Shopping local keeps revenue in community

To help kick you into gear, consider this: Christmas is just four weeks away.

On Black Friday, merchants who haven’t already lured shoppers with online deals (pre-pre-Black Friday!) are hoping people will come into their stores seeking real, not virtual bargains. Three days later is Cyber Monday, which experts tell us will likely be the biggest online shopping day of the season. There will be some great deals out there, but in many cases merchants will undercut even those low, low prices as Christmas draws closer.

With most online buying, the dollars local shoppers spend will leave the community with no sales tax cut helping pay for local schools, public safety, parks, roads and other public infrastructure. Only businesses with physical presences in the state – fortunately that includes Seattle-based Amazon – are required to collect sales tax. Online shoppers are supposed to calculate their “use tax” and send it in to the state Department of Revenue. Hardly anyone does.

Even with Amazon paying sales tax, Washington stands to lose about $400 million in uncaptured revenue this year. With Washington facing a $474 million budget shortfall in the next biennium, that uncollected sales tax would go a long way toward keeping the state in the black.

Although Congress should act to establish a uniform sales tax collection system, state lawmakers did make some welcome progress in the 2015 session to capture at least some revenue from sellers outside the state.

Businesses that make more than $267,000 in wholesale sales to Washington customers will be required to pay the state’s business and occupation tax. And out-of-state sellers paying a commission or other promotional fee to a Washington person or business could have to collect the retail sales tax. Washington joined 15 other states Sept. 1 in implementing this kind of legislation.

The best thing shoppers can do is to shop local, and pay special attention to smaller, “mom-and-pop” businesses. They are part of the fabric of our community, the sales tax they collect helps fund needed services and they provide a personal touch in a season that can sometimes feel all too impersonal if we do much of our shopping while seated behind a computer.

The day after Black Friday is Small Business Saturday, and businesses throughout the South Sound are hoping shoppers will spend some of their holiday budget with them. Our local bricks-and-mortar businesses deserve our support – and not just during the holidays.