Comments
By SyneRyder 2026-03-0514:23 Here's a gift link to access it if you don't have a subscription:
https://www.wsj.com/politics/policy/judge-orders-government-...
By jurschreuder 2026-03-066:027 reply “We live in the age of computers,” Eaton said. “It must be possible for Customs Service to program its computers so it doesn’t need a manual review.”
In DHL the link to get tax documents is already broken for a year or so, so I cannot get VAT back on DHL shipments.
With FedEx I can but it's a manual process of screenshotting a bank transaction and emailing a specific email address with a shipping number.
When tariffs started all the servers of the shipping companies went down.
So I highly doubt they will just do some computer magic.
From experience I assume they will "accidentally" run into all kinds of technical difficulties making it a 274 step process to get the money back.
For scale: Shopify, a software company by heart, with 170bn market cap and 3500 engineers employed, does not have native VAT support, required in the Europe which accounts for 15-20% of their revenue. All they would have to do to support this is add a checkout field "VAT number" that shows up on a pdf invoice.
So to assume a shipping company will just work some computer magic is really far fetched. The FedEx page only lets you login after you refresh the page exactly once already for more than a year.
> All they would have to do to support this is add a checkout field "VAT number" that shows up on a pdf invoice.
If only it would be that simple :)
In EU you have different procedures for B2C and B2B transactions. For B2B you need to verify the VAT number in VIES system and it’s not responsive like 50% of the time. I swear Germans literally turn off their servers when they go to sleep. If a customer provides a VAT number the flow might take even 12h+ to verify it. If you can do that verification you can use 0% VAT rate but if not you need to use a different VAT rate.
For B2C you need to support several scenarios: if company is outside of EU it needs to register for IOSS, if it’s a EU company that sells to other EU countries it needs to register for OSS or in each EU country for VAT separately but also a mix of both is possible. You can decide to no register to OSS special procedure but then there’s a sales limit before you have to register and you need to track it. Otherwise, you need to maintain special OSS registry with sales records and three pieces of proof that customer is based in the member country. Some EU countries have XML invoices (Italy, Romania, Germany soon) or mandatory invoice APIs (Poland), of course there’s actually no common EU standard so it depends on where the company is based.
Finally you need to choose a VAT rate for that country and they also change occasionally, e.g. Slovakia, Romania and Estonia all changed their highest rate just last year.
This is the bare minimum you need to support. There’s a lot of edge cases, e.g. it matters what country you actually ship from, and if you use e.g. fulfillment there are special procedures for that as well, or if you resell in B2B there are chain transactions which have their own set of spaghetti rules.
Much of that is at least for my company handled by our accounting company. We just print the correct VAT on the invoice, and report the same VAT to the accountant and they take care of the rest. The shop/payment processor etc doesn't need to be integrated to any of it. Though I have to post-process Stripe's reports, as they refuse to include the used VAT rate in there, despite them knowing it. Stripe does try to sell the tax service to us, but I refuse.
By deno 2026-03-0610:02 You can simplify for your use case (only B2C or you refund VAT afterwards for B2B, you only ship from one location, custom invoicing), but that’s what it takes to implement it correctly on platform level.
> does not have native VAT support
If citizens do not have access to high quality tools that allow them to exercise their rights that rights are "de facto" invalidated.
If corporations are allowed to implement regulations in faulty ways the economic system stops working and fraud is easier than ever.
Part of the problem is governments trying to look "pro businesses" have become just "anti regulation". Organized crime is rising in Europe as it is increasingly easy to move money around in uncontrolled ways thru big platforms. But asking big platforms to adhere to standards and If citizens do not have access to high quality tools that allow them to exercise their rights that rights are "de facto" invalidated.
Part of the problem is governments trying to look "pro businesses" have become just "pro fraud". Organized crime is rising in Europe as it is increasingly easy to move money around in uncontrolled ways thru big platforms. But asking big platforms to adhere to standards and regulations is something that corruption does not allow for.
