In November 2017 a new national coalition of small businesses (Business for Responsible Tax Reform BRTR) was formed to combat irresponsible federal tax reform. SCSBCC President/CEO Frank Knapp was chosen to co-chair the organization.
BRTR’s campaign warned Congress and the public that planned excessive corporate tax cuts would fail to benefit small businesses and would raise the national debt.
Congress passed and President Trump signed a $1.5 trillion tax bill that permanently cut corporate tax rates by 40% and gave large tax breaks to the very wealthy. Small business pass throughs received a temporary 20% tax deduction, but businesses had to qualify to receive the tax deduction.
As predicted, corporate tax cuts were used for stock buybacks instead of employee raises and business investments. This artificially increased the wealth of shareholders and corporate executives. Also as expected, the national debt has increased dramatically largely because of a vast reduction of corporate tax revenue. A March 2019 poll found that small business owners overwhelmingly said that they saw no benefit from the tax law.
BRTR is advocating revisiting the 2017 tax law to roll back the corporate tax rate cuts and provide funding for tax programs that would really help small businesses and entrepreneurs.