Jesus’ loving work continues with us
May 24, 2016
2nd arrest in connection with heroin overdose
May 24, 2016Louisiana residents shopping next weekend for the hurricane season will notice their goods cost a little more than usual.
The state has suspended the annual hurricane preparedness sales tax holiday that usually takes place on Memorial Day Weekend for the current fiscal year. The measure means items such as batteries and generators purchased next weekend will be subject to the full 5 percent state sales tax.
The holiday rollback was approved during the state Legislature special session to find more revenue to address Louisiana’s budget deficit. The state’s full hurricane preparedness holiday will not be back for a few years. In 2017 and 2018, the state will provide a 2 percent exemption for hurricane preparedness, meaning those specified goods purchased on Memorial Day Weekend will be subject to a 3 percent tax. Beginning July 1, 2018, the full exemption for hurricane preparedness will return.
The hurricane preparedness tax holiday is not the only one state lawmakers targeted during the special session. The sales tax holiday scheduled for the first weekend of August has been reduced to a partial holiday, as well. This year and next, the August tax holiday will only feature a two percent exemption before resuming in full in 2018.
Those purchasing firearms will also feel the effects of the state’s budget issues later this year. The Second Amendment Weekend Sales Tax Holiday has been reduced to a partial holiday. Firearms, ammunition and other specified items purchased during the first weekend of September in 2016 and 2017 will be subject to a three percent sales tax. These purchases will be fully exempt from the state sales tax again in 2018.
The Tax Foundation ranked Louisiana as having the third-highest combined state and local sales tax rate in the nation for 2016. However, that ranking was before the state added an additional penny to its four-cent sales tax in late March. With the additional penny, Louisiana’s combined rate increased to 10 percent, putting it above now-second-place Arkansas’s 9.3 percent rate.
