Committee Wants eBay to Report Seller Revenue to IRS
Raise your hand if you sell on eBay and don’t report your income to the tax-man. A United States IRS advisory committee recommended the IRS require Internet business sites to get tax identification numbers from all sellers, according to USA Today.
It appears this non-governmental panel wants to put the burden on sites like eBay, requiring them to collect tax ID numbers and report sellers’ income to the IRS. Blame eBay in part for IRS scrutiny - the committee was impressed with the auction site’s 2005 survey that showed more than 724,000 Americans described the top online auction site as their primary or secondary source of income.
eBay first conducted this survey in the US on February 23, 2004: “Today, there are more than 430,000 sellers on eBay.com selling full-time or part-time, compared to 150,000 reported by eBay previously.” The day after eBay released those numbers, I spoke to Jordan Glazier, General Manager of eBay Business. He said the statistic citing 430,000 sellers was based on an AC Nielsen study of 196,000 eBay users, but he could not tell me how they extrapolated those numbers to come up with the 430,000 figure, or describe the methodology used in the study. The number is comprised of full-time sellers whose only source of income is from eBay, and part-time sellers who use eBay to generate a second income or use eBay as a secondary channel for their main business.
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