Single sales-tax rate for all of the state?

Ever shopped around for a big-ticket item, like a TV or bedroom set, looking for a locale with a bit lower sales tax rate?

A determined group of Utah lawmakers wants you to stop that tax-rate comparison.

They're studying whether to junk Utah's sales tax system, which has resulted in 97 different tax rates depending on the geographic location of one's purchase, for a one-rate system statewide.

Think of it: one sales tax rate, whether you're buying in Park City, Salt Lake City or Ophir.

It may sound logical, fair and easy.

But local and state government is rarely logical, fair or easy.

The overall rate across the state would be 6.4 percent, says Rep. Wayne Harper, R-West Jordan, co-chairman of the Legislature's Revenue and Taxation Interim Study Committee. And out of that one-rate tax the state would take its share, as would each county, city or town. Even in areas where local residents have imposed a special extra rate on themselves, for a zoo or arts organization for instance, the uniform rate would be the same.

Committee members discussed Harper's idea Wednesday.

But no sooner had the talk begun than Harper started to point out anomalies. For example: "The tax rate in Salt Lake County would be 6.6 percent," not 6.4 percent. That's because of special transit/road sales taxes there.

Soon exception after exception began to emerge as lawmakers examined how a one-rate system could impact Utah's 29 counties and 210 cities and towns in different ways.

Still, a one-rate system statewide "is the magic key" to many sales tax headaches suffered by the state's retailers, said Jim Olsen, representing retail merchants and groceries. By law, retailers must collect the sales tax, remitting it periodically to the Utah State Tax Commission, which then disperses it to the state and local governments and so on down the line.

Harper said he, Sen. Howard Stephenson, R-Draper, and others have been brainstorming recently, trying to figure out a way to bring Utah into a complicated, multistate pact to deal with sales taxes on Internet sales.

Nationwide, that so-called "sales tax simplification" effort is anything but simple. And just this summer a special session of the Legislature put off implementation of a simplified sales tax system for online sales because many small "mom-and-pop" retailers don't have the computer systems installed to handle it.