Shoppers make their way through Downtown Crossing in Boston. During the annual tax holiday, shoppers in Massachusetts stores are exempt from paying the state’s 5-percent sales tax on purchases up to $2,500.

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AP / LISA POOLE

Shoppers hoping to catch a break on a big-ticket item during the annual sales-tax holiday in Massachusetts may have to save a little more cash than they planned as Bay State legislators have yet to approve the temporary tax break.

Massachusetts has held the two-day tax holiday for the last four years. However, in the past, legislators have been slow to approve the holiday, often waiting to sign off on it until just weeks before the event is intended to occur in mid-August.

This year appears no different, according to news reports, as House and Senate leaders appear divided on the wisdom of offering a tax break in a year when state revenues are strained by a difficult economy.

The Retailers Association of Massachusetts is lobbying for passage to help its 3,000 members.

“This year, more than any other, we need this,” said Jon B. Hurst, the association’s president. “Sales are down and costs are up.”

During the holiday, shoppers in Massachusetts stores are exempt from paying the state’s 5-percent sales tax on purchases up to $2,500. Sales of telecommunications services, tobacco products, gas, steam, electricity, motor vehicles, motorboats, meals and items priced above $2,500 remain subject to the sales tax. Also, prior sales and layaway sales are ineligible.

Last year, shoppers spent more than $500 million in Massachusetts during the tax holiday.

The amount of tax money the Bay State gives up on the holiday has risen each year, from $10 million in 2004 to $17.5 million last year, according to the Massachusetts Department of Revenue.

Rhode Island does not hold a tax holiday. In 2006, the General Assembly rejected a sales-tax holiday for the state, the second consecutive year the measure went down to defeat.

Massachusetts was among 14 states, as well as the District of Columbia, that held tax holidays last year, according to the Federation of Tax Administrators, a lobby group in Washington, D.C.

Two others joined the group this year — Vermont and West Virginia.

Vermont suspended its sales tax last weekend as elected officials there looked to help out the state’s retailers.

The exemption applied to “tangible personal property” under $2,000 except vehicles. Vermont officials estimated that the state would lose $2 million in revenue. The state also set aside $50,000 to help stores reprogram cash registers and $100,000 to reimburse eight municipalities that have a 1-percent local sales tax in addition to the state’s 6-percent sales tax, according to the Associated Press.

Massachusetts enacted its tax holiday five years ago, in part to counteract the advantageous tax policies of another of its northern neighbors — New Hampshire.

Hurst, of the retailers’ association, said that reasoning still stands.

“It’s because of the New Hampshire factor,” Hurst said. “We truly recover a lot of sales that would go to New Hampshire.”

Some Massachusetts residents don’t bother hopping in their vehicles to save money shopping in New Hampshire, he noted, instead logging on to their computers for tax-free Internet shopping.

pgrimald@projo.com