****I know I’m posting this a few days late but as much as Las Vegas is a fantastic town, wireless internet is hard to come by. And I refused to pay $15 a day for internet. So I wrote this on the plane ride to Vegas****
Well it’s another glorious Monday and as much as I want to complain about having to write a post, I’m on a flight to Las Vegas so I can’t complain. So I would just like to apologize for the post I’m about to post because honestly I have completely checked out. But anyway I’m writing to you today about the Amazon tax. I know it has already been touched on but there is some new info that I am completely against so I figured I would share.
So as you’re probably aware that the “Amazon Tax” finally got pushed through in North Carolina a little while ago. (I think Tim wrote about the tax earlier) As soon as NC legislation mentioned that they were going to try to pass this tax Amazon.com (and others) pulled its affiliate program out of NC. Now this affected numerous people. Ranging from small businesses that specialize in affiliate marketing (One owner told me that his profits have sunk 50% since the bill was passed) to college students trying to make some extra money for school.
So now that the law has passed and Amazon has pulled its affiliate program out of NC you’d figure everything would be fine right? Well not so much. NC’s department of revenue is going after companies like Amazon stating that “the state loses at least $200 million a year in uncollected sales tax from such businesses.” So NC wants money they think they deserve and I am dying to know why they think Amazon and other companies owe them money. Amazon dropped its affiliates in NC before the tax was pushed through but yet the NC government thinks that companies like Amazon owe them money.
So let me start my rant about why I think Amazon should be left alone and not bothered, after all the NC government is screwing Amazon out of a lot of money as it is. So ok let us start with Senator David Hoyle. He has been quoted as saying that he is completely for the NC government going after Amazon for money they believe is owed to them. Now if we look at Senator Hoyle, he is 70 years old and makes over 200 thousand dollars a year (http://people.forbes.com/profile/david-w-hoyle/19915) Now this tax does not really effect people such as Senator Hoyle because he is by far not in our generation. At 70 years old I can’t see the Senator doing a lot of online shopping; now I could be completely wrong. All I am saying is that the younger generation does quite a bit of shopping online and that the older generations do not. So naturally the older generation is not going to see eye to eye with us on the whole internet thing. Another reason is that the senator makes over 200 grand a year, so even if David Hoyle was involved in affiliate marketing losing a couple of thousand of dollars would not affect him. See my name argument with this tax is that it does not the generation that is in politics right now. All the Senators and people in the House of Representatives are in an older generation then us. They don’t see the internet as a tool for young small businesses to get a head start and expand their businesses. They just see that there is a way for the government to make more money so they say “hey let’s take advantage of this.”
So let’s look at the problems this tax has caused. Before they passed the tax companies like Amazon pulled its affiliate programs out of NC, causing many small businesses to lose profits. So now instead of promoting small businesses they are shutting them down. Causing numerous people to downsize their small businesses or even shut down. And on top of that NC is attempting to sue Amazon. So let me get this straight: In an economy that is supposed to be supportive of small businesses they have shut the door on numerous small businesses and now they are attempting to sue a large company, in which will cost them lots and lots of money. So if they sue Amazon sure the NC government will make some money, but at what cost. If Amazon get sued they will lose lots of money and be forced to lay employees off to save money, further weakling the economy even more.
It boggles the mind how the government thinks. They plan on gaining money from passing this tax when in reality they are causing small businesses to lose money, cut employees, and crippling the economy. Now I would just like to state that this post is completely my opinion and the fact that I am on a flight to Las Vegas with a few cocktails in my system. Now I just hope I can find some free internet so I can post this today.
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