[Bug 710873] New Tax Declaration Info Report - multi-national, multi-purpose (private, business, ...)

[John Ralls]

On Oct 27, 2013, at 11:13 AM, Mike or Penny Novack <stepbystepfarm at mtdata.com> wrote:

> Perhaps totally underestimating the scope of the problem.
> 
> For example, in the US there are 50 states, perhaps half of which have a sales tax. The problem isn't just that the rates would all be different but also that to what they apply (or not) would be different* and you'd need in addition a way to waive sales tax (for example, this customer is a non-profit that has filed a copy their exemption certificate with you). That's just for ONE country.
> 
> For doing this automated, leave to the folks (if any) trying to develop a "point of sales" system  (that would feed an accounting system like gnucash with the transaction already properly split).
> 
> Michael
> 
> * You might want an example of complexity? I am in Massachusetts. We have a sales tax but (in this state) it does not apply to items of clothing below a certain cost. If I bought a fancy coat for $300 it would be taxable. If I bought four dress pants at $80 per pair even though the total for those pair $320 that would not be taxable. If I went to a supermarket and bought various items of food (for home consumption), a bottle of laundry soap, and while there from the deli dept a sandwich to eat while in the store the food isn't taxed, the soap and the sandwich are.
> 
>  And proper calculation of sales tax amounts isn't to compute the tax individually on each item but to total up the taxables and compute the tax on that (like many states with sales tax the tax is rounded *up* to the nearest penny so if figured individually would average one cent more per item rather only rounding up once on the total). But I am far from certain all states work it that way.

California is similar in what's taxed, except that all clothing is. But to compensate in complexity, California has local-option sales taxes where cities and counties get to add on up to 1% each in 0.25% increments, so the tax is different from one city to the next.

Regards,
John Ralls