If you haven’t heard. California seems to think that affiliate marketers are big companies with endless resources. Little do they know that most are one man/woman shows. People who can’t work due to a injury or home makers needing extra income to feed the kids.

 If you’re unfamiliar with AB 178, it is a pending bill that is similar to one passed in New York that considers certain affiliate marketing publishers as sales representatives for out-of-state retailers. This would result in the out-of-state retailer being required to collect sales tax on sales to in-state customers.  It is possible that this could cause out-of-state retailers to disallow affiliate marketing for publishers based in California. This bill will be heard in committee on April 13Th in Sacramento.

If this bill is passed I think it will cost the state money. CA will need to pay someone to monitor affiliates for one. Why would anyone want to be involved with Internet marketing and have to be a tax collector for the state? Most SEMer’s simply do not have the resources to collect sales tax and would have to close down. All this will cost CA retailers web traffic and then sales.

Look for more states to start looking towards the Internet for revenue. In the state of panic now from government needing cash we can expect them to look at the Internet.

The Best Alternative To Collecting Sales Tax would be to monetize government websites. Why not? Government run websites get tons of traffic. States could even sell ad space or put up Adsense. I am sure this would generate the same if not more income the requiring everyday people to collect taxes.

Why do we blame industry and business owners when things go bad. Its not a business owners fault when the economy go’s belly up. If I’m a business owner I offer a certain position at a certain pay rate. If you don’t like it don’t take the job. Its unbelievable that US citizens think their employers owe them anything except their pay check each week. We have all gotten used to our employers taking care of us. Well I hate to say this those days have been over for years. Unions, pensions and goverments like CA have helped drag down the economy.