The US has had a long, now-dwindling tax holiday for online sales. To me, the tax avoidance is unfair to the brick and mortar stores that have to collect the tax while Amazon did not. Not blaming Amazon. They play by the rules, collect when they are told to. But unfair is unfair. Interesting to see this impact on sales.
In states that have the tax, households reduced their spending on Amazon by about 10 percent compared to those in states that don’t have the levy. For online purchases of more than $300, sales fell by 24 percent, according to the report titled “The Amazon Tax.”
Huge impact.
Nowadays, I typically just use Amazon to price match at stores like Best Buy. I never saw it as a huge deal that Amazon collected tax (I seldom buy very large items), but I’d rather help brick and mortar and its employees.
It also doesn’t hurt that I get my item immediately instead of waiting two days.
In reality in all states that don’t force collection of sales tax on out-of-state online sales you’re expected to pay it yourself when you do your income tax, but no one I know of does it.
It’s inevitable that all states that have sales tax will eventually force Amazon to collect. They’re losing too much revenue otherwise. Amazon will have to take the hit just like physical stores have to. The amount of tax affects purchases — especially large ones.
I have dramatically shifted purchases to either local even if Amazon is a few pennies cheaper.
The convenience factor has been more important to me than avoiding sales tax (combined with decent pricing). I prefer spending money locally, but some times it is too troublesome to make it to the store or I want an item that isn’t available locally. Ironically the local stores that were more likely to get my cash, book stores, have largely disappeared. I used to love walking to book stores on my lunch break, often coming back with something. But no book stores are within walking distance of home or office anymore.
“Not having to have retail stores” is equally “unfair”, I guess.
(I also live in Oregon where nobody collects sales tax; our retail stores like Best Buy still can’t compete, because they suck.)