Texas August Sales Tax Holiday Will Get Bigger

Great news for back-to-school shoppers. For the first time since it began in 1999 the annual August sales tax holiday will include many school supplies. A lot of families look forward to saving their hard earned money during the sales tax holiday weekend" Texas Comptroller Susan Combs said. Now they can make their back-to-school budgets stretch even further because more than two dozen school supply items will be tax-free." House Bill 1801 identifies school supplies priced less than $100 that will be exempt from state and local sales tax for the tax-free weekend. Pens crayons calculators notebooks rulers scissors and lunch boxes are a few of the items on the list. The full list can be found below. These items are in addition to school backpacks and most clothing and shoes priced less than $100 that are already tax-free the weekend of Aug. 2123. The Comptrollers office is sending information to retailers about implementing the expanded sales tax holiday. TAX-FREE SCHOOL SUPPLIES Binders Legal pads Blackboard chalk Lunch boxes Book bags Markers Calculators Notebooks Cellophane tape Paper (loose leaf ruled notebook paper copy paper graph paper tracing paper manila paper colored paper poster board construction paper) Compasses Composition books Pencil boxes and other school supply boxes Crayons Pencil sharpeners Erasers Pencils Folders (expandable pocket plastic manila) Pens Glue paste and paste sticks Protractors Highlighters Rulers Index cards Scissors Index card boxes Writing tablets