. And given Grover’s recent interpretation’s of The Constitution, which borders on sci-fi, he’s going to wanna see them interpreted so that no one pays anything and yet still manages to have services delivered while being paid for. Grover, NOT GONNA HAPPEN, now or in the future. Basic law of physics; Action vs reaction. If you want it, then it has to be compensated for from somewhere.
Numbers are neutral, it is the people interpreting those numbers that have the slant one way or another.
Grover only wants to make sure taxes aren”t raised on his fatcats.If you think he cares a whit about the middle class or the poor,think again.
Grover don’t care 1 whit about you or me unless he and his Big Business buddies can squeeze more money out of us, while at the same time crying about the big bad tax man making sure that they pay their fair share. Why do you think that him and Lepage are in lockstep everytime that any kind of gov’t money issue is raised ?
Don’t agree with you often but you are right a national sales tax will be the only way sales tax is effectively going to work.
Be still my beating heart ! BDN has struck oil, which here in Maine is called a Moderate Republican. Thanks Billy. I can now ‘go’ and tell St Peter that there is still some sembelance of humanity still to be found here about.
The people of Maine are already obligated to pay taxes on items purchased out of state or online. The fair thing to do would be for all the people who support this law to have them instead support the law that already exists.
The Internet Sales Tax plan is bad Mojo for small businesses, IMHO. It’s not as easy as it seems on face value. There are 50 states, obviously.
5 have no State sales tax. AK has no State sales tax, but it allows Municipalities to charge a sales tax.
6 have a State sales tax and allow a County sales tax.
22 have a State sales tax, allow a County sales tax, and allow Municipalities to charge their own tax.
The rest only allow a State sales tax.
This just adds another layer of Red Tape to do business. Large corporations can easily absorb the cost, but the small business person can’t keep up. How about the folks who sell on eBay? What do they do?
I buy stuff online often, because I can’t find what I want locally. I would gladly shop locally if I could find what I wanted. I always pay my use tax, and don’t have an issue w/ doing it.
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!
An internet sales tax is just WRONG….!
I thought Lepage understood that we are sick of being taxed to death. The state of Maine doesn’t have a income problem, they have a spending problem. Attempting to justify the ethics of taxes is ridiculous.
This is why I am DONE with voting for the GOP. They have no concern for the little guy. They indoctrinate us about how great tax breaks are for the economy but they don’t really believe it themselves. They just look out for themselves and their elitist buddies. This tax will hurt the average Mainer. Tax the Rich, not us.
I buy online every now and then (-;… and the reason isn’t about saving on sales tax. It’s because you can find anything that is made on the planet online. Type it in and it’s out there somewhere for sale.
If I buy stuff from Canada are they going to go after the Canadians for the sales tax?
If you buy Canadian items, Maine will come after you to pay the Maine sales tax. They send their Maine revenue cronies to search the files of the US Customs and track down who has bought Canadian items above a certain amount, and bam, you’ll get a nice little bill in the mail. And oh, if you try to contest it, you can do that, but an interest rate will start accruing while you make your appeal. The Maine revenue folks have also visited Canadian businesses that are frequented by Mainers and have applied strong-arm tactics like telling those businesses to start charging Maine sales tax at the point of sale or their delivery trucks might be delayed at the US borders…
The current trend of reactive thought is blocking many from the true realities and innovation the proposed Federal legislation is currently inspiring. In a perfect world in which consumers were honorably remitting sales and use tax legally required on all Internet purchases the proposes legislation would be unanimously demanded. Without the element of uncollected taxes this would simply be a conversation involving technology and it’s true capabilities eliminating legacy administrative burdens for consumers, businesses and governments.
Technology freely available on the Internet easily enables any business to easily calculate, collect and remit sales tax for any jurisdiction in any state. From personally experience, processing sales tax for any jurisdiction for any state is actually easier than processing shipping. Currently twenty four states have simplified their sales and use tax rates, definitions and remittance procedures as outlined by the Streamlined Sales and Use Tax Agreement (SSUTA). Federal legislation will require remaining states to either join SSUTA or enact similar simplification standards independently. Either way free technology currently available will be able to automate the entire process reducing legacy administrative burdens for merchants and states choosing to participate. Businesses requested to remit sales and use tax by member and participating states will enjoy the same efficiencies and savings currently celebrated by merchants voluntarily collecting and remitting sales tax.
