GCCA to Host Special COVID-19 Webinar to Discuss Biden’s “Path Out of the Pandemic”

On Friday, September 10, 2021, President Biden announced a six-pronged, comprehensive national strategy to put the Nation on a path out of the pandemic. The six-pronged strategy focuses on Vaccinating the Unvaccinated, Further Protecting the Vaccinated, Keeping Schools Safely Open, Increasing Testing and Requiring Masking, Protecting Our Economic Recovery, and Improving Care for those with COVID-19. Within that plan are provisions that will dramatically impact your business, such as, requiring all employers with 100+ employees to ensure their workers are vaccinated or tested weekly. We are expecting more information to be disseminated in the coming weeks. Therefore, we will be hosting a special COVID webinar this Thursday September 23, and recommend you tune in to get more updates from our team and have your questions answered.

GCCA Launches New Grassroots Campaign Opposing PRO Act Provisions in the $3.5 Trillion Budget Reconciliation Bill

On Wednesday, September 8, 2021, the House Education and Labor Committee released its portion of the Democrats’ reconciliation bill. It includes numerous provisions on the National Labor Relations Board and National Labor Relations Act, such as, provisions from the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act, including excessive penalties, unnecessary restrictions negatively impacting opportunities for gig workers and limiting employer free speech, and $5 million aimed at replacing secret ballot in union representation elections with phone-based voting— which would expose employees to union intimidation. The provisions will force unions on workers by taking away opportunities to work in the gig economy, limit employees from hearing facts about unions and how union spend or misspend employees dues, and intimidate small business owners to force them to yield to union demands. The inclusion of these measures will hurt small businesses and infringe on the rights of workers.

GCCA currently has an active campaign opposing the PRO Act legislation that has already passed the House of Representatives and is awaiting debate in the Senate. However, Democrats are now utilizing the $3.5 Trillion Budget Reconciliation Bill to attempt to pass some of the harmful PRO Act provisions. Even if you have taken action opposing the PRO Act in the past, we encourage you to participate in this NEW grassroots campaign and make sure your representatives are aware that you oppose the inclusion of these PRO Act provisions in the budget reconciliation bill!

Take action HERE

End of Step-Up in Basis Doubtful

The top House Democrat overseeing tax policy said Tuesday, September 14, 2021 that President Joe Biden’s plan to substantially raise taxes on inherited assets lacks sufficient support in the lower chamber, further dimming its chances of inclusion in a $3.5 trillion economic package. Biden’s proposal to end a tax break on inheritances known as “step-up in basis,” which wipes out the capital gains tax on assets when the owner dies, was already facing obstacles even before the House committee left the provision out of its draft tax legislation released Monday, September 13, 2021.  The plan had been central to Biden’s efforts to overhaul capital gains taxes as part of a broader effort among progressives to equalize treatment of employment income with investment income, and achieve a top capital gains rate of 39.6% before a surtax on top earners. The House committee instead proposed raising to raise the top long-term capital gains rate to 25% from 20%. The House Democratic leadership could still insert changes after the committee passes its draft and before the entire chamber votes on the legislation. Yet House Ways and Means Chairman Richard Neal’s exclusion of the measure from his own committee’s proposal, along with his latest remarks, indicate a last-minute addition of the capital gains overhaul is highly unlikely.

House Democrats Continue to Target Death Tax in $3.5 Trillion Budget Reconciliation Bill

On Sunday, September 12, 2021 the Democrats on the House Ways and Means Committee released a list of tax revenue provisions to finance the $3.5 trillion budget reconciliation bill. One concerning provision is the acceleration on the expiration of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017’s (TCJA) estate and gift tax parameters. When TCJA passed in 2017 it doubled the estate and gift tax exemption to $22 million for married filers and $11 million for individuals. That provision is currently scheduled to expire on December 31, 2025 and when it does it will revert the exemption back to pre-TCJA levels ($11 million for married filers and $5.5 million for individuals). However, the new provision provided by the Democrat House Ways and Means Committee members moves the expiration date up to December 31, 2021.  For family businesses, that means the amount they can currently protect from estate and gift taxes would be cut in half starting in roughly 3 months.