Serves you right, you rednecks
From the description of an eBay auction currently in progress:
NOTE: I DO NOT SELL OR SHIP TO OHIO RESIDENTS.
However, I guess the reasons behind this are rather more prosaic than the first impression made by this bold all-caps statement may lead one to believe. The seller is probably not some blue-blooded New Englander thumbing his nose at the residents of Ohio — the auction description says that the seller himself is based in Ohio, so I guess the reason for not selling within Ohio has got something to do with taxes or regulations or something of that sort.
posted by ill-advised at 8:44 PM
3 Comments:
But I don't think I'm giving eBay users a hard time. After all I'm a frequent user of eBay myself. But every now and then I come across something funny, so I blog about it hoping that it will give somebody else a chuckle too.
As for the other post, the one about Madonna's Sex book, sure I can understand that the seller would want to show his item in a good light, but his particular instance of exaggeration is so blatant and silly that I can't take it seriously. If he calls it a limited edition, he could at least omit mentioning that it's "limited" to a million copies.
Sure I would exaggerate a little bit too if I were trying to sell something, but I hope I wouldn't overdo it in such a ridiculous fashion.
illy: You're spot on. It has to do with avoiding state sales taxes, which would apply to Ohio residents. I never realized that it would also apply to eBay auctions.
But does this mean that state sales taxes only apply when both the seller and the buyer are from the same state? I would naively expect that the state governments would be greedier :) Is that because when the buyer and the seller are not from the same state, this counts as "interstate commerce" and the U.S. constitution forbids the states from interfering with it?
Post a Comment
<< Home