SC sales tax holiday is a boon for families. Here’s how to help more of them. | Opinion

Twenty-five years ago, then-Gov. Jim Hodges proposed an idea so popular it survives to this day: a three-day sales tax holiday in early August that lets South Carolina families save money on school supplies, shoes, clothes and computers. (Yes, kids, we had computers in 1999.)

The neighboring states of North Carolina and Georgia followed suit soon after but eliminated the tax relief that costs each state millions of dollars years ago. South Carolina’s program endured, despite skepticism and criticism from tax policy analysts and Post and Courier editorial writers who say it merely shifts the timing of purchases around while playing favorites with retailers.

Pshaw. As a parent who just spent $200 on a pair of shoes and a backpack, I can tell you the critics are wrong: Tax holidays in numerous states have been a godsend for numerous parents, especially those with teenagers and especially in this rough economy of recent years when employment is so tenuous for so many and historic inflation tore into income like a carnivore.

In the last three-day tax holiday alone, South Carolina shoppers bought more than $30.4 million items online and in stores without having to pay South Carolina’s 6% sales tax or any local sales taxes, saving more than $1.8 million, according to the state’s Department of Revenue.

That’s real money for parents — and relatively little for a state that collects billions in sales tax revenue each year. You can bet parents who know about South Carolina’s Aug. 2-4 tax holiday are waiting to take advantage of it and that retailers will eagerly advertise back-to-school savings in a state with hundreds of thousands of students and tens of thousands of teachers.

Exempt items include everything from underwear and sleep wear to swimwear, boots to ballet shoes, and crayons to computer bags. It excludes things like cosmetics and phone cases. (Sorry, kids.) There are some weird distinctions drawn: Shower curtains are exempt, but shower curtain rings and rods are not. Computers are exempt, but smartphones are not.

Even so, as back-to-school lists go, South Carolina’s is expansive and appreciated by many.

There is one change South Carolina lawmakers can and should make for next year, though: They should move the tax holiday from August to July, even if only a single week earlier.

The minor move would have major consequences, and makes perfect sense. First, it wouldn’t affect fiscal year budgeting for institutions whose fiscal years end in June. More importantly, it would benefit thousands of struggling South Carolina families whose school years start earlier now.

This year, classes resumed before the tax-free weekend in more than half of the state’s public school districts, according to a state Department of Education calendar. Moving the tax holiday back just one week would cut the number of districts starting classes before the tax holiday from 37 to a mere five. Moving the holiday back just two weeks earlier to mid-July would mean no school district would start before the tax holiday. It seems a no-brainer to make the move.

In 1999, Hodges said it plainly: “Parents who provide for their child’s education shouldn’t have to face the additional burden of heavy sales taxes.” In 2001, the director of the state’s Department of Revenue marketed the tax holiday, saying, “Gov. Hodges and state lawmakers have once again given all South Carolinians an exceptional opportunity to get the most of their back-to-school budgets.” The move to earlier first days of school for so many districts in recent years means that opportunity is no longer equal even though the burden still is.

In their next session, state lawmakers would do well to heed the words of the governor who proposed South Carolina’s sales tax holiday 25 years ago and change the law to move the holiday back one or two weeks.

The impact on the state coffers is relatively little each year but parents and retailers who have struggled economically in recent years would appreciate the change, and your moody teenager with her new shoes and backpack would be able to give you a big hug that much sooner.

That’s priceless.

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