By ByThyGrace 2026-03-0613:141 reply > Organized crime is rising in Europe as it is increasingly easy to move money around in uncontrolled ways thru big platforms.
Even though it's a sensible claim, and since you're implying causal relationship, can you provide a source for this? I'm not European so I wouldn't know.
By Frieren 2026-03-0720:51 > New technologies and increased digitalisation of financial transactions pose additional challenges, such as the convergence of different types of criminal activities like fraud, cybercrime and financial crime into one. Economic and financial crimes undermine legitimate financial organisations, distort competition and the overall dynamics of a free market environment, and have a significant negative impact on society at large. Criminal proceeds also fuel corruption, which in turn furthers crime.
https://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/BRIE/2020/6520...
By Kye 2026-03-0619:38 It's too bad DOGE killed 18F. Doing this kind of thing, and doing it well was their whole reason for being.
By tim-tday 2026-03-0819:53 People are really good at using computers when it comes to taking your money. Really bad at using computers when it comes to giving you money. You can’t explain that.
By the_real_cher 2026-03-0614:181 reply DHL is massive scam company.
I ordered a tent from overseas and they classified it as both a food product and an aluminum product and charged me 600 bucks in tariffs.
I'm fighting to get it back but they keep ignoring me with polite "were really busy" replys.
A product can be both, according to the current US administration. DHL is not necessarily at fault here.
By the_real_cher 2026-03-0718:33 You can eat aluminum? I can't myself. Because it can doesn't mean it should...
>A product can be both
LOL... A tent is a single product. What about a car? Do you expect to pay separately for the aluminum in the motor and gearbox, as well as for the entire car?
By buffington 2026-03-0622:14 If you'd kept reading the sentence, you wouldn't be asking the questions you're asking.
> A product can be both, according to the current US administration
The person you're responding to isn't trying to convince you that a tent is two things, they're telling you that the US government wants you to believe a tent is two things.
This is just the citizenry paying double tariffs. First, we bought the higher priced goods. Now, the companies are trying to take our tariff payments again, this time from the government, to "make up" for the tariff money that we had already paid them in the first place.
What should happen is that $X of the budget should be put into escrow for the next administration to use after these criminals make their way out.
Maybe triple. (1) paid higher prices, (2) the government will issue debt to refund the tariffs to importers who we already reimbursed through higher prices, and then (3) Congress will use the extra debt from the refunds as justification for higher individual taxes to pay for the 2025 tax cuts for businesses.
And the supreme court is to blame for all of this because they decided to invalidate lower court injunctions, reasoning that there was no chance for "irreparable harm"... Yeah, right.
By light_hue_1 2026-03-068:266 reply No. The people are to blame.
Both the people who voted for the criminal to be president. And the people who supported such a horrible Democratic candidate that she couldn't even win against Trump.
1. Nobody supported Kamala as the democratic nominee.
2. The US senate is horribly malapportioned and gates scotus nominations.
By simonh 2026-03-0620:45 Well, the Democrat apparatchiks that supported her.
And the person, and his henchmen and enablers, that implemented these tariffs in the first place.
Plenty of blame to go around, but to be fair there's a significant difference between ordering or enabling this debacle and ineffectively opposing it.
So everyone are to blame except the exceedingly small number of people who supported third party candidates that had no chance?
By komali2 2026-03-091:57 Yes, because that's several million people, and the elected democrat officials count in the hundreds.
It's actually tens of millions, if you count eligible voters that didn't vote. Not to mention the tens of millions of voters for the other Party.
People don't lose elections, campaigns do. And when they do, out of a refusal to accept responsibility, they cast blame outwards. They try to get people to blame each other, rather than the frankly quite obvious people at fault.
By braincat31415 2026-03-0614:121 reply Depends which people. The question is why people voted for Trump en masse.
People who voted for Trump were pretty clear about what their issues were. They wanted to bully trans and they wanted to stick it to the libs. They were looking forward to liberals suffering. Some of them would never vote for a woman or black person. They liked masculinity Trump projects - aggressive insulting fraudster.
