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Comment by Sharma | Hacker News Reader

I think its otherwise now. I will mention just one example and same thing will apply to many. I always preferred to buy from amazon(picking just one name) because of no tax and so always better than those stores.But now Amazon is charging sales tax in many states and plan is to charge in more and more states.That will be followed by other online stores and then it will always be more convenient to go to local store(because price is same) feel the item and return it hassle free if you don't like it!

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In the United States that isn't technically true. Most states require people to pay a "use tax" [1] on the stuff they buy from Amazon.

   [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Use_tax

The structure of the use tax in my state sort of encourages online purchasing. For purchases less than $1,000, there is an option to pay an income based lump sum (rather than itemizing the purchases and paying a calculated tax). Someone who doesn't care to keep track of the individual purchases saves a bit of tax by making sure they make sufficient purchases (for an AGI of $100,000, the savings kick in at ~$100 a month).

because price is same

Ah, if only. I swear, sometimes it seems like Amazon knocks 10% off MSRP, while Radio Shack adds 10%. And I'm talking sticker, not sales tax.

Although I cannot find the URL, I recall reading somewhere that, on average, Amazon prices were 9% lower than big boxes' (BBY, et al). not clear whether that was 'bottom line' price comparison (in which case AZN's prices would not include tax whereas brick & mortars' would. Now that AZN agreed to collect sales taxes for a number of states that delta will shrink.

But, I do believe that convenience of easy ordering (for lazy ppl like me), is bigger differentiator than a couple of percentage points on pricing.

And that's just generic products on Amazon. As you get more specialized, the price at most brick and mortar stores seems to keep increasing more and more, whereas the prices online remain consistently low.

Infrared LED at Radio Shack? They wanted something like $6 per LED. You'll find the same part online for pennies.

Amazon will always be cheaper than a retail store, because it doesn't need to pay for

1) Store building rent (they ship directly from their warehouses)

2) Cashiers / sales salaries

3) Store security, cameras, loss prevention.

4) Store utilities and other - electricity, water, insurance, heating, cooling, inspections.

5) Liability (such as customers falling or pretending to fall)

6) Inventory tracking, moving things around shelves, optimizing, etc.

Amazon does currently have to pay for the somewhat expensive delivery of single items to your house or place of work, so it's not all good.

Also the convenience that the parent talks about is not what I'd call convenient. Basically the last 4 times I went to a store, they didn't have the thing I wanted, or it was out of stock. And most of the time I want to go to a store, it's not open.

>Amazon does currently have to pay for the somewhat expensive delivery of single items to your house or place of work, so it's not all good.

I assume this is at least partially cancelled out by not having to deliver items to stores.

Not true, you have to pay for shipping for most items, especially the heavy ones.

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