yes, you have to pay tax

[iron2004]

Slightly off topic

EBT cards remove tax before the customers pay, and until recently transactions in which customers were using coupons wenyt through without a hitch, now the tax on coupons for EBT users is no longer taken off, and it always throws me off when i see it, as its usually 3 cents, until I remember, not many complaints though, YET!

[Primer]

Though...adult diapers are tax exempt. (looked over the posted list today...) Can't quite figure that one out... 0.o

Because if Depends were taxed.... it would be a no shit tax...

No, it's because when you get your cc statement after buying all your BTS crap, you'll poop yourself!

[KhirasHY]

Hehe, that's nothing Smiley...downtown hotels in Denver are 14.85% tax. Regular tax is 8.125%, but there are always extra taxes for lodging institutions. Fun, isn't it?

[Tito]

oh, and to add joy to this case, she moved rooms three times because "the beds aren't comfortable enough"... which is bull, because I went to check one of them and I damned near fell asleep as soon as my body hit it.

I think that she was doing that just to be a pain in the ass to you.

Hopefully you'll be lucky, and she'll make good on her word to stay elsewhere in the future.

[TimmyHate]

The American (and I'm guessing Canadian?) tax system baffles me...thank god my Fiance is always with me when i'm over there.

In New Zealand sales tax is 12.5%. On everything. And prices are displayed as such. See a can on the shelf for $2? You walk up to the counter, put a $2 coin down and walk off (well, not exactly but you get my gist). I constantly got thrown off because i like to have exact change (or near enough) and ALWAYS forgot to add tax in the US.

[mikoyan29]

The US tax system is baffling because it is up to the states to do sales tax and each state has a different rate and different items that are taxed. For instance, here in Michigan the sales tax is 6% and it applies to everything that is not food or newspapers. I don't remember if magazines are taxed or not. In Indiana, it seemed like everything was taxed. There is currently no Federal sales tax.

And I think it is even more convoluted when you are talking about things like hotel taxes and rental car taxes because those typically are up to the city or county you are staying as they are generally used to pay for things like stadia, museums and what not. States and what not typically like these kinds of taxes because generally it is other people that are paying them so the citizens don't bitch (much).

[SG15Z]

We get idjits wanting to know why textbooks are taxed, so don't feel bad. Happens everywhere. This coming weekend is TX tax free weekend. It's going to be massively bad because it's also right before the semester starts. I skeeered.

Yeah cause they're adding school supplies to the tax fee weekend this year. I is no looking forward to this weekend.

[Jay 2K Winger]

Closest thing to this I've had at the wholesale club are the resale/tax-exempt shoppers for businesses or embassies. For the most part, they're understanding about it when I tell them, "No, you have to pay tax on that." (Example: restaurants pay tax on all cleaning supplies, etc.)

There was one time, shortly after I started working there, when this customer buying things for his embassy snapped at me because I charged him tax on his alcohol.

J2K: "Right. Alcohol is not tax-free."
SC: "I'm diplomat! I don't pay taxes!"
J2K: "You do on alcohol."
SC: "I don't pay taxes!"
J2K: "You do on that item, sir. It's state law."
SC: "I'm diplomat!"
J2K: "I can't override it, sir. No one here can."

He seemed to get it after that, but gave me the cat-butt face.

[Broomjockey]

5% Gov't Sales Tax

Goods and Services Tax. They're *all* government sales taxes.

In New Zealand sales tax is 12.5%. On everything. And prices are displayed as such.

Skip to the bottom for the TL;DR version.

That's because (and no insult intended) your country is about the size of a postage stamp compared to the US and Canada.

New Zealand: 268,680 km2

Newfoundland and Labrador: 373,872 km2

And Newfoundland is far from the largest province, just tucked away down at the end of the country. It's fair to say that the prices for something doesn't change depending where in the country you are, I'm sure. But in Canada, due to shipping costs, some goods have increased costs, so the price is different on the same item, depending on where in the country you are. What's this to do with taxes being included? Simply this: they may be able to cover a larger area with a sign based on item costs, but since different provinces have different population amounts and area to cover, some of them need to levy additional taxes to cover expenses, so rather than having to reprint every sign for an area when the taxes change, they simply don't include the taxes. It'd be a huge cost for a chain to have to print up a new batch of signs all at once, just because, say, BC changed the tax rate one month, then several months later, the Federal government changed their taxes too. It's worse in the US where you also have county and city taxes on top of State and Federal.

TL;DR version: due to the massive difference in sizes, it is necessitated to have different tax rates in different areas, which can change at different times, making reprinting signs including taxes expensive and time consuming.

[TimmyHate]

That's because (and no insult intended) your country is about the size of a postage stamp compared to the US and Canada.
.

Why! We resemble that remark

No insult taken, we're a tiny little birthmark on the worlds rump.

And thank you Broom, your the first person who actually been able to articulate a logical reason for this. I knew that each states tax is different, but didn't realize they changed with any sort of regularity. Our tax rate has been 12.5% for...well as long as I remember.

Of course now they're talking about increasing it to 15% or even 20%.... At that rate, even on my (low) income i'll be effectively being taxed an average of 35 or 40%...My parents on the other hand (at 20% GST) will be hit with over 58% tax on their income...

[smileyeagle1021]

I knew that each states tax is different, but didn't realize they changed with any sort of regularity.

oh yeah... you can set your watch by changes to the tax code in the United States... every legislative session there is talk about whether to raise, lower, or leave the sales tax the same, and they are doing that with every single tax... in Utah every year there seems to be a slight decrease on taxes on food items and a slight increase in taxes on everything else.

[SuperNat]

Here in Australia, our GST is 10%.

At least it's easy to work out. LOL

[thehippie777]

Poor smiley, I wish she would go through with her threat. lol (Going to another hotel.)

Montana does not have sales tax, but we have travel tax for hotels (7%) and most recently a couple towns estabolished a city travel tax ($1/night).

Many many many guests when I tell them the rate "plus tax" either answer with "Montana doesn't have sales tax!" or "there's tax in Montana?".

Yay for the speal I opened with...over & over & over

[Broomjockey]

No insult taken, we're a tiny little birthmark on the worlds rump.

And thank you Broom, your the first person who actually been able to articulate a logical reason for this.

Maybe a birthmark, but a *really* nice one. I'd like to visit some time. Like Australia (in broad, general, strokes, sorta, but not really, I know ), but with a lot fewer poisonous and venomous creatures.

And glad I could articulate some logic for ya.

[Munkie]

I thank my stars I live in Alberta! WHen I visit BC though, I don't ever quibble over tax... there's only two things certain in life - Death and Taxes.

Though, TBH, taxes were invented to help fund the wars - TECHNICALLY we don't have to pay them if our country is not involved in a war. At least, that was what I heard from a little birdy some time ago...

And going back to the rest of it... Each province can and has printed out their own sales signs, etc, etc, to be used province-wide, etc...


and wow, I totally lost interest in this topic as I was writing this reply.