Small businesses, such as mine has, will soon realize the misinformation campaign currently underway attempting to protect small business interests is truly designed to further large e-ecommerce monopolistic goals. After all, why would the last remaining large e-commerce merchant (NOT AMAZON) spend millions of dollars advocating to preserve the competition they wish to maintain an advantage over?
As a small retailer and consumer I realized three years ago, when first introduced to this issue, that millions of Americans were mistakenly (and some knowingly) evading sales and use tax already due on out of state and Internet purchases, and increasing demands for solutions both Federal and technological are required. As a business owner and taxpayer I recognize, as the majority of informed citizens do, that passage of S.1832 the Marketplace Fairness Act simply grants states the right to choose efficient processing of sales and use taxes due for over fifty years, and promotes much needed technological innovation.A recent ICSC study discovers eighty six percent of Internet consumers surveyed prefer sales tax be collected by merchants at the time of purchase. After all, why should consumers be burdened with expense and time required to remit sales and use tax when merchants utilizing free technology can easily process sales tax due? Consumers should not have to be burdened and neither should merchants. Technology available freely on the Internet easily supplies merchants the key to unlock efficiency, automation and simplification simultaneously granting a majority of consumers their wishes. As a small business owner and consumer I welcome legislation that will eliminate the burden consumers face today having to track, calculate and remit sales and use tax on out of state purchases.
Granting States’ rights to efficiently collect sales and use taxes currently due on all Internet purchases is actually only one reason Congress should immediately pass S.1832. Small businesses actually have the most to gain. The $500,000 small seller exception is simply insignificant and unnecessary. Any business utilizing modern technology can easily process sales tax for any jurisdiction in the United States.
I strongly support and urge Congress to immediately pass S.1832 the Marketplace Fairness Act.
SUMMARY AS
OF:
11/9/2011–Introduced. Summary Marketplace Fairness Act
Marketplace Fairness Act – Expresses the sense of Congress
that states should be able to enforce their existing sales and use tax laws and
to treat similar sales transactions equally, without regard to the manner in
which the sale is transacted, and to collect, or decide not to collect, taxes
that are owed under state law.
-cont-
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d112:SN01832:@@@D&summ2=m&
Again, Maine steers clear of imposing internet sales tax when we buy goods out of state.
Keep eCommerce free trade.
Maine eCommerce stores should be free from charging a sales tax when shipping out of state… We have a base now for outlet shopping and to have the same presence online is going to be a greater loss when any one of those outlet stores decides to move their operations to a tax free state.
The long history of going to New Hampshire to buy goods will become even more prevalent when the eCommerce store was once based in Maine.
This is potentially astroturf.
http://www.opencongress.org/bill/112-s1832/blogs
I think most people do not want to be charged sales tax if they purchases something online or from another state. It’s not that they find it a burden to do the paperwork after the fact; they simply don’t believe they should be paying the sales tax at all if they purchase online or if they buy an item when they’re visiting another state. True, the law was already in existence, and maybe some people were aware of it, but for the ones who are not aware of it, and are just now learning of it, they don’t agree with the law.
I’m surprised the Emperor Penguin didn’t limit it to purchases under 75K, so all the “Job Creators” would be able to snare a Mercedes tax-free online.
The state already has that covered. You pay the use tax on that Mercedes when you register it.
Sales tax and excise tax are separate animals.
Yes, sales tax and excise tax are separtate animals and I said nothing to dispute that. Buy a car out of state or from a private person you WILL pay the “sales” tax when you registger the vehicle.
lepage is lying once again, he says these are sales taxes already owed the state, they are not. it is not required that an out of state company charge sales tax for items sold to maine residents.
Technicallyhe not lying. Currently the person making the purchase owes the tax thus the tax is already owed the state.
WE owe that tax if we made those purchases!!!
Another tax…I don’t support this…unless maybe you’ve got a great specific cause for it to go to, because, if it just disappears into the general fund, it’ll get urinated-away, like so much else of our tax money…
Oh, brilliant, more taxation. That’s just what we need, surely.
