GAO: Net tax losses anyone's guess
- By IDG News Service, James Evans
- Jul 26, 2000
Figuring the total for lost taxes from Internet sales is a murky science,
according to a government report released Monday.
The report from the U.S. General Accounting Office concluded that states
and localities may be losing anywhere from $300 million to $3.8 billion
in 2000. The new study is part of an ongoing effort to assess the merits
and drawbacks of taxing Internet transactions as lawmakers debate the issue
on Capitol Hill.
"There is a whole bunch of parameters that you have to have to come
up with a precise number," said James R. White, the GAO's director of tax
policy and administration.
For that reason, GAO officials developed a lower and a higher scenario
for what is being lost in Internet sales tax, White said. He added that
officials took into account estimates of Net sales, tax-exempt products
and users, and different taxing rates.
According to the higher estimate, about 2 percent of overall state and
local sales taxes would not be captured, or roughly $3.8 billion in 2000.
The lower scenario came in at $300 million.
White said the GAO also forecast the potential losses in 2003. Because
the Internet is so dynamic right now, such projections get even more clouded.
The high scenario for 2003 is that state and local governments could
fail to capture $12.4 billion in taxes, while the low scenario is $1 billion,
White said.
The Internet poses new challenges for taxation, such as determining
the place of purchase for a product bought online, White said. That situation
makes it difficult to decide how much a product should be taxed.
Sen. George Voinovich (R-Ohio) requested the Internet taxation study.
Voinovich is a proponent of taxing Net commerce.