Back in January, YouTuber Ingrid Nilsen met with President Obama and asked about the ‘Tampon Tax’ taking place in 40 states.
Of the 50 states making up the United States, Minnesota, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Maryland do not tax tampons. There is no sales tax in Oregon, Montana, New Hampshire, Delaware or Alaska, so these states also are excluded from the spotlight.
Nilsen explained that in remaining states, pads and tampons are taxed as “luxury goods.” She continued, “I don’t know anyone with a period who thinks it’s a luxury.”
Even more so, it’s been found that women spend up to $70.00 a year on these necessities, according to an article on change.org.
President Obama responded, “I think Michelle would agree with you on that.”
Nilsen replied, “Because it’s something that’s part of our everyday lives and is really crucial to our health as women. So I want to know, why do these items continued to be taxed?”
The President didn’t seem to have a confident reason as to why these items are taxed. He suggested that it could have been that men wrote those laws when they were passed.
“This raises a broader question that I’ve been working on since I came into office which was, how do we make sure that everybody has decent health care, preventive care and women in particular have the health care that they need,” President Obama said. ‘The basic idea is that women should not be at a disadvantage in the health care system and this is just one more example of it, which I confess I was not aware of until you brought it to my attention.”
President Obama thinks that the women in those states should work together in order to get those taxes removed. He continued to speak about one of his favorite topics, health care.
Since the interview between the U.S. President and the YouTube personality, more states are looking into changing the tax on these feminine items including California and New York.
Perhaps it’s because Nilsen is a lovely, bright, young female that’s been viewed on YouTube as “Missglamorazzi” for quite a while and a majority of her followers are females who are raising the attention of a pointless tax on items they need to buy.
Hopefully, there will be more states to jump on this bandwagon.
Check Out Ingrid Nilsen Chatting With President Obama
Written by Jordan Crowley