Unfortunately, the governor is tilting at windmills. Just because an internet purchaser happens to live in Maine is no proof that the purchased item is actually being used in Maine. The use part of the law was aimed at leases. Note: it would be much easier for one of the gov’s wealthy buddies to make this argument. He could, like Paulie, say it was purchased for use in his Fla home. Now who is actually going to get stuck holding the bag for purchases over the internet? You guessed it: the average Joe trying to save a buck. So, in that regard, it is also a NEW tax on Guess Who. That’s a “no new taxes” governor trying to fool the public again. You just can’t trust this guy.
The collection of sales tax is based on delivery address not purchaser’s residence. If an out of stater buys something from a Maine business while visiting Maine but has the business ship it to their home or out of state their is no Maine sales tax on that purchase.
I don’t like him and I agree he can’t be trusted, but it’s interesting how many people don’t know that they are obligated to pay this tax anyway.
Probably the worst economic decision ever on the state level. E- Commerce power houses like Ebay and Amazon just simply won’t do business with Maine (like it will put much of a damper on them anyways). Unless you can simply convince the other 49 states to implement a taxing policy at the same time to level the playing field then this will set back Maine. DON’T try pushing away techonology with this.
Here’s the irony, at least for me. For a variety of reasons, almost all the internet sites I do business with collect Maine sales tax already. Just mentioning.
If the store has a brick and mortar presence in the state, then they are obligated to charge sales tax on Internet sales.
Well with the current makeup of Congress, where the majority is in Republican hands and all but a handful of them have signed Grover Norquists Pledge to never raise taxes, I doubt that there is any danger of this passing. That is unless Grover Norquist tells them that it’s OK.
If i buy a box of pencils from someone in Idaho, and it sent to my address via a private shipper……IT IS NOT MAINE’S BUSINESS
How about taxing people who live in Maine and have second homes in other states? What you say lepage? It would bring in TAX REVENUE.
Well, that’s a whole other issue and maybe I agree with that. But the law, now, states that we have to pay taxes on the box.
They are not buying these items in Maine. I can understand taxing those who buy within Maine. How is buying over the internet any different then when they leave the state and buy the normal smaller things they return with? For example a pair of toenail clippers, an alarm clock, etc… What’s next border station’s at all crossing points between states where papers are checked , declarations are made, and duties paid?
That’s exactly what happens up in the County. People who live on the border and who shop in Canada have to pay duties on those items, but the paperwork is filed away in all those US Custom houses, and Maine revenue officials make regular trips up the the County to look through all those files, and then they send out tax bills.
Even Massachusetts gives a break on sales taxes on clothing costing less than $100. Maine’s government, regardless of party, is rapacious and has no respect for the working middle class. NH is no better (I spend as much time there as in Maine). In NH, if you earn less than $50k a year and live in a decent weather-tight house with a foundation on half an acre of land, you may be paying more in taxes than you would in Maine.
The only fair tax is a graduated income tax, which is what the property tax was 200 years ago, when property was a good measure of income-production. NH has simply never progressed into the post-agricultural and post- artisanal economy, while since 1970 or so Maine has increasingly used regressive taxes on the middle class to finance subsidies that bribe the votes of the indolent.
Oregon doesn’t have a sales tax. Sounds to me like both of them are saying, if you are in Maine and are gonna buy something from anywhere…. mail order, internet…whatever, then we get a bite. That’s crap.
The important thing to remember is: LePage DOES support increasing or creating a tax. Let’s all remember this.
So who is going to enforce the collection? Gov. Lepage going to sent auditors to all 50 states to audit businesses now required to collect tax? As one commentor stated this is just the beginning of a national sales tax. Cannot be enforced otherwise.
Well, with computers, this would be quite simple, unfortunately.
I don’t see this benefiting small businesses at all. I for one don’t buy online to save sales tax, because in most cases the cost is more with shipping charges. It is product availability that determines if I purchase online. In Aroostook county, retailers are limited resulting in limited product choices and availability. This would benefit the state coffers because they will collect the tax. The legislation would not change anyone’s shopping habits.
I never thought I would say this but I agree with LePage on this one. I think it will help the small business people in the state and it’s an excellent way to raise much needed revenue to help support our state. We can’t sit back and moan about cuts in much needed social services and what bad condition are roads are in and etc., and then not be willing to help support these programs by paying a small tax on what you may buy on line. This should have been done a long time ago.
