Music: Downloads Taxable in 15 States
States Look to Tax Music Downloads as Industry Brings in Billion-Dollar Profits
This year Apple celebrated the one billionth music download from its industry-dominant iTunes online music store.
The service allows audiophiles to pick from thousands of individual songs and albums for 99 cents a song -- tax free, right?
Not so fast. In 15 states plus Washington, D.C., those iTunes' downloads are taxable.
Come Tax Day, filers are supposed to claim them under something called a use tax, which is applied to out-of-state purchases.
Tax collectors haven't bothered enforcing the use tax because, until recently, digital sales were just a sliver of the real sales made in record stores.
But in 2005, online music downloads generated about $1 billion, and states are looking for ways to increase revenue by taxing services like iTunes.
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