The Winston-Salem Journal says the North Carolina Department of Revenue should sue online retailers who pulled out of North Carolina in order to avoid collecting sales tax:
North Carolina loses $200 million a year in interstate sales either online or through mail-order catalogs. Consumers who are saving on sales tax — although they are usually paying higher shipping and handling charges — are breaking the law. North Carolinians who use products purchased this way legally owe a corresponding amount of use tax.
For decades, legislators from most of the 50 states have been begging Congress to solve this situation. Congress has failed to do so. The real solution resides in a national policy on interstate sales taxation, but until that develops, the best way to get the money owed to North Carolina is through a lawsuit. The revenue department should go and get it.
I don’t know about you, but it just makes me uneasy having a local paper of record so vociferously defending the revenue department. By the same token, I don’t know why I’m surprised —- the Journal takes up for government every chance they get.