How do you propose the $$ collected goes toward those things?Highly unlikely El Piggo will spend a dime on social services and roads.He certainly hasn’t before now.
What the governor forgets is that the online sales are subject to shipping and handling charges, which more than make up for the loss in sales tax.
Main Street cannot handle the thousands of items that online sellers can. I buy locally when what I want is available locally. Of course in rural Maine, not a lot is available. I order quite a bit online. Maybe the local merchants should join online giants to sell products through their storefront stores.
It’s just another money grabbing government attempt. Is it a tax on the actual sale, or the purchaser? If I order it from another state, I did not purchase the item in Maine, so why is Maine due sales tax? If they add this tax, it by all rights can’t be called a purchase tax, rather a tax on the buyer, because the state had nothing to do with it. It’s sort of a 5% income tax.
Shipping and handling/transportation is added to anything you buy in a brick and mortar store.You just don’t see it as a separate charge.It has NOTHING to do with taxes due.
Only the item when purchased online may well be delivered door to door.
The comparison to Main St. is false to begin with. At best another shell game…
It started as a super highway and should remain a super highway.
The internet has brought about a change in commerce as never before, with multi-billion dollar internet companies because of “open commerce”
There is nothing else that can compare. It is amazing that the local politicians fail to grasp the basic concept of open commerce. It has enabled a boom in technology and created a new age of exchange to find material goods at the click of a button.
Not a single comment from any of the local politicians, as to how this is already a boom for the economy, nor are they able to state the revenues realized from this new age of commerce. Instead, we read that a University of Kentucky study estimates a $35M sales tax increase.
Hey, don’t we already have to pay the sales tax? I thought it was part of the Maine income tax form
Maine based businesses already collect sales tax. (cabelas for one) If it isnt on the shelf of a store in maine, how can the state be “owed”? If i make an internet purchase from texas, why should I pay 5% to maine ? Wouldnt I owe texas? Just more moronic boneheaded greed hurting the people of an already struggling low income area.
Lepage and Pingree in bed together to tax Mainers. Vote Angus!
LaPudge gave away 400million dollars in tax breaks, now he needs to make up his losses, on sales tax and higher road tolls.
Cant give away a Tax break, like saying “I’m giving away your wallet”
by not stealing it.
Aren’t you for lower taxes LePage?
If internet sales of books are hurting Maine booksellers why not revise our tax code and not require sales tax onbooks?
Sounds reactionary and backward to me.. a desparate attempt to beef up the State’s depleted revenues..a revenue grab..as usual out of the pocket sof the ordinary every day working person.
It is is just absurd to think this help Maine Businesses or discourages the kinds of purchases that Mainers are choosing to make on line. The world is changed forever..market places are changed forever.
People don’t by books at Amazon to beat the sales tax..they buy there because titles are available that aren’t available anywhwere in Maine and its posisble to get used and out of print books.
My last purchase as a used and dog eared copy of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin..”Toward The Future” .I doubt I would have found that in any Maine bookstore anywhere or any Maine library for instance.
From a summary by govtrack of the Marketplace Fairness Act (S. 1832):
Authorizes each member state to require all sellers not qualifying for a small-seller exception (sellers with annual gross receipts in total U.S. remote sales of less than $500,000) to collect and remit sales and use taxes.
Thanks Gerald..important to provide what information about the bill itself.we can..The full text and several articles about it pop up with a google search.
The $500,000 exemption is really the “eBay exemption” so that little sellers running an internet garage sale don’t have to collect and remit to every state the sales taxes on items shipped to that state. ( Imagine the burden of that).
More and more Maine self employed people of all kinds, including artists and crafters are using the internet to extend their selling season.. $500,000 sounds like a lot but I would wager that $500,000 in gross receipts might not trasnlate to all that much actual profit to live on and I can imagine this would be a great burden for many to have to keep track of and report sales and make trasnmittal to many different states.
Main Street in Maine, as Chellie seems to have forgotten
is lots of self employed pople trying in all sorts of resourceful ways to support themselves and their families.
But most importantly, this bill treads on some very well established territory in commerce law which forbids a state from imposing its laws and regulations on any business not domiciled in that state.
