A number of merchants have told me of their concerns. It goes right to this issue. Online businesses are inviting consumers to go to real stores, not virtual ones, scan the labels, and the online supplier promises to sell the item 5% cheaper. You can understand what competition like that can do to people who take risks, buy inventory and pay municipal taxes. They cannot compete with it.
Last week, the American government floated the idea of taxing online trading of goods in order to help real merchants, whose costs are higher, to be competitive. I have not yet finished deciding how I feel about that, but I would like to know what our stand on it should be.