There is no mystery about that.
By braincat31415 2026-03-0616:302 reply That's exactly the kind of simplistic thinking that I was talking about. People had legitimate concerns about cost of living, food inflation (look at the charts of food prices 2020-2024), ballooning national debt, military adventures, crime, fraud, expensive housing and rent. I could go on. Trump's government is unlikely to offer any solutions to the above, but that's a different story. Voting because they wanted libs to suffer... sheesh. Most people are not that dumb and have objective reasons to vote a certain way. Any party that wants to stay in power longer will have to address these issues. Do you really think an average family is more concerned about trans issues than their inability to afford a house?
Unfortunately you are pretty much out of touch with reality. What parent wrote is true for large swaths of voters (sticking it to libs - any regular US forum I ever opened was full of 'libtards' and other worse insults even on completely unrelated topics... or just go to bible south, even completely ignoring racism and bigotry topic).
Sure, thats not all, then there are folks believing that a criminal, notorious liar, populist and suspected pedophile is going to do magic unheard of in reality. Very smart, what could go wrong...
Solution of the issues you write would move US to highly regulated country maybe like France, which is unpassable in US and would cause massive issues down the line. Also, the issues you list are valid for basically whole world, has many reasons and US republicans are the very last group of people in a long line of people who would tackle specifically those effectively, they usually go into opposite direction.
By braincat31415 2026-03-0621:47 Don't look at the forums. The majority of normal US population is not on them.
Frankly, that is just lying to yourself.
None of that favored Trump. National debt, military adventures, crime, fraud - all of those are consistently better under democratic administrations. They are consistently worst under republican administrations. Trump himself committed crimes and it was very clear he will be more corrupt then anyone before him. Trump himself talked like someone who will be aggressive ... and here we are with Venezuela, Iran clusterfuck.
> expensive housing and rent
People who genuinely cared about those did not voted for Trump. However, some used these as excuse.
> Voting because they wanted libs to suffer... sheesh.
Yes. I say so because I was actually listening to what conservatives said and did. Yes, if you do not read what they actually say, there was a lot of sane-washing going on. But, you have to ignore what Trump voters were actually saying in conservative places.
> Most people are not that dumb and have objective reasons to vote a certain way.
Their priorities are not what you say they are. It is simple as that.
> Any party that wants to stay in power longer will have to address these issues. Do you really think an average family is more concerned about trans issues than their inability to afford a house?
Frankly, yes, MANY conservative people were radicalized by that prospect. That is why Trump team made created culture war about it prior election and why they do it now too.
By braincat31415 2026-03-0619:181 reply It does not matter what favors which administration (btw like I said, food inflation stats look awful during Biden's admin, although covid is probably more to blame). The grass is always greener on the other side, and people that cannot afford rent are just not going to vote for more of the same. It is always a swinging pendulum. The more I think about these things, the more I am convinced that Marx was right, and we only have a semblance of democracy. There is no fundamental difference between the parties.
Like I said, I am more worried about paying real estate taxes, keeping the house, getting my kids through the college, paying car insurance and being able to afford food, and not having to leave the city downtown before dark. Trans issues... not my concern at all. Immigrant rights - I frankly do not care. The plumber who was unclogging my kitchen pipe today is a Trump voter who is not a fan of this war, and he was mostly complaining about skyrocketting cost of doing business and cost of labor that started shooting up about 5 years ago, and THAT likely was the main reason for his vote. Many people keep hanging out on the forums where niche party darling issues get discussed nonstop, and that creates an impression that most of the population cares about them, but I don't believe that's the case at all.
Anyone who manages to decrease the cost of healthcare, food, gas, improves an economy, etc.etc. will get my vote. That was not Biden, and it is clear by now that will not be Vance. Anyone who talks about immigrant rights ahead of my own, defunding the police and so on will not get my vote.
