New sales tax collection law for Colorado..

[roberth]

The Commies are still there, some even, still in power. The Commies in our country wear Red and Blue. ‭

Yup, the communists sit on both sides of the aisle.

[iego]

Does it really "level the field"?

Mail order business have a cost that you don't .... mailing. Though you might think tax levels the field for small business, companies like Amazon and Walmart don't really have any overhead from this, and it's not going to affect their sales. People ordering online aren't magically going to walk into a retail store because there's a $3.00 fee added that they're... also going to get walking into the retail store.

Any small or medium business, on the other hand, that wants to ship *ANYTHING* - ever- now has their expenses increase by 25-50% or more in doing so. Your good customer moved to Denver and still wants your product? Someone in the neighboring town wants you to ship something to their grandma for her birthday? etc.

Note the requirements don't pass as 200 transactions to each taxing region, it just establishes a minimum size for a business. A business running 100,000 in volume probably isn't generating a profit of even $10,000, and the single-employee owner would be making less than minimum wage in most industries, if not taking a loss. So, it applies to ALL SMALL BUSINESSES. With the only except of "hobby businesses" e.g. people who have a business in name only, but not occupation.

The effect of this is the opposite of leveling the field, it's to drive out small business from competing with "mail order", as you're not going to be getting couch potatoes out to shop if they're going to potato.

The store (and at the end of the day, the consumer) does have to pay freight in too, as witnessed by the product sitting (locally) on the shelf. While there are differences in cost models between the two operations, local business and "mail order," the kinds of costs required to get the product to the consumer are similar, and reflect the costs of the product, marketing expenses, employee payroll, profit margin, freight, etc.

However, the one substantial cost that the consumer historically does not have to pay with "mail order" is sales tax. Or, used to be. Since no one voluntarily pays Use Tax, etc.

We used to have (and I'm sure they still exist) shipping tables from UPS that would allow us to (load them into our Point of Sale application and) calculate shipping charges for every address (zip code) in America. That seems like an undauntable task, but was reduced to a one page form of zip codes and rates that could be updated on a monthly/required basis. I'm sure that similar products will become (if not already) available for calculating (and remitting) sales taxes in modern Point of Sale applications/the age of the internet.

-John

[Irving]

Figuring out how much tax to charge based on zip code seems about as easy as it gets.

That part aside, the law seems unfavorable.

[crays]

Figuring out how much tax to charge based on zip code seems about as easy as it gets.

That part aside, the law seems unfavorable.

First part, NO: Not all tax districts are defined exclusively by ZIP code.
Second part, Agreed.

[TFOGGER]

Figuring out how much tax to charge based on zip code seems about as easy as it gets.

That part aside, the law seems unfavorable.

Right up to the point you realize that most(if not all)t taxing authorities require businesses to register as tax collection agents, and charge for that privilege. Imagine that instead of 2 tax licences, you as a small businessman have to manage 20, each of which entails it's own fee annually, and requires that you file a multipage return at least quarterly, if not monthly, regardless of whether you collected any tax for that jurisdiction.

[Irving]

I'll walk back my statement to, figuring out what tax to charge is certainly achievable without having to hire a full time accountant solely for that purpose.

I'm not sure why I'm trying to downgrade any complaints though, as it certainly sounds like a bunch of all around BS.

[Eric P]

Right up to the point you realize that most(if not all)t taxing authorities require businesses to register as tax collection agents, and charge for that privilege. Imagine that instead of 2 tax licences, you as a small businessman have to manage 20, each of which entails it's own fee annually, and requires that you file a multipage return at least quarterly, if not monthly, regardless of whether you collected any tax for that jurisdiction.

If that's the case, home rule tax collection needs to end. All applicable taxes need to be collected by the state, then distributed up to each tax district by the state. This makes more sense and eliminates local tax collector positions. Oops, there is the flaw, killing guberment jobs.

Otherwise this new policy will kill small businesses that don't sell through market places like Amazon. Was this law sponsored by amazon? Hmm...

[TFOGGER]

If that's the case, home rule tax collection needs to end. All applicable taxes need to be collected by the state, then distributed up to each tax district by the state. This makes more sense and eliminates local tax collector positions. Oops, there is the flaw, killing guberment jobs.

Otherwise this new policy will kill small businesses that don't sell through market places like Amazon. Was this law sponsored by amazon? Hmm...

Currently, it takes me about an hour to fill out monthly sales tax returns for my business. As an indentured servant of the state and the city of Golden, my princely compensation for that hour is a whopping 3.33% of the tax I am forced to collect on their behalf. If I am forced to register with, for instance, Grand Junction and Mesa County to sell a set of tires and ship them to one of my long time customers, I would receive about $8 to file a year's worth of returns, not taking into account the cost of the tax licenses. Allowing the state to collect all municipal taxes only works if they can configure the state return to account for all 650+ tax rates in various parts of the state, which would probably take the time to fill out the return from about an hour to several hours. I can't see the home rule cities giving up their fee revenue for business licenses, nor paying the state for collecting their taxes.