BREMERTON, Wash. - Yesterday, Washington state began taxing candy, with soft drinks to follow July 1, the Kitsap Sun reports. The Legislature decided to add candy to the list of items eligible for the state€™s sale tax as a way to increase state revenue.

Retailers were scrambling to figure out what constitutes candy because merchants are not only responsible for collecting the tax but figuring out which items the tax encompasses.

Tina Carlile of the Daily Stop store has been reading labels to find out what candies she stocks makes the sales tax cut. Confection with flour is classified as exempt, so a Milky Way is now taxed but a Milky Way Midnight Bar is not.

Mike Gowrylow, spokesman for the Washington Department of Revenue, said a list drawn up by the Streamlined Sales Tax Governing Board clarifies exempt and taxable candies. He said the candy tax is projected to bring in $30.5 million for fiscal year 2011, which starts July 1.

For the soda tax, retailers will not have to calculate that one because wholesalers will pay the taxes. At two pennies per 12-ounce container, the soda tax is estimated to generate around $33.8 million.

The state€™s tobacco tax jumped $1 per pack on May 1. The soda, beer and bottled water taxes will end June 2013.