Aamazon and other big internet sellers ( Overtsock.com etc.) aren’t breaking the law now.. The law does not make them subject to the sales tax laws of the states where their customers do business. This la would make any business with more than $500,00o in sales to collect and remit taxes for all states in which their customers reside.
Does that sound fair and reasonable to you?
Under Maine law the duty now is for the purchaser to report and pay that as a use tax. here is the State’s guidance on how that works and what you owe for all out of state purchases:
http://www.state.me.us/revenue/salesuse/use%20tax.htm#indhow
If you buy a coat in a state where there is no saleses tax you are legally required now to pay the state sales tax on that if you bring that item back to Maine for use.
The dark side of this trojan horse entitled “Marketplace Fairness Act” is that they are saying the internet shipping establishes the fact of a sale in that state and that should be recognized under Federal law as a sale in that state and subject to sales tax whether or not the seller has a place of bsuiness in the state.. In effect it gives the State authority to comple business not domiciled in Maine or having any business presence at all here tobe subject to Maine law and regulation.
Does that make sense to you? Does that sound reasonable to you?
I say sales taxes are about the privilege of operating within a state..of having the opportuity to sell goods within that state and properly applies only to businesses operating within that state. The way it is is the way it should be.
I in fcat believe there should be no sales tax on any non luxury item and that the use tax should only be retained and vigoroulsy inforced for things like yacht and private plane purchases, fur coats, all jewelry.
There should be no sales or use tax due on a cloth coat for a child in a working Maine family wherever it is purchased.
I don’t really care. I don’t order on line to avoid the taxes. It’s convenient. That small amount isn’t going to break me and if the politicians need more money to steal ………….have at it. Nothing seems to change.
Anyone who supports a bill like this is a blood sucker and I think its about time the American people threw all you good for nothing Anti Americans out of office and started over with HONEST people who care about this country and not just getting richer!!!!!!!
Welcome back Mal Leary!
Lepage and Pingree maybe you could see about stopping the earn income credits. When you pay in $500 per year in and get back $4,500 thats totally wrong. Stop the EBT cards and the welfare. Maybe we as tax payers could claim the welfare on our taxes each year since we have to support them. All in favor I….. Stop buying stuff on the internet and see how fast the company’s complain.
4 little dependents = $8000 or more at tax time for some in the lower tax bracket. It’s the only time I am envious of someone with 4 kids. I see new cars, trips to the mall, electronics, even a trip to the Dominican Republic, with these big EIC gifts, atleast we, I mean they, are putting it back into the economy. But I agree-this is one part of our government that is totally wrong.
I am not whining, just saying how the system has failed and doing the tax payers of this country wrong. Now R Lepage and D Pingree wants somemore taxes put on the poorest state in the union. I am so happy they both are getting along so well and agree. Let see what happens during election time this fall.
Disappointed with the governor. The ‘use’ part of ‘tax and use’ is onerous. We should be about reducing taxes, not increasing their scope.
This is not about fairness to merchants. For the state, it’s another revenue source. For us, it’s sucking more out of our already flat wallets.
No suprise Pingree supports it, but it’s hypoocritical of LePage.
Then the State Of Maine needs to come after you for theft.
Good to see you back, Mal!
No no no no please don’t do this to your citizens. Raise the fines for municipal violations by the official’s we elect, do drug testing for welfare, cut personal use of state vehicles. There are many ways to cut and save. Pingree has multi millions so it would not affect her or her family. What we need to do is to put more wealthy folks into government so they can reap even more from the taxpayers and raise the taxes on the normal hardworking folks, of Maine.
As he said,he’d cut the dams-until one of those fails and the families of the dead sue.And if you think that isn’t a reality,look up the state of our dams and water/sewer infrastructure. VERY scary.
Everything else you list has been cut to the bone already if not past that.
Because Maine needs another revenue stream. Here’s an idea – stop squandering what’s already coming in. If they want a “level playing field” then get rid of the Maine sales tax instead of trying to collect from out of state retailers. I mean, wow, we have an income tax that graduates to 8.5% at only $39k income for a family, with median incomes for singles and households above that top threshold. Then we pay another ridiculous sum to the town to register a car, with no depreciation on its value past 5 years – I’m paying the 5th year of value on a car made in 1991 right now. Then property taxes, which are above 1% and not unreasonable, but it adds up. Oh, and how about those tolls (that they want to raise another 26%). Then use tax, with a presumption that I’ve spent a certain amount out of state unless I can otherwise prove with receipts.
