Idaho people shop in Oregon due to tax? (Boise, Nampa: sales, to buy)

[deem]

I am curious if you live in Idaho - do you shop in Oregon due to no tax?
We are moving there(Idaho) - and I would think it would be no big deal - support your state - but we are curious how important this is to the masses?

[cleosmom]

I know when I drove truck with my husband if we were going to be going through Ontario, OR we'd stop and get supplies there rather than paying the tax in ID.

[Syringaloid]

Originally Posted by deem

I am curious if you live in Idaho - do you shop in Oregon due to no tax?
We are moving there(Idaho) - and I would think it would be no big deal - support your state - but we are curious how important this is to the masses?

Only a small part of the western boundary of Idaho borders Oregon and there are people from some of those small towns like Payette, Weiser, New Plymouth, Fruitland that probably do shop in Ontario to avoid sales tax. But you need to know that the shopping in Ontario is nothing spectacular--a Wal Mart and some other budget stores. Ontario is pretty small and isolated.
You are not going to see people from Boise/Nampa/Caldwell driving the 30 to 40 miles to Ontario to shop at a WAl Mart. The Boise metro area has plenty of great shopping and most people in Boise would laugh at the thought of driving to po dunk Ontario to shop.
So to answer your question, No--most people from Idaho do not shop in Oregon except for a small number of Idahoans who live on the Idaho/Oregon state line.

[Sage of Sagle]

Time is money....and gas is money....and on a car you pay a "use tax" to register it here anyhow, so it wouldn't make sense for most of us, even if I lived in South ID...

[CafeDelSol]

Driving to Oregon just isn't cost effective unless you live close to the border. Many of us shop on the internet as much as possible.

[shades_of_idaho]

We live in Cambridge,ID and do most of our shopping in Ontario. Mostly because we can get what we need there not as much for the no tax. Since they just put a Bi-Mart in Weiser we tend to go just that far if we do not need to do a big grocery shop. I agree time and gas probably cost close to the tax you might save driving to Oregon . But with Wal-Mart and Red Apple market and a few of the other stores we usually go to in Ontario it is where we mostly shop. We usually only go shopping twice a month and do a shop until you drop day. I do not think we would drive the extra miles to save the tax if the stores we shopped at were in Idaho closer to us than Nampa Caldwell Boise area.

Chris

[Kathleenh54]

We live in Ashland, Oregon which is located in Jackson County. The county turned down two (2) recent initiatives which would have paid to keep the libraries open. Now we don't got no liberries in dis joint. Support yur govmint and kep the liberries open or yul be talkin like dese here foks.

[Torrie]

This is the type of thing you do if you live in Vancouver, WA. WA has lower property taxes than Oregon, so you live across the river in Vancouver and then drive over to Portland to buy your big ticket items at Costco to reep the benefits of no sales tax.

[Gene M.]

Having just joined this forum, I can't let Kathleen's remark about libraries just sit there.

Jackson and Josephine Counties voted down a library levy. Jackson ****y, in the last 5 years, built 8 new libraries, knowing full well the funds weren't there to keep them going and that there would be a day of reckoning. That day came last election. So, these new, beautiful brick, wood and glass libraries sit. In Josephine County, I understand that the Librarian is the highest paid county official.

The governing bodies in these two counties can't seem to understand that deferring maintenance on parks and other properties for 30 years isn't a crises, it's poor planning.

We're considering a move to Northern Idaho, so taxes are a major point of interest. I hope the elected officials of Idaho are more responsible than those oif So. Oregon. And if folks in Ashland speak so poorly, it's probably because SOSC teaches politics, not grammar.

Gene

[pw72]

It happens, but more from Vancouver, WA residents going into Portland to avoid taxes. When you factor in gas prices, the trip to Ontario from Boise doesn't pencil out.