Ag leaders have been pushing your lawmakers on Capitol Hill to extend the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act—which will expire on Dec, 31st of this year if Congress doesn’t take action.
Dustin Sherer with American Farm Bureau says if lawmakers let the bill expire, it could have a negative impact on farmers.
“If nothing is done, there will be a tax increase at the end of the year that will hit farmers and ranchers in the pocketbooks, overall, that will be taxed tens of billions of dollars more than they otherwise would, and we need to make sure that Congress does its job and makes these tax reforms permanent,” says Sherer.
He says the majority of Americans will also be paying more in taxes if Congress does not renew the legislation.
“Sixty-five percent of American households across the country are going to see a tax increase in the trillions of dollars,” according to Sherer. “Farmers and ranchers, the overall tax rates that their business income is taxed at went down. The estate tax exemption was doubled from five and a half million to $11 million indexed to inflation. A lot of important provisions to agriculture in these expiring provisions.”
He says there are still several steps to extending the legislation. The first of which is the reconciliation process between the U.S. House and Senate.
“February 20, the Senate passed its version of a budget resolution which only dealt with some energy provisions, some border policy, and some additional defense spending. And then the following week, the House passed a budget resolution that’s aimed towards having one big, beautiful bill, as Speaker Johnson, and President Trump have referred to it, and so that happened on February 25,” he says.
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