IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/tul/wpaper/1206.html

Does Online Cross-border Shopping Affect State Use Tax Liabilities?

Author

Listed:
  • James Alm

    (Department of Economics, Tulane University)

  • Mikhail I. Melnik

    (Department of Business Administration, School of Engineering Technology and Management, Southern Polytechnic State University)

Abstract

How does online cross-border shopping affect state use tax liabilities? We collect our own data on actual online cross-border shopping transactions from eBay.com, focusing upon a "representative" commodity classification and a "typical" day. These data allow us to examine the extent of actual online cross-border shopping by buyers, and the subsequent potential impact on state use tax liabilities of buyers. Our results indicate that online cross-border shopping is highly prevalent on eBay, with out-of-state purchases accounting for on average 94 percent of the volume of a state's online purchase transactions. Even so, given the limited volume of eBay- based transactions relative to total sales transactions, the likely impact of cross-border transactions on state use tax revenue streams is negligible, even if we assume full buyer compliance with state use taxes.

Suggested Citation

  • James Alm & Mikhail I. Melnik, 2012. "Does Online Cross-border Shopping Affect State Use Tax Liabilities?," Working Papers 1206, Tulane University, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:tul:wpaper:1206
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://repec.tulane.edu/RePEc/pdf/tul1206.pdf
    File Function: First Version, 2012
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Alm, James & Melnik, Mikhail I., 2010. "Do Ebay Sellers Comply With State Sales Taxes?," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 63(2), pages 215-236, June.
    2. David Merriman, 2010. "The Micro-geography of Tax Avoidance: Evidence from Littered Cigarette Packs in Chicago," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 2(2), pages 61-84, May.
    3. Ballard, Charles L. & Lee, Jaimin, 2007. "Internet Purchases, Cross-Border Shopping, and Sales Taxes," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 60(4), pages 711-725, December.
    4. Tosun Mehmet S & Skidmore Mark L, 2007. "Cross-Border Shopping and the Sales Tax: An Examination of Food Purchases in West Virginia," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 7(1), pages 1-20, December.
    5. James Alm & Mikhail I. Melnik, 2012. "Cross-border Shopping and State Use Tax Liabilities: Evidence from eBay Transactions," Working Papers 1205, Tulane University, Department of Economics.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Blog mentions

    As found by EconAcademics.org, the blog aggregator for Economics research:
    1. Online purchases and state use taxes
      by Economic Logician in Economic Logic on 2012-08-31 18:55:00

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Shuzhong Ma & Yuxi Chai & Hongsheng Zhang, 2018. "Rise of Cross†border E†commerce Exports in China," China & World Economy, Institute of World Economics and Politics, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, vol. 26(3), pages 63-87, May.
    2. James Alm, 2019. "What Motivates Tax Compliance?," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33(2), pages 353-388, April.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. David R. Agrawal & William F. Fox, 2017. "Taxes in an e-commerce generation," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 24(5), pages 903-926, September.
    2. David Agrawal, 2012. "Games within borders: are geographically differentiated taxes optimal?," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 19(4), pages 574-597, August.
    3. James Alm & Keith Finlay, 2013. "Who Benefits from Tax Evasion?," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 43(2), pages 139-154, September.
    4. Christian Ben Lakhdar & Nicolas Gérard Vaillant & François-Charles Wolff, 2016. "Does smoke cross the border? Cigarette tax avoidance in France," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 17(9), pages 1073-1089, December.
    5. Leal, Andrés & López-Laborda, Julio & Rodrigo, Fernando, 2009. "Prices, taxes and automotive fuel cross-border shopping," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(2), pages 225-234.
    6. Benjamin Harbolt, 2019. "Tax Avoidance through E-Commerce and Cross-Border Shopping," CESifo Working Paper Series 7814, CESifo.
    7. Agrawal, David R., 2014. "LOST in America: Evidence on local sales taxes from national panel data," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 147-163.
    8. Richard Friberg & Frode Steen & Simen A. Ulsaker, 2022. "Hump-Shaped Cross-Price Effects and the Extensive Margin in Cross-Border Shopping," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 14(2), pages 408-438, May.
    9. Andrés Leal & Julio López-Laborda & Fernando Rodrigo, 2010. "Cross-Border Shopping: A Survey," International Advances in Economic Research, Springer;International Atlantic Economic Society, vol. 16(2), pages 135-148, May.
    10. Huynh, Dat & Sokolova, Anna & Tosun, Mehmet S., 2022. "Tax Elasticity of Border Sales: A Meta-Analysis," IZA Discussion Papers 15525, IZA Network @ LISER.
    11. Brian E. Whitacre, 2011. "Do higher broadband adoption rates mean lower tax collections from local retail sales? Implications of e-commerce in rural areas of the US," Regional Science Policy & Practice, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 3(2), pages 71-85, June.
    12. James Alm, 2019. "What Motivates Tax Compliance?," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33(2), pages 353-388, April.
    13. Zhao, Jianqiang J. & Kaiser, Harry M. & Zheng, Yuqing, 2022. "Do grocery food taxes incentivize participation in SNAP?," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(C).
    14. Berger, Melissa & Fellner-Röhling, Gerlinde & Sausgruber, Rupert & Traxler, Christian, 2016. "Higher taxes, more evasion? Evidence from border differentials in TV license fees," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 74-86.
    15. Ander Iraizoz & José M Labeaga, 2022. "Incidence and Avoidance Effects of Spatial Fuel Tax Differentials: Evidence using Regional Tax Variation in Spain," Working Papers halshs-03789430, HAL.
    16. Hansen, Benjamin & Miller, Keaton & Weber, Caroline, 2020. "Federalism, partial prohibition, and cross-border sales: Evidence from recreational marijuana," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 187(C).
    17. Agrawal, David R. & Trandel, Gregory A., 2019. "Dynamics of policy adoption with state dependence," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    18. Annabelle Doerr & Sarah Necker, 2021. "Collaborative Tax Evasion in the Provision of Services to Consumers: A Field Experiment," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 13(4), pages 185-216, November.
    19. Keaton Miller & Boyoung Seo, 2021. "The Effect of Cannabis Legalization on Substance Demand and Tax Revenues," National Tax Journal, University of Chicago Press, vol. 74(1), pages 107-145.
    20. Zarko Kalamov, 2020. "A sales tax is better at promoting healthy diets than the fat tax and the thin subsidy," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 29(3), pages 353-366, March.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • H71 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - State and Local Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue
    • H73 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - Interjurisdictional Differentials and Their Effects

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:tul:wpaper:1206. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Nicholas Lacoste (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/detulus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.