Some already sold on requiring online retailers to collect N.J. sales tax

One of the proposals in Gov. Chris Christie’s $34.4 billion budget proposal calls for online retailers to collect the state sales tax when consumers make purchases on the Internet.

New Jersey Retail Merchants Association president John Holub said Wednesday that he’s been trying for a few years to get the state to require those collections.

“We kind of got a little bit of the wind taken out of our sales when Amazon decided to essentially cut a deal with the governor’s office and begin collecting sales tax, but we’ve always said from the beginning this is much bigger than Amazon,” Holub said. “There are a whole host of other online-only retailers that are able to exploit this loophole.”

By not adding the 7 percent sales tax to purchases, Holub said, online-only retailers have a competitive advantage that threatens the livelihood of bricks-and-mortar merchants in New Jersey.

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Residents are supposed to include the uncollected sales tax when they file their state income tax forms, but few people do.

Having online retailers collect the tax could generate more than $100 million a year in additional revenue for the state, Holub estimated.

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