The top Republican and Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee said the Treasury Department “missed the mark” in new guidance that limits tax breaks for businesses that get their Paycheck Protection Program loans forgiven.
In a joint statement Thursday, Senate Finance Chairman Chuck Grassley and Democrat Ron Wyden said the Treasury is depriving some small businesses of much-needed economic relief by forcing them to choose between getting their PPP loans forgiven or claiming write-offs on expenses they covered with the loan money. The IRS published guidance on the issue Wednesday.
“Regrettably, Treasury has now doubled down on its position in new guidance that increases the tax burden on small businesses by accelerating their tax liability, all at a time when many businesses continue to struggle and some are again beginning to close,” Grassley and Wyden said.
The congressional reaction to the guidance puts additional pressure on the Treasury and Internal Revenue Service to allow taxpayers to claim the expense deductions. Grassley and Wyden encouraged the IRS to reverse its position.
The lawmakers said they are working to include language in year-end legislation clarifying that taxpayers qualify for expense deductions even if their loans are forgiven. That could be included in government spending legislation that Congress must pass by Dec. 11 before federal funding runs out.
Chris Moran, a tax attorney for law firm Venable LLP, said, “the IRS guidance seems to be inconsistent with congressional intent” in the CARES Act, which created PPP loans for businesses struggling from the pandemic. The law stated that the forgiven loan won’t be taxed, but didn’t specify whether companies could still write off the expenses they covered with that money.
O.B. Rawls IV is CEO of iPayment.
Kevin Wack is the Banking Editor at American Banker, leading the publication's coverage of large, regional and community banks. He also writes regularly about business, regulatory and legal issues that affect the banking industry.
Kevin, who's based in Southern California, has more than 14 years of experience at American Banker. He previously served as the publication's consumer finance reporter and, earlier, while based in Washington, D.C., as its Capitol Hill correspondent.
His investigative journalism has been honored numerous times by both the Society of American Business Editors and Writers and the American Society of Business Publication Editors. In 2020 he won the Jesse H. Neal Award for the best range of work by a single author.
Kevin's career in financial journalism grew out of two jobs he had in Washington, D.C., during and immediately after the global financial crisis. In 2009, as a fellow in the American Political Science Association's Congressional Fellowship Program, he worked for a Senate subcommittee that was investigating the causes of the crisis. He later worked on the staff of the Congressional Oversight Panel, which was charged with overseeing the use of bailout funds.
Excluding the forgiven loan from tax “is essentially meaningless if the expenses funded by the loan are nondeductible,” Moran said.
Still, many taxpayers aren’t expecting to get permission to claim the deductions, from the IRS or Congress, in the short term.
“I think most of them are, at least for now, resigned” to not getting the write-offs, Joe Kristan, a partner at the accounting firm Eide Bailly LLP in Des Moines, Iowa. “They’d certainly like to be allowed by Congress to step in and allow their deductions, but they’re not counting on it.”