Sales Tax: When ‘Animal Farm’ Meets the Metaphysical World of the Internet

"The Amazon Tax: Empirical Evidence from Amazon and Main Street Retailers," a study by three researchers at The Ohio State University, is sometimes touted as proof that the Amazon tax will severely damage companies like Amazon. The researchers found that households in California, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Texas and Virginia reduced Amazon expenditures by 9.5 percent in response to the Amazon tax. However, this decrease was offset by a 2 percent increase in purchases at local brick-and-mortar retailers and a 19.8 percent increase in purchases with competing online retailers. For high-ticket items (over $300), the research found that consumers were even more likely to shift purchases from Amazon to other merchants.