U.S. Sens. Todd Young (R-IN) and Maggie Hassan (D-NH), members of the Senate Finance Committee, led a bipartisan group urging Senate leadership to expand the Research & Development (R&D) tax credit and to ensure that businesses can fully deduct their R&D investments each year in upcoming legislation.
The senators previously introduced a bill, the American Innovation and Jobs Act, that would expand the refundable R&D tax credit for small businesses and startups and ensure that companies can fully deduct R&D investments each year. In August, the senators led bipartisan efforts to include a similar provision into a potential Senate budget package. Now, the two senators are pushing for their bill to be part of any upcoming legislative package.
“We write to urge you to support U.S. economic competitiveness and innovation in any upcoming legislative package by expanding the research and development tax credit for small businesses and preserving full and immediate expensing for R&D investments,” the two wrote in a letter to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY).
Without Congress re-instating the full deduction, the members said, high-paying jobs and domestic investment were in jeopardy.
“Starting this year, innovative U.S. companies lost the ability to immediately write-off the full value of their investments in R&D. Unless Congress acts quickly to restore full and immediate expensing for R&D, this change will jeopardize high-paying American jobs and constrain domestic investment in strategically critical technologies,” the senators wrote. “It is also crucial that Congress further promote U.S. competitiveness by strengthening the R&D tax credit claimed by innovative startups and small businesses across the country.”