Unfortunately I always seem to have a choice between a bad candidate and a worse candidate. This time I had to choose between a word salad producer who was a VP of a senile president, and a baffoon. The democratic candidate was as unlikeable as the republican. I stayed home. You guys can attack my position as much as you want, but I am not going to put my financial well-being and that of my kids behind the issues that do not matter much for me, and that is not going to change. I believe the same goes for most of american families.
I'll give you a small example. I live in heavily democratic district. A local government had a referendum a few years ago on permits to build low income housing units, subsidized by local taxes. Housing immigrant families was mentioned. The referendum was a complete fiasco. You would have barely found any Trump voters in the room. People's concern about taxation took precedence.
Last years took us from Obama to Trump to Biden back to Trump who will likely lose midterms because of many things including the Iran adventure. Neither party offered any tangible advantage.
> It does not matter what favors which administration
It does matter. Republicans are supporting the Iran war right now. Americans in general are not, republicans are in. Conservatives and MAGA even more. So, no, they were not actually worrying about military adventures, they like them.
> The grass is always greener on the other side, and people that cannot afford rent are just not going to vote for more of the same
Oh yeh, actually, data shows they do.
> I am more worried about paying real estate taxes, keeping the house, getting my kids through the college, paying car insurance and being able to afford food, and not having to leave the city downtown before dark.
Funny crime was going down for years. Funny, actual crime rates do not even enter discussion about crime. It was republicans who wanted business like expensive college. Who are against students ability to discharge that debt in bankruptcy.
> Trump voter who is not a fan of this war, and he was mostly complaining about skyrocketting cost of doing business and cost of labor that started shooting up about 5 years ago
Well, maybe he should not have voted for Trump.
> Anyone who manages to decrease the cost of healthcare, food, gas, improves an economy, etc.etc. will get my vote.
It would be a mystery why would someone who want cheaper healthcare and better economy would vote for party that consistently pushes for healthcare to be more expensive and worsens economy voted republican. But republican voters do so while people like you talk about these as if matter for republicans
> This time I had to choose between a word salad producer who was a VP of a senile president, and a baffoon. The democratic candidate was as unlikeable as the republican. I stayed home.
Frankly, if Harris is as unlikable as Trump for you, then I doubt the economic concerns here were drivers of yours stay home action. Because it was super clear where Trumps administration will go - including economically.
> Trans issues... not my concern at all. Immigrant rights - I frankly do not care. [...] Immigrant rights - I frankly do not care. [...] Housing immigrant families was mentioned
Fun fact, Biden deported more people then any president before him. Democratic party was never all that pro-imigrant as conservative propaganda makes them.
As for trans, it was republican party that made that issue and they did gained vote on that.
By braincat31415 2026-03-0622:011 reply War - history won't agree with you. Trump started Iran. Biden got us into supporting Ukraine on the other side of the planet. I like neither.
Crime - I don't care about "going down for years". I look at Chicago where I work, and people in my office these days make sure they are out of the south part of downtown before the dark.
The guy's business started nosediving 5 years ago, and you mention Trump again? Jeez.
Anyway, you really sound like a (not very convincing) TV commercial. I am telling you that neither party improved the life of an average american (or mine if you don't want to generalize), and you are telling me these are not the droids I am looking for. That's the reason I don't like talking to die hard republicans AND democrats. Neither makes any sense anymore, and neither looks beneath the surface. Maybe instead of voting for the side that I like more I should start voting for the party that pisses me off less. But there are still reasonable folks to talk to from either party, and they are NOT found in this discussion. Bye.
By braincat31415 2026-03-0717:522 reply Not to me. Both involve us in wars that have nothing to do with us, both are sucking away the money that could be spent on improving things domestically instead of spending it on MIC. Both use lame excuses for justification (WMD vs "fighting for democracy".) One is about protecting private equity access to Ukrainian agriculture, the other one is about denying China access to heavy crude. Both are likely to be losers. I am sick of both.
By UltraSane 2026-03-0722:10 Preventing Ukraine from being taken over by Russia improves US security. Just sitting and doing nothing would be incredibly stupid and amoral.
But actively bombing Iran is so stupid the US never did it until Trump was elected.
