IP: Internet taxation, meaningless polls

[David Farber <farber () cis upenn edu>]

> From: "Gillmor, Dan" <DGillmor () sjmercury com>
> Reply-To: farber () cis upenn edu
> To: "'David Farber '" <farber () cis upenn edu>
>
>
> Dave, many newspapers around the country ran an AP story this morning that
> showed overwhelming opposition to taxation of products and services sold on
> the Internet. It's a classic lesson in why polling can be misleading:
>
> http://www.mercurycenter.com/svtech/columns/gillmor/docs/dg091599.htm
>
>   QUESTION: Would you like to pay higher taxes?
>
>   Answer: Uh, is that a trick question?
>
>   Survey researchers recently posed a query like that to active Internet
> users, asking if they favored a national sales tax on online purchases. The
> results, released on Monday, were scientifically valid in their narrow
> context -- and about as meaningful as a Republican Party analysis of Bill
> Clinton's record.