> No national sales tax currently exists, to my knowledge. So this is a new precedent.
No, because, despite the media calling the Marketplace Fairness Act an "Internet Sales Tax", the bill is not a national (or any other) tax. It is a bill which conditionally lifts existing barriers to states extending their sales taxes to cover online retailers selling goods to people in the state.
If the bill passes, then states with sales taxes would have to choose whether or not to meet the conditions set in order to extend those taxes to internet retailers selling into the state. No tax is created directly by the bill, and any tax enabled by the bill would be a state tax, not a national tax.
> People are already struggling, burdening them with a tax that will generate revenue that is peanuts compared to what we're spending on our wars.
Most states aren't using any of the taxes they collect to fund wars, and the central purpose of this isn't so much to raise new revenues (though it will enable states to do some of that) as to eliminate the tax incentives that currently exist which favor out-of-state internet-based retailers over in-state retailers (internet-based or brick-and-mortar) due to the inability of states to levy the same taxes on the former as the latter.
No, because, despite the media calling the Marketplace Fairness Act an "Internet Sales Tax", the bill is not a national (or any other) tax. It is a bill which conditionally lifts existing barriers to states extending their sales taxes to cover online retailers selling goods to people in the state.
If the bill passes, then states with sales taxes would have to choose whether or not to meet the conditions set in order to extend those taxes to internet retailers selling into the state. No tax is created directly by the bill, and any tax enabled by the bill would be a state tax, not a national tax.
> People are already struggling, burdening them with a tax that will generate revenue that is peanuts compared to what we're spending on our wars.
Most states aren't using any of the taxes they collect to fund wars, and the central purpose of this isn't so much to raise new revenues (though it will enable states to do some of that) as to eliminate the tax incentives that currently exist which favor out-of-state internet-based retailers over in-state retailers (internet-based or brick-and-mortar) due to the inability of states to levy the same taxes on the former as the latter.