Quote:
Originally Posted by Poflymn
The purpose of customs is to essentially discourage buying outside of Canada. The reason they charge you taxes is more or less a penalty for not spending the money within Canada from a Canadian Business. The theory behind it is that you could have bought the item in Canada but decided to buy it elsewhere in order to avoid having to pay taxes on the item.
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That's not entirely correct. For alcohol and tobacco, yes, since the markup in duties and taxes is astronomical. Whereas, if you buy from the U.S. it is just the local taxes (the province you reside) you pay. There are also plenty of countries that Canada has trade agreements with that also only incur local taxes and not the standard duties and taxes.