If recent proposals taken to the U.S Congress are successful, we might no longer have a tax-free Internet connection. This is serious business so I’ll cut directly to the chase, the American Congress has to discuss the possibility of introducing new taxes in the Internet domain. Two of the most important taxes are on Net shopping and monthly fees on Broadband, DSL and other connections types. Some senators also take in consideration other fees such as a tax per e-mail (to avoid spam they say).
For now states are prohibited by federal law to collect Internet access sales or access taxes, but all that might change after the Congress finishes to discuss the project. And it’s a major possibility that taxes are to be instituted as they could generate millions of dollars in revenue.
With statements such as:
“Are we implicitly blessing a situation where states are forced to raise other taxes, such as income or property taxes, to offset the growing loss of sales tax revenue?”
or
“The independent and sovereign authority of states to develop their own revenue systems is a basic tenet of self government and our federal system,”
It’s easy to see where things are going for the moment. The idea it’s not new anyway, proposals for taxes such as this exist for at least six years, but for now they remained unsuccessful. Well now things just might change given the political situation, but things aren’t settled yet.
Of course there are some who oppose such taxes, and of course these are those who have most to gain from keeping the Internet free for all. Yes, I’m talking about Internet giants such as Yahoo! or eBay that are part of NetChoice. And it seems they are not alone, there are others, though scarce, that consider excessive taxation to be a problem. Take Jeff Dircksen from the National Taxpayers Union for example:
“If such a system of extraterritorial collection is allowed, Congress will have opened the door to any number of potential tax cartels that will eventually harm rather than help taxpayers.”
In the end it’s a battle between the high income that could be made (easily) from such taxes and the right to access the Internet freely. And to be honest, what the hell, internet taxes?
6-5-2007 10:10:06
One of the major problems with many poorer communities is the lack of internet. The internet is an essential tool in communications these days, it is nigh impossible to achieve a higher education or maintain a professional job without access to the internet and that’s what a tax would accomplish. It would cut off the internet from those people that need it most. Just another tax that would increase the gap between rich and poor. I think this is another case of polotitions remaining blind to their constituents. They get caught up in what’s best in the short run economically and, as a country we can’t think short term anymore. If polotitions would only consider what’s best not for the country but for the country’s people they would realize that a tax like this is only hurting everyone, not to mention jepordizing freedom of speech throughout the nation.
6-5-2007 11:15:01
It is the same as always, if not this year then they will pass it the next year or the next. Have you ever thought about how much taxes we really pay every year. Know wonder states are wanting to annex.
6-5-2007 14:55:34
That is complete bullshit, of this is put into place then we might as well give up are other freedoms to. The United States politicians are turning into a bunch of nazi loving faggots. Next thing we know they’ll be fascist to.
6-5-2007 15:54:43
time to grab your guns, the people must stand up for something, this is better than anything.
6-5-2007 16:24:49
These very tax these govt use for war. Torture American people or use it for their military research. And yes did i forgot to mention build their own property.
6-5-2007 17:33:02
AT&T tried to pass similar measures not too long ago that would open the door to charging for a “premium” internet experience. They claimed that they simply cannot continue in the future without this added revenue, if I remember correctly. Thankfully they lost, but some laws were lessened in “congressional-pity”. Not too long after their internet crap, FCC changed some rules. Cingular has been bought by AT&T.
Some of this internet stuff could be a real attempt to institute a law to tax the internet. However, it could be a step to gain some other advantage with the intention to have the internet taxing legislation fail.
I think congress needs to reread the Federalist Papers again.
6-5-2007 18:40:59
I thought this country was founded on “taxation without representation”? If I have to pay a tax from something I bought in another state, how can I vote on how that money is spent?
6-5-2007 19:09:47
Internet is expensive enough as it is. This probably wont get passed if enough people say NO. Keep in mind people, the politicians don’t pass the laws the people do. So if some of you ****** would get off your lazy asses and do something about it retarded shit like this will never happen.
6-5-2007 21:20:25
Matt, our elected officials no longer represent us, the people. They represent special interests (read: corporations) because special interests give them the money required to keep winning elections. Simply put, we’ve been cut out of the loop.
6-5-2007 21:53:14
What about those people going to college, who repeatedly access the internet for informaiton, and emails. We pay a hell of alot in tuition, nothing like making a college student more poor
6-6-2007 05:52:26
College is expensive! Not all professors make a ton of money (I work at a tax office), so I’m not sure why tuition is so expensive. Only medical professors make the real money & a select few computer science professors. Perhaps us students will have a special tax credit?
My response to government not longer supporting the people: there are 435 house members to represent over 300,000,000 people. How can anyone represent numbers like that?! Perhaps what we need is a larger congress. Or, as spoken of very negatively in the Federalist Papers, take a route similar to Rome and split the country into more manageable soverigns. However, even a closely knit confederacy could have problems. Or, perhaps there needs to be a change in the people of America to have alliance with the state before the federal government?
