News Jobs Bill To Help Small Businesses
A $17.6 billion jobs bill approved by Congress in March offers employers two tax breaks for qualifying new workers hired in 2010.
Companies will be exempt from paying Social Security payroll taxes (normally 6.2 percent of a worker’s wages) for any new worker who was unemployed for the prior 60 days. (Workers will still have to pay their own Social Security tax share.)
Each of those new employees retained for a full year would net the company an additional $1,000 back on its 2011 tax return, or 6.2 percent of the wages paid to the employee in 2010, whichever is less.
Companies of any size can claim the credits, for an unlimited number of workers.
The measure’s estimated cost is $13 billion over 10 years.
Separately, the legislation also extends a provision to that allows small businesses to write off as much as $250,000 of their capital expenditures in 2010.
The expanded “section 179″ deduction first came into play two years ago, as part of a 2008 stimulus bill, and was renewed in 2009.
Extending it allows companies to buy assets like vehicles and write it off as capital expenditure.
Section 179 begins phasing out when a business spends more than $800,000 annually on equipment.
The measure’s estimated cost is $35 million over the next decade.