Posted on 01/14/2005 9:09:13 PM PST by Zon
N.Y. asks online cigarette buyers to cough up tax
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg said Friday that smokers who bought cigarettes over the Internet had better be prepared to cough up taxes they tried to avoid by going online.
"The law says you got to pay your taxes. The handful of people who don't are just stealing from the rest of us," Bloomberg said in a weekly radio address.
The city's finance department this week sent letters to 3,700 smokers asking them to fork over $1.3 million in city taxes from Internet tobacco purchases.
The annual loss to the city from online tobacco sales totals $40 million, according to Joanna Perlman, a finance department spokeswoman. Some individuals owed as much as $10,000.
"If you have a bill for $10,000 for cigarette taxes, you're a dealer, you're not just smoking," Bloomberg said.
"The finance commissioner is required by the city charter to enforce the law. It's against the law to buy something out of state and bring it in and avoid sales tax," he said.
I just googled, "Tobacco Seed," and found a bunch of links.
Hey, no kidding. Well, there you go. :)
Coffinnails.com had the best selection, plus send instructions for growing and drying.
We got 100 seeds of 4 different types of tobacco for less than $20.
From what I understand, you do have to start the seeds indoors ( they're very tiny) about 3 months before you plant them outside.
Tobacco is closely related to the tomato, so if our 'maters last year were any indication, we should have no problem with the tobacco!
REALLY? That's why asked you first. I'll trust a FReeper before any Google search result.
Thanks.
Quite welcome Ma'am, and thanks for the tax graphic!
I can't seem to get to the site. It just brings up a search listing. You have any other links to that site?
Nevermind. I got it.
I found this pretty stunning:
How much space will I require?
A soil area of approximately 1 metre by 8 metres will be able to sustain 50 plants, producing enough tobacco for well over 5,000 cigarettes.
The lawmakers think that we are all dumb sheeple out here. You just proved them wrong!
Also, before you harvest your initial crop, save some seeds.
As each generation of plants completes it's life-cycle, the crops will become more and more acclimated to your specific growing conditions.
(Plus, you only have to buy seeds once ;)
Sweeet! This sounds like a great hobby! If I'm able to start it this year, I'll be sure to keep y'all updated.
""The tax was increased because we wanted to keep young people from starting to smoke," Stark said. "Going on the Internet and purchasing packs without the tax evades the strategy around saving people's lives.""
What a load of crap....lolol. It's plain it's all about feeling entitled to pick the pockets of citizens, a legal form of mugging in NY and elsewhere.
Unless the laws(rules) have changed you can grow all the tobacco you want.You just can't sell it to cigarette and cigar companies without a "Tobacco stamp",and the "Stamp" was awarded to particular farms in the amount of acreage you could plant and sell.
The reason I know this is when I was a kid(1960's)my parents looked at farm to buy that had I believe a 10 acre "Tobacco Stamp".In of all places Central Missouri.
The seller must be reporting it. Shades of Mexice, where the
vendors used to report cigarette sales to the authorities
at the border--who would take (steal) them. They didn't
report wetbacks.
Colorado went "red" on 1/1/05.
Catch me if you can....
What's the story on Denver's smoking bans?
I'm going out again next summer and it was great when I was there last year.
It did? How did that happen? I must have missed something.
Dummy me. Disregard my last post. Colorado raised the taxes. I was thinking of something else. :)
Massachusetts,of course,is one of the highest excise tax states,if not the highest. They then add 5% sales tax to the excise tax,making it $1.58 per pack,or $15.80 per carton.
And then these idiot politicians wonder why we smokers are becoming tax cheats.
We also can't smoke anyplace but outside,of course.
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