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Wednesday, Feb. 20, 2013 | 7:30 p.m.
Sun coverage
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid lent his support to two proposals Wednesday night that could bring Nevada hundreds of millions of dollars.
Passing an online sales tax at the federal level and passing a state level online poker bill would change the game at the Nevada Legislature, where Democratic legislators are eager to increase funding for education but so far unsure about how they accomplish that.
“I’m going to do it as quickly as I can,” Reid said of a federal proposal to tax online sales.
The Democrat from Searchlight said he has the votes in Congress to pass the proposal but declined to provide details about what’s holding up the proposal.
“We have a problem with, it’s not only Republicans on this one,” he said. “We have more than enough to pass it. If I don’t get cooperation from a couple of senior members, I’ll do it without them.”
The deal would likely bring $200 million per year to Nevada, meaning legislators could chalk up an extra $400 million above what Gov. Brian Sandoval is proposing to spend in the state’s next two-year budget.
Reid also supported Sandoval’s move to create interstate online gambling compacts that would allow licensed companies to operate legal online poker websites for gamblers living in Nevada and its compact partner states.
“Nevada doesn’t have a choice unless the federal government does something,” Reid said. “I don’t blame them. I would do it too. We should’ve done it on a federal level. There’s a lot of reasons we didn’t.”
A federal deal fell apart last year, leaving Sandoval to work with Assembly Majority Leader William Horne, D-Las Vegas, to create a state-level solution.
After a disagreement between the two, the governor and legislator have reached a compromise and legislation should proceed through a committee Thursday.
Licensing fees and whatever revenue the state collects through its compacts could also provide legislators more money to budget as they craft the state’s spending plan during the next few months.
What many business owners need to know is freely available modern technology eliminates the burdens clung to since 1992.
Internet savvy shoppers and merchants all agree that API protocol technologies taking into account dozens of variables easily provides real time shipping at checkout processes to over 40,000 different zip codes. Real time shipping has been a win win for merchants, shippers and consumers keeping pricing fair and competitive ultimately creating new markets and opportunities.
Today the very same API technologies freely and seamlessly provide automated tax processing for any merchant to a mere 10,000 tax jurisdictions. Free automated tax processing is actually a win win for consumers, merchants and local governments keeping pricing fair and competitive ultimately creating new markets and opportunities.
Basic economics teaches us competition benefits consumers providing a strong supply of goods and services lowering demand and prices. I personally find it interesting that opponents of this legislation already using API technologies to deal with complexities of shipping (for some time now) all of a sudden find it too burdensome when it know challenges their only real market advantage; false tax free pricing. It is clear to me, a small business owner benefitting from automated tax processing, that a few well funded influential companies are frightened of new efficiencies, opportunities and competitiveness.
The MFA simply grants States' rights to collect existing sales/use tax already due in 45 states. The MFA encourages equal application of tax policy providing small businesses with free software, simplified tax policy standards, and a fair and competitive marketplace. Consumers benefit from lower pricing, and tax jurisdictions efficiently receive their honorable sales/use taxes already due ensuring a greater percentage of every tax dollar honorably remitted funds intended programs and services. That's a trifecta in my book.
I strongly support and urge Congress to pass S.336/H.R. 334 the Marketplace Fairness Act.