LOS ANGELES – Is an uncooked pizza a grocery item or a restaurant one? That’s the debate currently circulating in states like California that don’t have a sales tax for grocery items, National Public Radio’s The Salt reports. The reasoning behind what makes an item eligible for sales tax can be baffling to retailers — and consumers.

For example, two dozen states label a Hershey bar as candy, but a Twix bar — because flour is an ingredient — as a grocery item. Candy is taxed, but grocery items are not. Now some of those states are looking into whether take-and-bake pizzas should be included in items that have the sales tax levied. To further confuse things, food stamps can only been spent on items not eligible for sales tax.

A question from a Papa Murphy’s franchise, which sells take-and-bake pies in 37 states, the majority of which don’t assess a tax on the unbaked pizzas, ended up with the Streamlined Sales Governing Tax Board, which helps 24 states figure out their sales tax code. “When you are looking at crafting these definitions, you are looking at clear, bright-line tests. You want to take the subjectivity out of it,” said Craig Johnson, executive director of the board, which represents New Jersey, Ohio and Wisconsin, among other states.

“In some ways the line that they are being asked to draw is an indefensible line,” said Kirk Stark, a professor of law at the University of California Los Angeles. “As a result, we get these zany, incomprehensible distinctions.” The tax board will give its ruling on take-and-bake pizzas later this week.