According to Ken Cassar, Senior Analyst at Jupiter Research, "With budget deficits on the horizon, state and local governments have stepped up their efforts to collect sales tax from online retailers. The collection of taxes is no longer an if but a when. Fortunately for online retailers, only a minority of their customers are aware of the fact that they can avoid sales tax by shopping around."
According to the survey, only 46% of consumers were aware of the fact that they could avoid sales tax by comparison shopping at many different retailers' websites. Of those aware, 61% do not go out of their way to find online retailers that don't charge sales tax. Thirty percent of this group sometimes looks for an online retailer that will not charge sales tax and only 9% always looks for a retailer that will not charge sales tax.
Jupiter says that among those that are aware of the fact that sales tax can be avoided, only 9%, actually make merchant selection decisions based upon whether or not that retailer charges sales tax.