By braincat31415 2026-03-0722:371 reply > Preventing Ukraine from being taken over by Russia improves US security. Just sitting and doing nothing would be incredibly stupid and amoral.
The only thing it improves is the pockets of the US MIC. It will be taken over anyway, being in Russian backyard. Why didn't you take your broomstick and go fight over there if you are such a believer? Or would you rather leave the meat grinder for the Ukrainians to experience? What's amoral and stupid is that now I have to pay three times as much for heating because of LNG exports.
> But actively bombing Iran is so stupid the US never did it until Trump was elected.
LOL. Obama and Libya 2011 come to mind as a close contender. But I agree with you on this one.
You are saying exactly what a Putin shill would say, that Putin's victory is certain so don't even try to fight him.
By braincat31415 2026-03-0815:371 reply Hehehe. Nice try. All I am saying this is not our fight. If you really think it is, don't be a coward and join in, instead of having Ukrainians die for you.
Thank you for proving what I said at the very beginning of this conversation. Say something that makes perfect sense, democrats like you would label a Putin shill. Say someting against Trump's policy, get labeled a libtard. Both get us into moronic wars.
No wonder I no longer bother going to the polls. Take care.
You keep repeating stupid Russian talking points about the war. Russia invaded Ukraine with the goal of taking it all over and Ukranians are defending their country because they don't want to be part of Russia. This isn't hard to understand.
By braincat31415 2026-03-0913:431 reply You must be really dense. I don't repeat anything. I am saying that I am paying through the nose to heat my house as a result. I don't give a flying duck about your Ukraine and Iran. None. Got it? Saving the patch of dirt on the other side of the planet will not motivate me to vote for your party. Reducing cost of living will. Hopefully more and more people feel the same way.
By UltraSane 2026-03-0914:14 Sounds like your house is poorly insulated.
By watwut 2026-03-0614:10 And as always, all acts of republicans and conservatives are fault of the democrats.
The only people who are innocent are the people who have huge power in their hands and literally made decisions that caused this.
If you really want to get to the root cause, on the Democratic side it’s the people who promoted/supported/covered up for Biden when it would have been obvious to anyone close that he wasn’t fit for the purpose any more. And Biden himself, for his hubris.
That was why things were rushed and there wasn’t a proper primary. Yes, they could have held a very late/quick convention and would likely not have picked Kamala, but anyone getting the nomination at that late stage would still have been hugely in the back foot.
There is no single root cause in a complex system of checks and balances. Many parts need to fail for things to get as bad as they are now. Trying to reduce everything to a single fault is either stupid populism or blatant propaganda.
IMHO the highest court, which is tasked with delivering timely justice, ought to make their decisions in a reasonable amount of time, and not allow legally questionable executive actions to continue while the legal question is unanswered.
You may consider that populist, but my opinion is that SCOTUS has derelicted their constitutional duty in these trying times.
By tremon 2026-03-0715:21 I agree, but derelicition of duty by SCOTUS during this regime does not explain why a 34-times convicted felon and insurrectionist was even allowed to run for office again. Nor does it explain why the entire Senate keeps rolling over for every wet fart coming from the office of the Pedophile Of The United States.
You can find many other valid issues with the US system listed in this thread. Most of them are valid criticisms, and many of them identify a different underlying cause. Pointing them out or even focusing on a single one is not necessarily populist -- but insisting that there is a singular root cause is.
I love how the root cause is always the opposition, never the perpetrator.
Focusing on the Democrats (who are hot garbage) is such a wonderful way to keep attention focused anywhere but on the almost half the country still supporting a murderous cabal filled with people covering for a bunch of (other??) people who raped children to get pleasure from the sexual torture (yes, it's pretty clear from the Epstein files that they did everything they could to destroy those young children's minds and hearts for sport, and that was the real 'game' they were playing).
But by all means, carry on about bad tactics in the election, surely that is the 'root cause' here.
I don't disagree with you, but I also wonder what exactly the Biden justice department was doing with these files for four years. It seems to me like they were covering for the same people. Being "in the club" is more important to them than party.
