SCOTUS Should Balance Main Street and Online

SCOTUS Should Balance Main Street and Online

For more than 50 years, the Supreme Court has prevented states from requiring out-of-state sellers to collect sales tax unless the seller has a physical presence, such as a local store or warehouse, in the state in which the sale occurs. Although the out-of-state sellers’ customers are supposed to remit tax on such sales, very few of them do so. As online retail sales continue to grow, states’ annual revenue loss has been estimated to be as much as $33.9 billion in 2018.

MGA’s Alex Brill on CNBC’s Squawk Box

MGA’s Alex Brill on CNBC’s Squawk Box

“The trade news is a negative at the moment. Going forward I don’t think this is the way to grow the economy by slapping tariffs on the way that we’ve seen. Whether this is strategic or not is yet to be determined. Whether there will be some grand deal that’s going to be worked. But this is clearly something that should be concerning to employers. Not just those guys who are directly on the list today, but really who is safe? Some industries might be. Maybe it’s the hospitals, some really domestic type industries that don’t care so much about what is happening in our trade patterns. But I think a lot of folks are rightfully concerned about a new uncertainty in public policy.”

Cost of Opioid Crisis to Average Rhode Islander is $2.8K — 6th Highest in U.S.

Cost of Opioid Crisis to Average Rhode Islander is $2.8K — 6th Highest in U.S.

“‘Opioid abuse is an epidemic in the United States, claiming more than 42,000 lives in 2016 alone (CDC 2017c). In addition to its devastating impact on families and communities, the opioid epidemic is costing the US economy tens of billions, if not hundreds of billions, of dollars annually. The types of costs attributable to opioid abuse – health care costs, criminal justice costs, and lost productivity, for example – are fairly well understood, as is the economic impact of the crisis at the national level,’ writes the report which was authored by Alex Brill of the American Enterprise Institute and Scott Ganz of Georgia Institute of Technology.”