And if the merchandise is located in China at the time the sale takes place? What city do they pick then?
Then the consumer owes use tax and the seller doesn’t owe sales tax, because its a sale from outside of California. This is also specified in the state tax information document posted upthread.
But Apple isn’t paying sales taxes in Cupertino for sales it isn’t required to pay any sales tax on in the first place. For the most part they deliver from their many California warehouses (and even retail stores), not China, for in-state orders.
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.)
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.