Rantz: Democrats’ bill taxes love, targets dating apps with absurd excise tax
Apr 8, 2025, 3:00 PM | Updated: Apr 9, 2025, 11:13 am

A Washington Democrats wants to tax dating apps for a worthy cause. But is this the right way to do it? (Photo illustration by Joe Raedle, Getty Images)
(Photo illustration by Joe Raedle, Getty Images)
A Washington Democrat wants you to find love, but thinks you should pay more for it. A new bill puts an excise tax on dating apps.
slaps a monthly tax on dating apps to raise money for domestic violence programs. The bill would require dating app companies to pay $1 per Washington-based user each month鈥攔egardless of whether the user pays for the service. The only users excluded are those with inactive accounts for at least 24 months, which means dating apps would have to pay up to $24 per user that they can’t even monetize by serving them with ads.
Revenue from the tax would be funneled into a newly created “Domestic Violence Services Account,” aimed at funding intervention programs and support services for victims.
There may have never been such a poorly devised tax, even if it’s meant to fund a worthy cause.
This is a tax on finding love (or hook ups)
The bill targets services like Hinge, Bumble, Tinder, and Match.com. The business environment in the state is inhospitable as it is. This makes it worse. And a dating app tax will inevitably mean more ads for free users, which some already complain make apps and services less desirable to use, and higher monthly or annual fees for users.
Rep. Lauren Davis (D-Shoreline), one of the聽辞苍濒测听reasonable Democratic representatives in office, is behind the bill. So why does she want to tax you for finding love?
“Candidly, I’m looking for funding. I’m looking for a resource, and there certainly is a statistically a reasonable nexus between dating and dating violence. The problem that I’m trying to solve is a very urgent one,” Davis explained on “The Jason Rantz Show” on KTTH.
What’s the funding crisis?
Funding for domestic violence is necessary because one of her colleagues, State Rep. Tarra Simmons (D-Bremerton), passed . It effectively eliminated the Crime Victims Penalty with an unfulfilled promise to backfill the lost funds. As a result, county prosecutors have complained about a lack of funding for victim advocates.
Davis’ bill is meant to address those missing funds.
“I’m trying to give the budget writers a way to solve this problem. In my opinion, we should not adjourn without solving this problem. It is categorically unacceptable to defund victim services across the state of Washington. That is unfair. It’s wrong. It’s immoral,” Davis explained.
But this goes about it the wrong way. And singles looking to make meaningful connections shouldn’t have to pay the price. It’s not the users, or the businesses, responsible for the lost funding.
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