[dragonwriter]

> Do you think California would accept a company like Apple not collecting the sales tax because the merchandise came from China?

California sales tax collecting authority spells out in black and white that they are not to collect sales tax in that case, so I’m going to say “Yes”. (OTOH, they do have to collect the equivalent use tax, based on the location where the goods are delivered if they are, because of their other business circumstances – as Apple is – required to register with CDTFA and collect and remit use tax on behalf of customers. But, again, that’s both technically separate from sales tax and, more to the point, has a very specifically specified location which, again, Apple would not be legally free just to move to their HQ or some other location.)

[jll29]

Apple uses another legal entity, Cork, Ireland-based Apple Sales International (ASI) that asks Foxconn to produce a purchased device and to ship it directly to the country where it was ordered. This is part of a game called ¨transfer pricing¨, an OECD-approved legal procedure for multinational corporations to lower their overall average effective tax rate by creating a trans-jurisdiction network of company entities with patent/trademark cross-licensing contracts:

https://taxjustice.net/faq/what-is-transfer-pricing/#:~:text....

https://curia.europa.eu/juris/document/document.jsf?text=&do...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple%27s_EU_tax_dispute

https://scholar.google.de/scholar?as_ylo=2019&q=oecd+transfe...

It is not just Apple. For example, this permits SIEMENS AG to claim they are headquartered in the low-tax village of Zug, Switzerland for tax purposes, despite the company´s Web pages state the giant has its HQ in Neuperlach Sued, part of Munich, Germany. Governments lose billions in taxes every year from transfer pricing.

[sharedbeans]

Ok I think I see that they would be required to collect use tax in this case, it would not be the customer remitting it.