Amazon Drops North Carolina Affiliates

Amazon continues to drop certain states as affiliate tax legislation is passed in each. It has now officially dumped its North Carolina affiliate program, or "Associates Program".

North Carolina has ensured that everyone loses in this transaction. The state is prepared to pass a law requiring online companies to collect sales taxes if they have affiliate marketers in the state.

This will drive North Carolina’s income tax downward as it puts its constituents out of business. Amazon gets less sales, affiliates lose income, and North Carolina doesn’t get the tax revenue it hoped for.

Nice job, guys.

Here is the official notice from Amazon, thanks to Domain Name Wire:

We are writing from the Amazon Associates Program to notify you that your Associates account has been closed as of June 26, 2009. This is a direct result of the unconstitutional tax collection scheme expected to be passed any day now by the North Carolina state legislature (the General Assembly) and signed by the governor. As a result, we will no longer pay any referral fees for customers referred to Amazon.com or Endless.com after June 26. We were forced to take this unfortunate action in anticipation of actual enactment because of uncertainties surrounding the legislation’s effective date.

Please be assured that all qualifying referral fees earned prior to June 26, 2009 will be processed and paid in full in accordance with our regular referral fee schedule. Based on your account closure date of June 26, 2009, any final payments will be paid by September 1, 2009.

In the event that North Carolina repeals this tax collection scheme, we would certainly be happy to re-open our Associates program to North Carolina residents.