Miami Herald LTE – Airbnb untaxed

December 22, 2016
Airbnb talks about a tax deal. If one business doesn’t have to pay the expenses that another pays, they can do it cheaper. The Uber ride is cheaper: There’s no cost to buy a medallion, storage, repairs or insurance. Buying the shirt online is cheaper because no sales tax, a decade-long advantage that is now changing, but too late for the brick-and-mortar stores that have closed. The hedge funds that fuel these ideas also unjustly get tax-free profits. I can understand giving tax breaks to a business that brings jobs to an area. Allowing business to grow unfettered, untaxed and unregulated because of advantages isn’t fair to all the regulated businesses that pay these other costs. Superior products or service will succeed, creating behemoths that demand advantages, monopolies that control our environment and too big to fail businesses that are able to crush opposition. Disruptive? Yes. Better?
Source: http://www.miamiherald.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/article122596989.html