A good idea worth considering is the economic expansion what would be created by an internet tax. Right now my girlfriend doesn’t pay for an internet access. She gets it from nieghbors unsecured wireless routers. Perhaps a tax would prompt people to secure their networks, purchase IDS and the like. Also, new routers will need to have the ability to account for packets. A company will need an audit trail to see how much one person sent and recieved in a manner the IRS could conduct an audit on.
Perhaps a tax will create more tax revenue. However, this possible economic growth as a result of a tax will cost us “privacy.” If our packet usages is being logged, and the technology is widespread to do so, Homeland Security will have an easier time watching for the real threat: domestic “terrorists”.(???)
6-6-2007 08:40:27
what the hell!? can’t we vote on anything!!! I’m sure America doesn’t want this.
6-6-2007 09:34:55
And here are a few more suggestions for the US Congress to consider for the upcoming decades:
1) Taxes on toilet usage, every time you poop or pee, a tax comes out of your credit account.. – Reason: It prevents water shortage problem that half the world is facing right now, and many kids wouldn’t have to go thirsty due to water shortages and drought/famine in poor countries.
2) We’ve all had the urge to turn the lights on every time we enter the room, well now we need taxes to prevent energy wastage, everytime you turn on the light bulb. 0.02 $.. chaching.. Reason – Now you’d think twice if that scrap your going to write in your notebook indicating the failed love life you’ve had the past year is worth spending the extra 2 cents in taxes over, or you’d rather just sleep.
There are probably several more I can think of with screwed up reasoning that makes sense to some people (*cough* the french).. Bottom line is.. You get the picture..
6-6-2007 09:52:18
more bullshit. we should start a large Wireless NETWORK around the world. maybe buy one of those high speed sats hook it up to broadcast our networks and thats it. free
6-6-2007 11:25:27
What next? Are they going to start taxing the air we breathe as well?
This is the most ridicules thing that I’ve ever heard. I know about the net neutrality issues and such but taxing the internet usage is absurd. Internet is a major tools for communication and sharing ideas or knowledge. If the government tax it, it will only restrict the internet to those who can afford. How about students or disable person? They depend most on the internet for commucation.
I hope the government would reconsider this mad idea.
6-6-2007 13:02:15
[quote] not to mention jepordizing freedom of speech throughout the nation. [/quote]
freedom of speach??????? whats that… im sure there will be free-speech zone’s on the internet to once they tax us for it
its not about what is best for the people its a case of whats best for their golf buddies and their campain funders.
[quote]time to grab your guns[/quote] – not the answer, although typical american responce.
[quote]What next? Are they going to start taxing the air we breathe as well?[/quote] – nope they are just going to start adding mind control drugs to the air. oh wait they dont need drugs to control minds just FEAR
anyway work todo. keep the internet as one there is already enough of a digital & finanical devide.
everyone is the same we all live we all die. some people just think they are better than others.
6-6-2007 14:26:02
Totally screwed – in every sense of the word!
6-7-2007 03:15:07
Thinking about this more, I’m not sure an internet tax will make much of a difference to whether a person will pay the “internet-subscription”, or buy the #4 at McDonalds. We already pay various taxes on our cell phone bills, some states have very high sales tax rates, and others don’t have state withholdings for W-2 income. Missouri collects withholdings, Texas doesn’t. Does this mean I am going to move out of Missouri?
Perhaps going against any contribution limits and voting for 3rd parties will fix these issues? Just because a congressional candidate isn’t on NBC doesn’t mean you can’t vote for them!
Also, remind people around you about this sort of stuff come voting time. Come Todd Akin’s reelection I’m going to do all I can to let everyone know about his votes against the “ideal” internet. Sad thing is, everyone is going to hate me because I’m talking politics, and not about Cartoon Network (nothing against CN!). Sad Face.
6-7-2007 08:55:20
Technically isn’t it illegal to tax over the internet? With all those proxies, international communities, and everything else there is no way they can add any real tax to the internet without a lot of dissent for the US.
6-8-2007 13:50:41
How do you tax, for example, emails?
Assuming for a moment such a law was passed, you’d need a way to track the mail. The obvious way is to have the mail servers do it. But that’s easily circumvented by using a server in another country, where the law doesn’t exist.
Now, you can get fancy and start tracking the data that goes along certain ports to see if people are going to mail servers or not, but there’s no set criteria for how to connect to them (web based email clients, where the computer you use never actually sends the mail, are a good example).
So in order to keep track you’d need someone (the ISPs) to manually check all the data they send out in order to see if it’s an email or not… The explanation procedes to get more convuluted to the point where the feasibility appears too low to contemplate.
6-8-2007 13:57:12
@Bomb Bloke
Well no. All they need to do, is to make all companies that offer mailing services and are based in the US, charge for every email you send. This won’t be very helpful because everybody would switch to free services in other countries, but still, there are methods to implement mailing fees.
6-9-2007 00:54:14
We have internet sales taxes here in Washington State; try to buy from amazon.com here without paying sales tax if you don’t think so.
we also have taxes embedded on broadband access in Grant county – sales taxes are applied to the access fees charged my ISP ( I own the ISP) on access to fiber customers by the Grant County PUD. The state taxing authority says pay it. Complain if you like, but pay it.