Spain lowers VAT on feminine hygiene products from 10% to 4%

The Spanish government has lowered the VAT on feminine hygiene products from 10% to 4% as part of a new targeted tax scheme.

"These are essential items, not luxury products," Spain's labor minister, Yolanda Díaz, tweeted on Thursday.

Spain has also reduced the VAT on condoms and other forms of non-hormonal birth control.

Spanish social rights minister Ione Belarra said she was "particularly pleased" these points were included in the new targeted tax scheme.

"It is unfair that women, especially lower-income ones, have had to put up with a pink tax for this long," the politician tweeted.

Targeted tax scheme

The Spanish government's new targeted tax plan lowers them for low and medium-income households as well as self-employed workers while increasing them for the wealthy and for larger companies.

According to Spain's finance minister, María Jesús Montero, this will allow the government to collect another €3.144bn in 2023 and 2024.

The scheme includes a "solidarity tax" for people with over €3m in assets. This, according to Díaz, "will be compatible with the wealth tax and will prevent the tax dumping the People's Party advocates for". Conservative politicians recently invited Catalan entrepreneurs to their regions with lower taxes, drawing the ire of the Catalan government.

The Spanish government's new scheme also means people who earn up to €15,000 gross per year will benefit from the lowest possible income tax rate, with additional tax benefits for those who make up to €21,000. People who earn under €15,000 will not have to file taxes either.

Corporate tax for small and medium-sized businesses will be lowered from 25% to 23%, but people with €200,000 to €300,000 in assets will have an income tax rate of 27%, up from 26%, while those with more than €300,000 will have to pay 28%.