Buying video games, tax views

[Flake]

Which really is incredibly annoying once you have been around and noticed that is exactly what stores to in places in Europe and Asia that I've seen (I suspect this is the standard thing to do, with USA and Canada being the exceptions).

I think it has to do with the tax structure of younger countries compared to older countries. One of the things that is different about Canada and the US is that we have more divisions of government than most countries if only due to sheer size. They want their cut at the state / province level, too.

[Breetai]

Which really is incredibly annoying once you have been around and noticed that is exactly what stores to in places in Europe and Asia that I've seen (I suspect this is the standard thing to do, with USA and Canada being the exceptions).

I think it has to do with the tax structure of younger countries compared to older countries. One of the things that is different about Canada and the US is that we have more divisions of government than most countries if only due to sheer size. They want their cut at the state / province level, too.

China includes tax in their prices. Their government is a couple hundred years younger than the US.

[Flake]

Which is why I said "older countries". Can't fault me on that one.

[Breetai]

Which is why I said "older countries". Can't fault me on that one.

Sure I can. The People's Republic of China has only been a country since 1949. The United States of America has been a country since 1776. If you say that China existed before that, then you also have to agree that the United States did as well. The current government and economic system in China is a lot younger than The US. If you want to talk about Japan, the currency was re-done after World War II, so that system is a lot younger than the American one as well. If you go the route that The US and Canada are divided into a lot of administrative districts, so therefore it makes no sense to have different prices tags in each of them, I will just retort with the fact that there are 33 taxable regions in China. Canada has 13. The US has 52 I think?

[jfrost]

I don't find that very compelling either. In this country every government level also takes a cut of the tax, and it is included in the price. Things could be simplified. There's nothing stopping anyone from showing prices with and without taxes on the tag. (Annoyingly, in Brazil the problem is the opposite, is that we don't know the amount of tax that's included in the price. Our government was established in 1987, by the way.)

[Menegrothx]

Which really is incredibly annoying once you have been around and noticed that is exactly what stores to in places in Europe and Asia that I've seen (I suspect this is the standard thing to do, with USA and Canada being the exceptions).

I think it has to do with the tax structure of younger countries compared to older countries. One of the things that is different about Canada and the US is that we have more divisions of government than most countries if only due to sheer size. They want their cut at the state / province level, too.

If it's sheer geographical size we're talking, does any know how the system works in Russia? Or in India (population+multiple states)? Russia isn't completely unified either

[Flake]

Sure I can. The People's Republic of China has only been a country since 1949. The United States of America has been a country since 1776. If you say that China existed before that, then you also have to agree that the United States did as well.

Really? You want to use China as an example of how simplicity is possible in a large country? Okay, ignoring that you are using country and state as the same term (they are not), China is even MORE complicated thanks to corruption, random tariffs, artificial scarcity, necessary bribes, and counterfeiting. Not to mention that even though the 32 provinces are all governed by the same economic plans, the four special economic zones, Macau, and Hong Kong are the wild frontier for pricing, speculation, random VAT's and fluctuating sales taxes.

C'mon, who uses China as a good example of how to keep things simple? You can't even say that they've really had the same government since 1949. The difference of the system under Mao, Deng, and their successors is too wild to say that it's the same state in anything but name.

@Menegrothx: Russia is pretty wild, too. I've only ever made it out to the East Coast (and that's a terrible example for judging the country as a whole) but they rarely even listed prices, much less let you know what the tax rate was going to be.

Things could be simplified. There's nothing stopping anyone from showing prices with and without taxes on the tag.

Yes, there is. I already made that clear. There is a reason why everything is always priced at X dollars and .99 cents. It's a marketing tactic that works incredibly well. There is no financial incentive in doing a tiny bit of math for the customer that would necessitate random prices all over the place and invite complaining from customers who are not aware that sales taxes fluctuate over small areas.

Plus you'd still have to make it clear on the ledger and receipts what money was paid for the game and what money was assessed as a tax. So now instead of having a POS system that simply applies a percentage against the cost of the game that is inline with local and state taxes, you have to instead go back and pull the tax out of the final number and then figure out what portion of that money was for the state and what portion was for the county. Then you have to print out a receipt informing the customer of this, because legally the customer has to be made aware of their entire tax burden for possible filing purposes. Either way, the customer is doing math in their head.

[Breetai]

Sure I can. The People's Republic of China has only been a country since 1949. The United States of America has been a country since 1776. If you say that China existed before that, then you also have to agree that the United States did as well.

Okay, ignoring that you are using country and state as the same term (they are not)...

...the 32 provinces are all governed by the same economic plans, the four special economic zones, Macau, and Hong Kong are the wild frontier for pricing, speculation, random VAT's and fluctuating sales taxes.

And there ya go! I could have used Japan if I'd wanted, but it's the same thing. The rest of your rant on China being nuts doesn't really apply much, when all you needed to say was that the administrated districts of China all use the same sales tax rate (not VAT yet, for the record).

I don't find that very compelling either. In this country every government level also takes a cut of the tax, and it is included in the price. Things could be simplified.

Are all the different regions of Brazil using the same sales tax rate?

[Flake]

Hong Kong does use VAT and I believe Macau does as well.

And the point was that if people want the 'whole story' to be on the price tag, China is not an example of that.

Japan I will concede to you on. Japan has always been the odd ball out. There is something magical about shopping in Japan, no matter what kind of stuff you are looking to buy.

[Breetai]

Hong Kong does use VAT and I believe Macau does as well.

And the point was that if people want the 'whole story' to be on the price tag, China is not an example of that.

I think we were talking about having the full price on the tag, with tax included, not the "whole story."

Japan I will concede to you on. Japan has always been the odd ball out. There is something magical about shopping in Japan, no matter what kind of stuff you are looking to buy.

True. I really feel the magic when I want to get some used panties without having to do the transaction with a real person who might think I'm a pervert.


But still, Japan has the same sales tax rate across the entire country (5%, but likely going up to 10% in a few years).