By the_real_cher 2026-03-0614:20 This is the real lesson to take away from all of this.
Voting doesn't matter the only thing in history that has ever changed corrupt politicians is violence.
Woah.
1) You seem to think I'm some sort of GOP-pedo-billionaire sympathiser; nothing could be further from the truth. I'll help you slam the prison door and throw away the key.
2) No-one mentioned Epstein in this part of the discussion until you did - I thoughts we were discussing tariffs. I was responding to someone saying that, in the context of the tariff mess, they blame the people who voted for Trump, and "the people who supported such a horrible Democratic candidate that she couldn't even win against Trump". My point was simply on this specific issue, the root cause was the hubris and chain of events that led to Kamala being chosen, almost at the last minute, rather than that people "supported" her in that situation.
(And if you need someone to explicitly state that, yes, they also blame the people who voted for Trump or you get triggered, then consider it confirmed.)
You made a choice to focus on one (less important) half of the equation, and that choice comes with consequences - including obfuscation of the actual perpetrators, who commit crimes against humanity. We have had years of this which enabled our current situation. I don't think it is the right choice to make.
I was not going to pretend to understand your motives via text - not enough information. So I was responding to the concrete effects of your comment whether intended or not, and not to your personal opinions. I was pointing out the other (more important) half that you failed to acknowledge. It's so horrible that just stating it makes it seem like I am 'triggered', when I was just just stating facts.
The conversation is not strictly about tariffs, that was just the starting point. Once it was expanded to Trump and Kamala and the election, the context was far larger and naturally everybody reading would reasonably understand this. You contributed to expanding the conversation, it is normal that discourse would follow from that.
In brief, I think we need to be quite careful to explicitly mention specific evils at this time, particularly because a major tactic of those perpetrating them is making a lot of noise to drown out focus on their crimes.
By mft_ 2026-03-0712:50 I focused on the part of the comment that I was replying to that I disagreed with.
Without wanting to be overly reductive, this is the point of discussion: to focus on the points of disagreement, for the purposes of understanding, alignment, or persuasion.
I would have thought that this was obvious, and how people expected discussions to work. I would have said that needing to be thorough and explicitly state each point of agreement, alongside addressing the points of disagreement, was frustrating and unnecessary. But maybe I'm wrong on this, so thank you (genuinely) for giving me this to reflect on.
(RE: "triggered" - maybe re-read what you wrote. Responding to an ostensibly benign comment about the background cause of Kamala being chosen as the candidate, with "such a wonderful way to keep attention focused anywhere but on the almost half the country still supporting a murderous cabal filled with people covering for a bunch of (other??) people who raped children to get pleasure from the sexual torture" certainty comes over as disproportionately and inappropriately emotional and angry in word and tone, to this observer.)
By thechao 2026-03-0612:58 Restricted representative size, gerrymandering, FPTP voting, businesses with resident/citizen rights, the restriction of 42 U.S.C. 1983 to not cover Federal actors...
By 0xedd 2026-03-0620:56 [dead]
By tim-tday 2026-03-0819:55 That’s the American way
By LostInTheWoods 2026-03-065:30 Some companies ate the cost of the tariffs. The whole thing is a mess.
Tons of goods companies paid tariffs for were inputs for those industries.
Instead of being mad at companies that were forced to pay illegal tariffs, who now want to recoup some of that, be mad at the cause of illegal tariffs. Letting the govt keep the money by fighting over who is a victim, hold the govt feet to the fire so they learn not to do this to begin with.
By simonh 2026-03-0620:48 You really think Trump is capable of learning such a lesson? This isn't a 'they' situation, it's a 'him' situation. The cronies enabling him may well be cap[able of learning such a lesson, but their noses are too deep in the trough of self interest to care.
By AngryData 2026-03-0610:12 Ehh, they do a little better, but they are very much run by capital now. Most of their politicians are capitalist investors. And while individuals may get smacked down on occasion, as a whole they still follow the desires of capital holders above all else.
