The Sales Tax Takes the Weekend Off. The Fine Print Is the $100 Line.

The timing is not an accident. Texas parks its sales-tax holiday on the weekend before most districts go back, and Magnolia ISD's first day is Wednesday, August 12. From Friday, August 7 through midnight Sunday, August 9, qualifying clothing, footwear, school supplies and backpacks priced under $100 ring up with no sales tax. In most of Greater Magnolia that means keeping 8.25 cents on every dollar.

The $100 line is per item, and it works like a cliff, not a discount. A $95 pair of shoes is tax-free. A $105 pair is taxed on the whole $105, not on the five dollars over. There is no cap on how many qualifying items go in the cart, so ten $20 shirts are fine, and so is a receipt with forty things on it.

What counts: everyday clothing and shoes, student backpacks, and the supply-list staples, from notebooks and binders to crayons, glue, scissors and lunch boxes. What does not: computers and tablets, which Texas has never put on the list, plus jewelry, handbags, rented clothing, and gear made for a single sport. Cleats and shin guards stay taxed even in August.

Online orders qualify, with one catch. Payment has to go through during the window. An order placed and paid Sunday at 11 p.m. counts, even if the box lands on your porch Thursday. An order sitting unpaid in a cart until Monday morning does not.

The comptroller's office puts the statewide savings at about $142.5 million over the three days. Divided among every shopper in Texas that is a modest figure, but a full back-to-school run for two or three kids can clear $40 or $50 in tax by itself. One more thing the fine print gets right: the exemption follows the item, not the store. A shop on the corridor rings it up the same way the big boxes do.