Although many feel that the recession relief supplied in President Obama’s American Recovery and Reinvestment Act is not coming quickly enough, other financial experts are saying that relief for small business owners is already here. Sacramento Business Journal writer Michael Shaw wrote a great piece on which benefits are ready to roll, and how taxpayers know if they should take advantage of them. Check out part of his article below, or you can read the full text here.
Those are the benefits promised to small-business owners in the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, better known as the $787 billion stimulus package passed by Congress and signed by President Obama in February.
“The government is trying to provide a comprehensive approach to helping small businesses by focusing on these three separate areas,” said Barry Goggin, president of the Better Business Bureau’s Northeast California office. Although not a government agency, the Better Business Bureau is actively publicizing the advantages for small businesses under the stimulus plan.
Goggin said the job opportunities have been slow to arrive as funds flow gradually to hundreds of agencies, departments and governments. But the tax benefits and loan programs have been made immediately available.
Jim Leet, a certified specialist in taxation in California for the past 20 years who practices at law firm McDonough Holland & Allen, explains that there are several write-offs, deductions and credits designed to allow businesses to keep more of their profits.
For several years, small businesses have been able to immediately write off the purchase of some fixed assets, such as vehicles used for work, deducting the full amount of a $25,000 truck, for example, as opposed to a smaller amount over many years for the vehicle’s depreciation. But the overall limit has been greatly increased under the stimulus plan, Leet said, from $125,000 to $250,0000.
