I got a kick out of reading this article about
the arena-related "occupational tax" and how it is applied
before the sales tax, meaning that sales tax applies to the occupational tax as well as the original bill. In other words, the occupational tax is itself taxed.
Well, not according to the State. The Nebraska Department of Revenue falls all over itself trying to explain why one tax being applied to another tax is not, in fact, a tax on a tax. There may be a difference on paper, but the fact is few people care about that technicality. If two taxes show up on a receipt and one tax affects the other tax, that's a tax tax in most folks' minds. Period.
Which gets me wondering: will most places itemize the new tax on receipts? Can all modern POSs handle that sort of thing? I suppose they probably can, but I really have no idea. If the occupational tax were just wrapped into each item's cost nobody would ever notice, just like we don't notice that we
already pay taxes on taxes -- such as paying sales tax on things that have already had sales taxes applied on them at earlier stages in its lifecycle.
The DOR isn't going to win this one. But their attempts sure are entertaining.