Legislation that would speed up the date for when Amazon and other online retailers would have to start collecting the state sales tax may be dead.
The bill overwhelmingly passed the House, but is now facing resistance from Indiana Gov. Mike Pence and Senate leaders, including the state senator who originally agreed to carry the legislation in the Senate.
“It just doesn’t seem to have a lot of legs right now,” said Sen. Ryan Mishler, a Republican from Bremen and the original Senate sponsor of House Bill 1007.
Mishler said the bill will likely die, without a hearing in the Senate.
The legislation would have required online retailers, including Amazon, to start collecting the state’s 7 percent sales tax July 1.
The legislation would have required online retailers, including Amazon, to start collecting the state’s 7 percent sales tax July 1.
But it would also negate an agreement made between Amazon and former Gov. Mitch Daniels, in which Amazon agreed to start charging its customers the sales tax Jan. 1, 2014.
Mishler said he still supports the idea of making online retailers collect the sales tax, calling it a “fairness issue” for bricks-and-mortar retailers required by law to charge their customers a sales tax that online retailers have escaped.
But he said the legislation could also undermine the state’s credibility with other businesses seeking to move to Indiana.
“It makes it look like Indiana is willing to go back on [a] deal,” Mishler said.
Pence views it the same way. During a press briefing with Statehouse print reporters earlier this week, Pence said he views the deal that Daniels made with Amazon as “constructive and productive” – and one that he’d be loathe to break.
...
The online sales tax issue has grown in importance in recent years, as more consumers are shifting to online purchases and as the state relies more on sales tax revenues to pay for education and other public services.
A study completed last year by the Indiana Fiscal Policy Institute and Ball State University researchers estimates the state loses out $114 million a year in uncollected sales taxes on Internet purchases.
See the full story here:
