Court Opinion

ID: 9617626
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 04:59:01.48798+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:04:13.719341
License: Public Domain

*88Felton, Chief Judge,
dissenting from the judgment as to Division 2. In my opinion, the law cited as Code Ann. § 92-3402a (b) was not intended to apply to the equipment of a nonresident contractor using the equipment temporarily within the State of Georgia. Such use is not a retail sale or use defined in this Code section. The first sentence of the section means permanent use, consumption, distribution or storage within this State.
The “use” of the equipment was not a retail sale of the property in the regular course of business. Code Ann. § 92-3403a (I). “ ‘Retailer’ means and includes every person making sales at retail or for distribution, or use, or consumption, or storage to be used or consumed in this State.” Id. (K). (Emphasis supplied.) Under this definition the taxpayer is not a retailer of the equipment.
If there is a provision of law for taxing a resident Z% on the cost or value of equipment used in manufacturing or fabrication, which I doubt, the provision is discriminatory against temporary users of equipment in this State in that the resident would pay the tax one time and use the equipment for months or years, whereas the temporary nonresident user would use the equipment for a lesser time than the life of the equipment. If Code Ann. § 92-3402a (b) applies to a resident it would apply only because the contractor would be a dealer as to the equipment because it is to be consumed in the use, in Georgia.
I think the trial court was correct in reversing the assessment dealt with in the second division of the opinion. I concur in the judgment as to the first division of the opinion.