Will a New Supreme Court Decision Change Online Shopping?

As consumers shop more and more online, they’ve often stumbled across a delightful fact: Many online purchases are tax-free. This can mean consumers save a few dollars on small purchases, and even more money on big-ticket items, making it even more difficult for physical stores to lure in buyers. It’s a boon for shoppers in the states that don’t collect sales tax for online purchases, but has severely hurt the ability of states across the country to close budget gaps.

But all of this may soon change. For a long time, online retailers did not collect sales tax on many purchases because of a 1992 Supreme Court case, , which prevented states from collecting sales tax, the court that the decision was “flawed,” and that rejecting it “is necessary to ensure that artificial competitive advantages are not created by this Court’s precedents.”