Jon Anderson wrote:
There are thousands upon thousands of loopholes and deductions in the
tax code. There is nothing wrong with taking advantage of them.

I was astounded to find a bunch of state loopholes (Missouri)
for anything that goes with capital equipment. Basically, any
tools, materials, upgrades, consumables, repair parts, etc. that
go on or into a piece of capital equipment are not subject to
state tax! I have a tax number (merchant and manufacturer's
exemption number, they call it here) so I don't pay tax on the
components that go into something I sell. But, apparently, as I
read the tex court rulings, if I were to buy a manual Bridgeport
and convert it to CNC for my own use, for instance, all those
parts would be tax exempt since they were an "upgrade". Don't
take this as legal advice anywhere but Missouri, but your state
may have a similar arrangement. I used to pay tax on a lot of
the stuff that didn't actually become part of the sold product,
but not anymore.

Jon