Congressional legislators are pushing — once again — a federal online sales tax. The House brought forth on Thursday the Marketplace Fairness Act, a bill that supposedly reconciles the differences among the three introduced — and that failed — in Congress in 2012.
The measure gives states the power to mandate that out-of-state retailers that sell products online collect a sales tax.
“The bill does not tell the states they have to do it. It just enables them to do it,” said Republican Rep. Steve Womack, in a Politico report. “How many more small brick-and-mortar obituaries do we have to see before we recognize that we have a problem?”
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is said to have made the bill a priority, Politico said.
Critics of the bill say it’s essentially unchanged from the three that failed earlier and that it imposes new taxes on online merchants.
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Cheryl Chumley is a continuous news writer for The Washington Times. Previously, she was part of the start-up team for The Washington Times’ digital aggregation product, Times247. She’s also a 2008-2009 Robert Novak journalism fellow with The Phillips Foundation. She can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com.
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