Dallas Morning News: Texas Was Tougher Than Other States in Dealing with Amazon on Sales Taxes

When a Dallas resident or shopper in College Station or Lubbock makes a purchase from Amazon or any other online retailer with a physical presence in Texas such as Wayfair and RH.com, the state gets its 6.25 percent. The cities get their local sales taxes too. In Dallas, that’s an additional 2 percent for a total sales tax of 8.25 percent.

But that’s not true for cities in Alabama, Alaska, Idaho, Iowa, Mississippi, New Mexico and Pennsylvania, according to a new report from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. The think tank’s new study said that while Amazon has been collecting state sales taxes across the U.S. since April 2017, cities are being left out because of their state rules.

“Sales taxes are important revenue for cities in New Mexico, for example, and those local officials will have to put pressure on their state lawmakers to change the law,” said Carl Davis, research director at the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy and author of the report. Read more

---