this post was submitted on 18 May 2026
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Steam already charges a state sales tax, so this isn't at Steam. There are a lot of other smaller online stores that don't bother with state taxes though.
That's only partly correct. Steam only charges a state sales tax for states that require sales tax on its purchases. CA does not impose state sales tax on digital products, so Steam does not charge CA residents a sales tax on purchases. This is aiming to level the playing field for brick and mortar stores as well as make more money (from normal people instead of taxing billionaires).
That's interesting, I've seen it in multiple states and just assumed it was the standard at this point. Is CA late to the game on this because so many of the online companies lobbied against it hard in their home state?
I'm not sure, but that sounds likely. We have Silicon Valley, which contains billionaires who think they are more important than other people and have no problem saying stupid stuff like, "taxing digital products will cost jobs and move companies out of CA."