Maine businesses already pay taxes. Their owners already pay taxes. If the state wants to compete with its neighbor and the Internet, drop the sales tax.
Moving to New Hampshire sounds better and better every time an article like this comes up.
Stop giving them ideas.
Here’s an idea, Maine needs to recover from its own fraud abuse. See the following report and tell me how many TV stations brought investigative journalism to its viewers, in Maine. Other states do and they recover vast sums. Let your fav tv news team know that you are interested in more.
These are some of the stories the Maine Center has published since its founding in December, 2009. Back then, our goal was to publish a dozen stories a year in three newspapers. Two and a half years later, we’re published in more than 20 newspapers and we’ve produced more than 80 stories. And our stories get results: Potentially dangerous dams are being inspected more frequently. The legislature and the governor passed a law that says judges, not amateur bail commissioners, must set bail in domestic violence cases. And $500,000 was returned to a state agency because of our reporting on a million-dollar energy efficiency contract. Democracy requires transparencyin government. The work we do at the Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting demands and promotes that transparency and provides you with the information you need to understand, engage with and hold accountable your government. Center staff spends weeks and months digging through documents, interviewing experts and analyzing what we find. The result is stories that hold officials accountable and reveal the backroom maneuvers, power and money behind the making of public policy. Our work has received national recognition from the Columbia Journalism Review, ProPublica and the Wall Street Journal. Our staff has been asked to speak to fellow journalists at the national conference of investigative reporters, at the Society of American Business Editors and Writers and at the Boston University narrative journalism conference. Our stories have provoked many editorials in our media partners’ publications. One of those editorials, written after we published an exhaustive study of the state’s ethics laws, spoke to the heart of what we do. Wrote the Journal Tribune: “This study, and all of MCPIR’s work, is journalism at its best: Pointing out the shortfalls of government so that those in power will take note and change things for the better.” And we’re equal opportunityinvestigators: Our stories have exposed wrongdoing,misfeasance and abuses of power on both sides of the aisle in Augusta, from powerful Democrat John Martin’s favors for the Irving companies to Republican Speaker Robert Nutting’s inflated Medicaid charges when he owned a pharmacy. Our work isn’t possible without you. We are pioneering a new model of journalism in Maine: We’re a nonprofit group supported almost entirely by donations. In the midst of a crisis in the news industry that has diminished the ability of local and national media to do investigative reporting, we provide our stories free of charge to our media partners. So your support is vital to our success. Please make a gift to the Center by clicking here, by visiting our website,www.pinetreewatchdog.org, and clicking the Donate Now button at the bottom of our home page or by using the “Donate Now” button in this email. You can also send a check to the Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting, Post Office Box 284, Hallowell, Maine 04347. We are a 501c3 organization and your donations are tax-deductible. Thank you. Jay Davis, PresidentJohn Christie, Publisher and Senior ReporterNaomi Schalit, Executive Director and Senior Reporter “Wherever the people are well-informed, they can be trusted with their own government.”- Thomas JeffersonThe Maine Center for Public Interest ReportingPO Box 284 Hallowell, Maine 04347 pinetreewatchdog.org 207-458-2023 mainecenter@gmail.comMember, Investigative News Network,Investigative Reporters and Editorsand the Online Media Legal Network
This is spam-asking for donations.Delete immediately please BDN
This is not spam, I put it on for the mere sake of information > Yes, I should of deleted the asking for gifts or donation. That was my fault not the site. My intent was to show that we do need to employ more Investigative Journalism to keep all citizens informed so correct judgments can be made and pressure can be put upon the source’s.
Conley, can I make a suggestion? Paragraphs would help make your comments more readable. Thanks.
To LNB-this won’t attach to your post about Teilhard de Chardin.A GREAT library resource is WorldCat.org.Free search for anything in any participating library in the US.I found a book that was only at the Folger Library in ME and was able to get it sent to my local library.Took a couple of weeks but WELL worth it.
I just searched for that specific title.It is available at 3 libraries in ME.Great book BTW.
