Swiping left or right on a dating app could soon cost money with new tax

Whether you swipe left or right as you’re looking for the love of your life on your phone, one state lawmaker is introducing a new bill to tax online dating companies, and it would be up to those companies to decide whether to pass the tax onto customers.

Rep. Lauren Davis, D-Shoreline, introduced House Bill 2071 on Tuesday, which would require dating app companies like Tinder, Bumble, Match.com, and others to pay the $1 excise tax per every user in Washington per month. The tax would not apply to users who have accounts, but have not accessed those accounts for 24 months.

Davis said she is looking for a way to fund services for domestic violence victims, intervention treatment, and perpetrator treatment.

“Domestic violence (DV) perpetrators as a group are extremely dangerous and they are responsible for an untold share of community violence, not just against their intimate partners, but more broadly,” Davis said. “Having a DV conviction is the No. 1 predictor of recidivism, the No. 1 predictor of violent crime. These individuals are the folks who are most likely to kill a law enforcement officer.”

Davis’ own experiences with domestic violence

Davis, who was a victim of domestic violence, shared her own story during a House Community Safety, Justice, and Reentry Committee meeting at the State Capitol in 2023.

“In the summer of 2021, I ended a tumultuous relationship that was defined by a pattern of severe psychological abuse and course of control,” Davis testified. “When I had broken up with him previously, my abuser would threaten my career or threaten to kill himself in order to get me back. The day I left for good, he used his body to block my exit so I couldn’t leave his house. I was able to break free and I never looked back.”

Tuesday, Davis told KIRO Newsradio her bill is a response to the state’s failure to make good on a promise to fund services after the House passed HB 1169 to eliminate the Crime Victims Penalty without backfilling lost funding.

“The State has massively defunded victims’ services that operate out of prosecutors’ offices specifically and help victims navigate our impossible legal system, which is entirely focused on the needs, wants, wishes, rights, and protections of criminal defendants and not victims,” Davis said.

KIRO Newsradio reached out to several online dating services, who have yet to respond at the time of publishing.

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