The House has passed legislation (H.R. 4213) that would have extended 63 current tax provisions, but the Senate failed to bring this bill to a vote. Thus, all of these provisions expired at midnight December 31, 2009.
The most notable provisions include:
- Deduction of state and local general sales taxes (section 164) (Personal Tax Incentives)
- Additional standard deduction, up to $500 for individuals and $1,000 for couples, for state and local property taxes (section 63) (Personal Tax Incentives)
- Research tax credit and alternative simplified credit (section 41) (General Business Tax Incentives)
- New markets tax credit (section 45D) (Community Assistance Provisions)
- Empowerment zone incentives (sections 1391 and 1202) (Community Assistance Provisions)
- Renewal community tax incentives (sections 1400E, 1400F, 1400I, and 1400J) (Community Assistance Provisions)
- District of Columbia Investment Incentives (sections 1400, 1400A, 1400B, and 1400C) (Community Assistance Provisions)
- Net disaster loss designation and $500 limit per casualty for personal casualty losses attributed to federally declared natural disasters (section 165) (General Disaster Relief Provisions)
- Expensing for qualified disaster expenses (section 198A) (General Disaster Relief Provisions)
- Biodiesel and renewable diesel incentives (section 40A) (Energy Incentives)
- Alternative motor vehicle credit for heavy hybrids (section 30B) (Energy Incentives)
- Although the House has acted and passed its version of the Tax Extenders Act of 2009, the Senate failed to act on similar legislation, as a result the following additional key tax provisions will expire:
- Increased exemption levels for the individual alternative minimum tax (section 55) and personal tax credits allowed against the AMT (section 26)
- Exclusion of unemployment compensation benefits from gross income (section 85)
- Alternative fuel mixture tax credit (section 6426(e))
- Reduced estimated tax payments for small businesses (section 6654(d)(1)(D))
Instead of handling tax issues, Congress has devoted it’s time to developing and passing an extremely controversial health care package.