BDN . Please delete this as it doesn’t relate to the article and promote’s a web site. See how childish your remarks are ? Information is a good thing.
“There is no denying that passing the bill would give thousands of small Maine businesses a real boost,” LePage said.
How will this give a boost to small business owners? People are still going to shop online only now, they’ll have to pay Maine sales tax. How is this going to ensure people are shopping locally first?
People shop online because there is more choice, and they don’t have to drive over crappy potholed roads to get exactly what they want. People shop online because the prices are better and there is more selection. There are many times when I try to shop locally, and when I ask if the store owner carries a certain product, I am told, “No, but we can order it.” Well duh, so can I!
I went to my local bookstore to ask for a fairly recent title(it was a NYT 2011 bestseller)
They didn’t have it and he ordered from—Amazon.So why would I go to his store again?
Update in Augusta, so we keep the same cronies in so they can keep ripping the citizens off.
Former director McCormick, IT employee received cash and airline miles from extensive use of personal cards for MaineHousing purchases Former director of Maine State Housing Authority (MSHA) Dale McCormick and one of her employees used their personal credit cards to make over $170,000 in purchases for MSHA,…
Nothing to do with the Internet taxes and McCormick was not found guilty of anything.
It is implied that they all use the internet to book travel and gain reward points using state funds… in addition to the $170k in purchases. Figure upwards of 300,000 in reward points. But travel points alone could be over a million miles?
It was a suggestion that followed another comment to seek revenue from other sources. Seems you follow some political agenda and not what helps, all our citizens. And yes, I believe the 2 party system is outdated. Its all about the person or the people in our state or our country.
It’s far from over. This was not her first time. The key here is to rid our state of these people. See this follow-up as fraud is fraud regardless of how it is done.
It is unclear if MaineHousing will seek reimbursement from McCormick or the IT Director for any rewards or cash received as a result of the frequent and excessive use of their personal credit cards.If so, it wouldn’t be the first time the former director has had to pay back the Authority. The OPEGA report notes that McCormick was paid “duplicate” reimbursements on several occasions, and had to be contacted after her resignation to pay MaineHousing back for one of those duplicate reimbursement payments that hadn’t been noticed prior to the OPEGA report.
I am getting so tired of being “Dictated” by this State and Country……………
what middle class?! Everything that’s needed fixing have fallen on the middle class’s backs till now, no such thing! Became the poor! This is from stingrays904 NOT randy!
“No new taxes’ was his mantra while campaigning. After a year and a half, he is finally realizing the follie of his huge tax give-away to the wealthy. Sales tax is a flat tax, except for the extra 2% on restaurant sales. Flat taxes are harder on the middle class and the poor than they are on the wealthy. So Paulie’s spin is that this isn’t a “new” tax – BS! His alternate spin is broadening the original intent of the “use tax”, which was to tax leases wich were actually installment purchases. Q: How can you tell if Paulie is trying to screw the middle class? A: His lips are moving. This guy just can’t be trusted.
There isn’t a middle class anymore!! Everything that’s needed fixing gets done on our backs till we’ve now become the poor! Leave us alone!!
States can already tax internet sales. We do not need an act of Congress to do it.
There’s something really wrong when one of the most conservative governors in the union signs on to an effort to increase taxes and starts using loaded leftist terms like “Marketplace fairness”. I like Paul, I really do, but between this and his pushing to add a new healthcare tax to the tax bills of tens of thousands of working Mainers to support a “high risk pool” that amounts to corporate welfare for out of state insurance companies, I have to say that I’m glad to see the Libertarian Party starting to get its’ act together. A two term former governor who is the most competent and capable candidate in the race as their presidential nominee this time out (Former New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson) and an actual US SEnate candidate on the ballot and campaigning her in Maine (Andrew Dodge). I can only hope this means that in 2014 they’ll have a gubenatorial candidate to advance into the political marketplace here in Maine as well.
no -no taxes on the net -you can expect the UN to add on to this -keep it free
Reading today’s comments, I am impressed how many people are willing to take money from local merchants and give it to a giant company (e.g., Amazon) to help “the little guy.”
Our local merchant buys online in lots, and then passes on the savings.
