Congress Pulls Together Proposal To Ban Internet Access Taxes Permanently

I like to think that our elected officials just really care about us but the members of Congress are probably just sick of having to continually renew the Internet Tax Freedom Act. I guess it doesn't really matter what the motivation is as long as they do it.

The first Internet Tax Freedom Act became law all the way back in 1998. Its purpose was to promote the growth of internet services — then, before the first dot-com bust, still a brand-new idea — by making sure they wouldn’t be taxed out of being. The law prohibits local, state, and federal governments from imposing taxes on internet access or specific internet-only features, like any tax “imposed on or measured by the volume of digital information transmitted.”

I think Congress has figured out they can't get their heads out of their asses consistently enough to follow through on the every couple year expirations, and has been making a lot of common sense things permanent; a lot of tax rules were put on autopilot with inflation adjustments in the past few years, for example.

But if they don't have to continuously renew the tax freedom whatever funny name it is, how will they manage to earmark some unrelated proposal to get passed through?

Hello election year distractions.

I doubt the Dems are going to let this happen.

Very good news if it happens. Too bad that congress normally sees things as taxable simply because they exist.

I think it means they want to clear the way for taxing internet services so that we can pay taxes for our Internet purchases, Netflix, Amazon TV, etc.

Get ready for the real tax revolution.

toast0 said:

I think Congress has figured out they can't get their heads out of their asses consistently....

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Awesome!!

Waiting for the earmarks now.

timberwolf said:

Very good news if it happens. Too bad that congress normally sees things as taxable simply because they exist.

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Well as long as people keep looking to the Federal Government to monitor and regulate and study every damn thing they'll continue to be able to justify taxing everything that is related to it all.

Face it, people decided they liked playing with drones. Now businesses are looking at using drones as servitors. The FCC and the FAA see a potential future need to regulate this business application of technology, and because it could interfere, recreational use of drones as well. As the government works out what they will have to do in order to regulate/monitor drone use they will incur costs and those costs will either be paid through fees, taxes, or both.

In the meantime, as drones replace delivery vehicles, more and more drivers will be put out of work and have to look for something else to do. Vehicle fleets will shrink and vehicle manufacturers will lose sales which will impact service and sales. Plastics and electronic sales will jump slightly, the vehicle manufacturing industry will shrink some. Demand of electricity will increase and gasoline sale will slow down. Oil will last a little longer, so energy companies will be able to rely on oil a little longer and delay real implementation of cleaner energy.

It's just fun to see how these things are all related.