Scott Goldberg explains what this will mean to retailers and individual states:
Should sales tax be collected on that tablet or LED television you just bought online at a sweet Cyber Monday sales price? The answer, in many cases, isn’t clear and the U.S. Supreme Court isn’t about to resolve the confusion.
The high court declined today to hear appeals by Amazon.com and Overstock.com of a March decision by New York’s highest court upholding the constitutionality of that state’s first in the nation “Amazon law” —a 2008 statute requiring out-of-state Internet sellers with web marketing affiliates in New York to collect New York sales taxes on deliveries to New York residents.
A dozen other states have copied the New York law, but in October, the Illinois Supreme Court shot down that state’s 2011 Amazon copycat statute. Some lawyers had hoped that the apparent split between state courts would persuade the U.S. Supreme Court to take the case. As is customary, the Supreme Court issued no explanation today of why it declined to hear (“grant cert” to) the Amazon and Overstock appeals .
Source: Forbes
