Looking Back: Why ‘Tampon Tax’ bill did not pass last year

BISMARCK, N.D. (KFYR) – For half of the world, menstruating is just a normal part of life. For others, it’s a political divide, and for some, it’s the worry in the back of their head that they won’t have the supplies they need to get through the week.

About a year ago, North Dakota state representatives voted on a bill sometimes referred to as the Tampon Tax. The bill proposed eliminating the sales tax attached to feminine sanitary products like tampons and pads.

Marty Boeckel testified during the hearing, speaking on behalf of the organization Days for Girls International in support of the bill.

“Girls and women and other menstruators— for them, this is a necessity. We cannot stop our periods, we cannot live without adequate products,” Boeckel said.

At 56 to 33 votes, the bill didn’t pass.

Boeckel said out of the approximate 372,000 women in North Dakota, about 174,000 of them menstruate.

The U.S. Census Bureau said as of 2022, 11.5 percent of North Dakotans live in poverty.

Boeckel said any women or girls in that number probably also struggle to get the period supplies they need.

At the time the bill was up for vote, a similar bill about making diapers tax-exempt was also up for vote.

Some representatives who voted on those bills spoke with KFYR about the bill.

“A lot of these tax reductions are just reducing in one sector, and then it just piles onto another sector, so it’s not really true tax relief,” Rep. Dick Anderson said.

Other representatives said it’s important to remember there was a separate tax relief conversation on the table during the same session.

“Trying to weight the pros and cons of it through that lens at the time, and I put more emphasis on the tax cut for all North Dakotans,” Rep. Jared Hagert said.

Representative Zachary Ista was one of the 33 representatives who voted for the bill to pass. He said the slippery slope argument is faulty since things we already exempt certain necessary products, like food, from sales tax.

“For about half the state of North Dakota, at some point in their lives, they’re going to need period products like tampons. It’s an absolute necessity for women in North Dakota, and it makes no sense to me that we would subject it to sales tax when we carve out sales tax for other things,” Rep. Zachary Ista said.

The diaper bill that was voted on during the same session passed at 88 to 6.

A 45-count box of Kotex tampons at Walmart costs nearly $10 right now before the 70 cents in sales tax. A 44-count box of diapers there costs nearly $10 with no sales tax.

You can find more information about donating to Days for Girls on either their website or their Facebook page.

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