Legislature Proposes Doing Away With Two Sales Tax Holidays
Louisiana residents currently have three different sales tax holidays where they can shop and save on certain items during the prescribed time and have the state sales tax waived. If a new proposal by the legislature is passed then you and I would only have one sales tax holiday to take advantage of those tax savings.
The current sales tax holidays are the Hurricane Preparedness holiday, the 2nd Amendment holiday, and the General sales tax holiday. The hurricane holiday usually happens in May just before the start of the hurricane season. The 2nd Amendment holiday is usually in September at the beginning of hunting season. The general sales tax holiday is usually in late August as families are spending money on back to school items.
Under the proposal, House Bill 24, the hurricane holiday would be no more. The 2nd Amendment and general sales tax holiday would be combined. The legislation was passed by the House Ways and Means Committee and will move forward to the full house for debate.
The elimination of these tax holidays is part of a plan to ease Louisiana's fiscal deficit. However, by many estimates, this particular piece of legislation would barely make a dent in the several hundred million dollars the state currently projects the budget deficit to be.