I have no problem buying from a local business and would much rather do that than buy online.But some places carry limited supplies,none at all or we can order it for you then they charge you for the shipping. So if I have to pay shipping I might as well as look online for the best price and have it shipped directly to my home. How many of you have hobbies and have no choice but to order online b/c a local business won’t carry it as there’s not much call for it. I have ordered online just for that reason. So why I should I pay a sales tax for something online when I could have purchased the item at a local business. I am tired of all these taxes. It’s no wonder we don’t have any extra money to spend. By the time we pay taxes, pay for basic living expenses there’s no extra money left to spend on anything else. IMHO Augusta and Washington has a champagne appetite on a beer salary and need to learn to live within their means and stop making we the people pay for their high maintenance living.
“There is no denying that passing the bill would give thousands of small Maine businesses a real boost” says Lepage. How does he figure that? Im still shopping online. I’ll just pay the tax. Its still better than driving crappy roads at 3.50 a gallon and dealing with all the people…they deliver to my h0use, done deal.
I will still order line for the reason that it will still be cheaper compared to brick and mortar.
Give me a break.
A tax is a tax, is a tax.
This must be the new bipartisanship I hear so much about.Screw the consumer and both parties are for it.
You can blame the pro lifers for that scam.If people knew how much they’ve cost us over the last forty years there would be outrage.
Support the EFF (Electronic Freedom Foundation)
The other thing that went on until the ins and drug cos. got wise was busloads of old people going to Canada for “lunch”They’d load up with Canadian scrips and nobody said a thing.
What is a Republican doing supporting a tax increase? Where’s the Tea Party and the think tank on this topic? They should be screamin’ at the tops of their lungs.
The more correct approach for Maine (which Pingree and LePage alledgedly represent) is to eliminate the sales tax in order to be more strongly competitive with New Hampshire.
Forcing people to pay sales tax on out of state purchases is just going to make it more expensive for Maine people and businesses. LePage, buddy, what happened to your free-market thinking? Do you realize that this Internet tax is a two-way street – that Maine businesses that sell over the Internet will become less competitive elsewhere?
I don’t get it. Don’t any of these politicians actually support the average Joe or Joan? Folks are already strapped for cash and now these “do-gooders” want to raise the cost of goods? How about forcing the free market to come up with its own solutions instead of getting government even deeper into our pockets?!!!
For those who don’t know we actually have a use tax ( That’s the $32 million says is owed the state..out of state purchases on which Mainers have failed in their legal duty to report use tax)
Here is a link to the official Maine State guidance on how to report use and what you must by law
report:
http://www.state.me.us/revenue/salesuse/use%20tax.htm#indhow
Amazing eh?
Anyone want to sign a citizens petition to repeal the use AND sales tax on all non luxury items..on all items with a purchase price of $200 or less except liquor , cigarettes and jewelry.?
And that’s not a new law. It’s right there on the Maine state tax form.
Is there use tax when I purchase goods over the internet?
Yes. Purchases over the internet are treated the same way as purchases made out-of-state. If the vendor is not registered with Maine and does not charge Maine sales tax, then you would be liable for the use tax.
Common taxable items for businesses are office supplies and equipment, computer hardware, software and supplies, janitorial supplies, fax machines and supplies, photocopiers and supplies and books. For individuals common taxable purchases are computers, books, downloaded music & cd’s, clothing, and auctionhouse purchases.
Where can I get an Individual Use Tax return?http://www.state.me.us/revenue/salesuse/IUSEIntrnt.pdf
That’s right..so what do you think Joe. Do you think we should repeal te use tax or do you think the use tax is reasonable.
And what do you think Joe about whether one state should be able to make business located in another state subject its laws and regulations? Tht’s what this law allows.
.
Not to mention that we take in far more Federal Money than we give.
If this bill passes, it will gut the only bright part of our economy. It
will not affect any of our NAFTA trading partners. Only companies in
the USA. The flight of business to our NAFTA trading partners will be
immediate and universal. It’s one thing to require businesses in Maine
to collect your sales tax for Maine. It is entirely another for you to
require a business in Wyoming to collect Maine sales tax for Maine. You
will never be able to require a business in Canada or Mexico to collect
sales tax for Maine. Maybe they should look at the real problem.
Requiring the residents of Maine to pay the sales tax that the already
owe but don’t pay.