In just fourteen states and the District of Columbia, menstrual products aren’t subject to the so-called “pink” sales tax. This Election Day, Nevada voters added the Silver State to the slowly growing list of states embracing the movement towards menstrual equity.
Voters on Tuesday approved State Question No. 2, meaning Nevada consumers will be able to buy sanitary pads and tampons without paying the state’s 6.85 percent sales tax. Supporters of the measure, proposed by Democratic state Sens. Yvanna Cancela and Joyce Woodhouse, argued that taxing the products placed an unfair financial burden on women.
The Food and Drug Administration regulates tampons as medical devices; other medical devices, like bandages and prosthetics, are exempt from Nevada sales tax.
Nevada becomes the tenth state, along with Washington, D.C., to specifically exempt menstrual products; the other five states simply don’t have a general sales tax on anything.
While folks who menstruate would obviously argue differently, the remaining 35 states in the nation don’t define tampons, cups, and sanitary pads as necessities. Thankfully, at the federal level, legislators are making some moves in that regard.
U.S. Rep. Grace Meng (D-NY) convinced the Department of Homeland Security to allow FEMA-funded shelters to purchase menstrual products with grant funds—just like the other acceptable purchases of “personal necessities” it already allowed, including toilet paper, soap, toothpaste, toothbrushes, and underwear.
Most recently, the Restoring Access to Medication and Modernizing Health Savings Accounts Act of 2018, sponsored by U.S. Rep. Lynn Jenkins (R-KS), passed in the House. It would allow menstrual products to be covered as a qualified expense by flexible spending and health savings accounts, repealing the limitation otherwise imposed by the IRS’s current (mis)classification of menstrual products.
Still, this outdated mindset persists, even despite pressure from the American Medical Association.
The American Medical Association supports legislation to remove all sales tax on feminine hygiene products.
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"Feminine hygiene products are essential for women's health, and taxes on them are a regressive penalty," said AMA President-Elect David O. Barbe, M.D. "We applaud the states that have already eliminated sales taxes on these products, and we urge every state to follow suit."
These products are not a luxury but a basic necessity of life that women use starting around age 12 until their early 50s. During those years, the average woman may use 20,000 or more of these products.
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There is no equivalent medical product that is used only by one sex on a monthly basis for decades.
Opponents, predictably, also leaned heavily on the financial impact, with arguments that essentially boiled down to “If the bleeders don’t pay up, who will?”
Exempting feminine hygiene products from Nevada’s sales and use taxes will result in less revenue for the State and local governments, including school districts. This loss of revenue may adversely affect the provision of state and local governmental services.
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Nevada voters should not approve yet another tax exemption that violates sound tax policy, shrinks the tax base and decreases revenue for public services.
Nevada’s pink tax elimination, which applies solely to tampons and sanitary napkins (not cups), passed with 56 percent of the vote, and goes into effect on January 1, 2019.