Interesting Links for 9-11-2011
Nov. 9th, 2011 11:00 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
andrewducker- Very little that you do is conscious
- Why Kids Hate Math (They're teaching it wrong.)
- Amazon Won’t Pay Self-Published Author For Books It Mistakenly Gave Away
- Warm Birthday Wishes to [your_name_here]
- A new way of paying for things. I'm intrigued - and wary.
- Australian Senate passes carbon tax.
- Dossier shows NoW surveillance on massive scale
- An interview with the woman who inspired Sandman's "Death".
- Simultaneous cat and external keyboard input causing kernel panic (with pictures)
- Treasury to close loophole that allows VAT-free DVDs from the Channel Islands
- How the Federal Rail Authority is Regulating Passenger Rail Out of Existence.
- How Pringles are made. I was fascinated! (video)
Tags:
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- brain,
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- carbon,
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- computers,
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- mathematics,
- mobile,
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- neilgaiman,
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- payment,
- pringles,
- psychology,
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- sandman,
- square,
- surveillance,
- tax,
- thingsireallyhate,
- trains,
- uk,
- unconscious,
- usa,
- video
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no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 11:27 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 11:35 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 11:50 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 11:52 am (UTC)Maybe The Pope should do a deal...
no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 12:13 pm (UTC)However there are several other territories which are inside the EC customs area but outside the VAT zone:
Andorra
The Åland Islands (Finland)
The Channel Islands
The Canary Islands (Spain)
The overseas departments of France (Guadeloupe, Martinique, Reunion and French Guiana)
Mount Athos (Greece)
no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 01:46 pm (UTC)I didn't Google all of them, but the German and Italian ones look like they're partially or entirely inside the Swiss borders.
no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 12:11 pm (UTC)But now the likes of Tesco, Amazon and Asda have all moved their dispatch businesses there it's just ridiculous to allow it to continue. The disadvantage caused by the mail service has also gone because the Royal Mail lowered the cost of postage to/from the channel islands and put on daily flights to satisfy the demand.
Given the very low profit margins on these sort of goods, it is now pretty much impossible for a company based on the UK mainland selling low value consumables such as say ink cartridges or CD's to remain competitive.
no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 12:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 01:32 pm (UTC)In order to keep companies from moving weird places just to avoid the sales tax, we don't charge sales tax on goods ordered through the Internet. That means that Amazon and such build warehouses and creates jobs where it makes sense to create them, not simply where they can dodge taxes.
Otherwise every major online company would have moved their offices to New Hampshire where there is no sales tax.
no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 01:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 01:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 01:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 01:45 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 01:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 01:47 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 01:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 01:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 02:01 pm (UTC)But the physical stores have an advantage as well. If you order from Amazon you'll pay less but get your product in three to five days and if the package is large have to go to the post office to pick it up.
If you go to a physical shop you pay slightly more but you get the product the day you buy it. For many people and products that's a crucial advantage.
Plus physical shops can accept cash while online shops can't and there are many people who need to use cash (teenagers, people without credit cards, people who work jobs where they are paid in cash and don't want to put it in a bank and pay taxes on it, etc...) which is another advantage to physical stores.
Beyond that, lots of products can not realistically be sold over the Internet because of their size or weight. I supposed I could purchase a large television or refrigerator over the Internet and save some money on the base price of the item, but the shipping costs I'd incur would be so much that I'd end up paying far more than if I just went into a store and bought it and loaded it into someone's car or truck.
no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 02:18 pm (UTC)There will always be an advantage for online retailers in terms of lower operational overheads, but to be given a tax advantage as well seems odd to me.
no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 02:25 pm (UTC)Even here in France (a much smaller country than the US) it takes three to five days for Amazon stuff to arrive.
In the US the tax advantage assures that Internet based companies will not end up all concentrated in one state that simply decides to not tax something. Otherwise Amazon, instead of employing people in dozens of states, would only have employees in New Hampshire. That would be great for New Hampshire but put thousands and thousands of people across the country out of work.
Beyond that, an argument can be made that the online retailers are putting just as much if not more more money into government hands, because the post office is part of the federal government, and those companies are giving them a lot of postage (which physical stores are not.)
no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 11:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 05:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-09 05:07 pm (UTC)