Bill seeks tax break for feminine products

BANGOR — The state is being asked to forgo on average $1.34 million in sales tax it collects annually on feminine hygiene products.

Rep. Christina Baker, D-Bangor, said Thursday she didn’t need to work hard to get eight co-sponsors for a bill to exempt sales tax on products such as tampons, pads and panty liners. “The bill has good support,” she said. “Six of them [co-sponsors] are men.”

The bill is scheduled for a public hearing in front of the Taxation Committee April 28. A similar bill on incontinence products was unanimously defeated earlier this session by the same committee.

Feminine hygiene products, unlike other personal care items used by both sexes, are a necessity, Baker said. “Women need them,” she said. “It’s not voluntary; they have no choice. It’s a discriminatory tax. That discrimination needs to be corrected.

“Thinking about the matter, I really can’t come up with an equivalent product for men,” she added. “Condoms,” she said, “are a choice.”

The Legislature’s Office of Fiscal and Program Review has not determined the actual amount of sales tax women pay each year on feminine hygiene products. A representative said his official analysis would be completed before the public hearing.

According to 1997 U.S. Census Bureau figures, 312,303 girls and women in Maine are between the ages of 12 and 45, the general ages of menstruation.

Assuming each woman experiences a 28-day cycle, each has 13 periods a year. On Thursday, the price of a 40-count box of Tampax tampons ranged from $4.97 to $6.99 a box in three Bangor area stores. Based on those prices and on a 5.5 percent sales tax, women pay an average of 33 cents tax per box.

If each woman uses one box of tampons each cycle, she would pay an average $4.29 in sales tax per year. Given the previous estimates, Maine’s female population pays about $1.34 million each year in sales tax for feminine hygiene products.

“Removing the tax is a small way to acknowledge women’s reality,” Baker said.

“The human race should not be taxed,” she added. “It’s a wonderful contribution women make in bearing our children — and our future. We’re bearing the future. It’s not the most pleasant experience to go through month after month. This bill takes note of that contribution.”

Three states — Arizona, Minnesota and Pennsylvania — do not charge sales tax on feminine hygiene products.

Sen. Richard Ruhlin, D-Brewer, who is lead co-sponsor of the bill, said his signature to the legislation “doesn’t mean my qualified support or lack of support.” He said he disagrees with feminine hygiene products being listed as a specific exemption in the tax code but does not rule out that they shouldn’t be exempt. “I’m not a woman, but I would think they’d be a necessity,” he said.

Instead, Ruhlin said he would consider broader language that covers all health products.

That is something supported by Billy Miller, owner of Miller Drug in Bangor. He said he would be willing to spend an additional half-cent on sales tax if all health care products were exempt.

“If you’re going to have no sales tax on feminine hygiene products, then revamp the whole system to include all health care products,” Miller said. “To have it just on feminine hygiene products, to me this is cherry picking.”

The tax exemption on feminine hygiene products is being supported by the Maine Women’s Lobby, said Executive Director Laura Fortman.

Whether the bill will pass out of committee is unknown. “People said they are just going with the flow” on taxation issues, Baker said, mentioning that “the puns are floating around” the State House about this bill.

The legislation did come late this session, and the bill contains a clause saying it was filed “after deadline.” In early April, the majority of the joint Legislative Council agreed that it should be heard before the Taxation Committee April 28.

That public hearing falls within a 28-day cycle, Baker admitted. “That’s fitting,” she said, laughing. “Maybe there will be a full moon.”

The next full moon is April 30.