http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sales_taxes_in_the_United_State...
"At 8.25%, California has the highest state sales tax, which can total up to 10.75% with local sales tax included."
"Washington has a 6.5% statewide sales tax."
What am I missing???
"At 8.25%, California has the highest state sales tax, which can total up to 10.75% with local sales tax included."
"Washington has a 6.5% statewide sales tax."
What am I missing???
Hence when we tell Californians that not having an income tax is not as great as it sounds because it means we pay an outrageously high sales tax, and then they realize that our outrageously high sales tax is lower than theirs, it is funny.
No ones pays as low as 6.5% here, though, because there are county and local taxes. The state is divided into a bunch of small regions for tax purposes (about 2.6 million locations), roughly corresponding to zip+5 regions, not not exactly. I've got a database giving the rate in each of these locations.
Checking that database, the minimum actual sales tax is 7%, the maximum is 9.5%, and the average (giving equal weight to each location) is 8.6%.
Here are all the rates, and how many locations have each rate:
+---------+----------+
| rate | count(*) |
+---------+----------+
| 0.07000 | 22526 |
| 0.07500 | 12404 |
| 0.07600 | 38365 |
| 0.07700 | 172606 |
| 0.07800 | 258871 |
| 0.07900 | 174886 |
| 0.08000 | 65948 |
| 0.08100 | 118239 |
| 0.08200 | 148568 |
| 0.08300 | 43973 |
| 0.08400 | 115138 |
| 0.08500 | 131129 |
| 0.08600 | 224180 |
| 0.08700 | 210720 |
| 0.09200 | 41020 |
| 0.09300 | 282441 |
| 0.09500 | 622649 |
+---------+----------+