MultiTax Commission

An intergovernmental state tax agency whose mission is to promote uniform and consistent tax policy and administration among the states, assist taxpayers in achieving compliance with existing tax laws, and advocate for state and local sovereignty in the development of tax policy.

P.L. 86-272 Statement of Information Project

The Uniformity Committee at its meeting in November 2018 agreed to form a work group to update the MTC’s “Statement of Information Concerning Practices of Multistate Tax Commission and Signatory States under Public Law 86-272.”  The statement was last updated in 2001.  The work group will propose revisions to the Statement to address changes that have occurred during the past two decades in the economy and the way that business is conducted. 

Article: “An Insider’s View of the MTC’s P.L. 86-272 Project”, pdf icon Brian Hamer, Tax Notes State, March 22, 2021
Article: “In the Wake of the MTC’s P.L. 86-272 Project”, pdf icon Brian Hamer, Tax Notes State, August 8, 2022

This project was approved by the Executive Committee at its meeting on July 31, 2014. The Uniformity Committee subsequently met to discuss the project and consider the scope as well as the make-up of a working group.

Background Materials

 

Revisions to P.L. 86-272 Statement of Information as Approved by the Commission and the MTC Executive Committee

Final Version of the Revisions to the Statement on P.L. 86-272

This version of the revised MTC Statement of Information on P.L. 86-272, with minor corrections approved by the Hearing Officer, was approved by the Executive Committee at its meeting on November 20, 2020.  This version was also adopted for recommendation to the states by the Commission at its annual meeting on August 4, 2021.  Additional information on the revisions and on the project to draft those revisions is provided below.

P.L. 86-272 Statement of Information Work Group

The P.L. 86-272 Work Group has completed its review of the current MTC Statement of Information and submitted a revised version to the Uniformity Committee for its consideration:

 

Public Hearing

The Uniformity Committee recommended the proposed revision to the P.L. 86-272 Statement of Information to the Executive Committee, which  asked the commission to hold a public hearing. That hearing was held August 5, 2020, 2:00 P.M. ET, with Robert J. Desiderio,  Professor Emeritus, University of New Mexico School of Law, as the Hearing Officer.

The Hearing Officer’s Report is available here: Hearing Officer Report

 

Source Materials

Hearing Materials

Reference Materials
Legislative history and court decisions

Court decisions addressing federal preemption

Materials describing internet “cookies”   

Materials describing the transmittal of code to a customer’s computer

  • Soltani Expert Report (filed in the Ohio Crutchfield litigation) .  “When a user visits a website . . ., the website transmits code and images to the user’s computer via the user’s current internet connection.  Often the code and images are stored on the user’s hard drive in order to improve the website performance. . . .  This stored content is referred to as the browser cache.”  This Report is attached to this email—see discussion beginning on page 20.
  • MakeUseOf website:  “The browser cache is a temporary storage location on your computer for files downloaded by your browser to display websites. Files that are cached locally include any documents that make up a website, such as html files, CSS style sheets, JavaScript scripts, as well as graphic images and other multimedia content.  When you revisit a website, the browser checks which content was updated in the meantime and only downloads updated files or what is not already stored in the cache. This reduces bandwidth usage on both the user and server side and allows the page to load faster. Hence, the cache is especially useful when you have a slow or limited Internet connection.”
  • Pressidium blog.  “How does the browser cache work.”  “The cache is a software or hardware component that is used to temporarily store values for faster future access. The browser cache is a small database of files that contains downloaded web page resources, such as images, videos, CSS, Javascript, and so on . . . . The browser requests some content from the web server.  If the content is not in the browser cache then it is retrieved directly from the web server.  If the content was previously cached, the browser bypasses the server and loads the content directly from its cache.”
  • Here is an explanation of JavaScript, which is a bit technical. (MakeUseOf)

Materials relating to foreign commerce discussion

Materials relating to independent contractors discussion

Materials relating to Joyce/Finnigan discussion

 

Articles regarding P.L. 86-272

Other materials

 

Work Group drafts

Meeting summaries and related materials

Reports to Uniformity Committee

*posted with permission from copyright holder