On January 3, Rep. Vern Buchanan (R-FL), a senior member of the tax-writing Ways & Means Committee, introduced H.R.143, a bill that would make permanent expiring individual tax rates (including section 199A), the standard deduction, the estate tax personal exemption, and other individual tax provisions. The bill also specifically repeals the expiration date of section 199A, the deduction for qualifying noncorporate business income.
The “TCJA Permanency Act” has 48 cosponsors, all Republican House members.
Extending or, if possible, making permanent the lower individual and estate tax rates enacted in December 2016 is a top priority of both President Trump and the GOP-controlled Congress. The effort will be at the heart of the massive tax reconciliation bill that Congress will try to enact before the end of the year.
Prospects: It is by no means certain that Republicans, with their tiny majorities, will succeed in enacting an all-GOP bill that includes extension of the expiring tax rules. But odds are that Congress will find a way to make extension happen, because most Democrats as well as Republicans do not want to allow the lower- and middle-class tax rates to revert back to their much higher 2016 levels.
NAIFA Staff Contact: Jayne Fitzgerald – Director – Government Relations, at jfitzgerald@naifa.org.