Progress slow on major issues: Washington works on taxes, housing, consumer protection

Hardware Retailing, Jan, 2008

Washington is worried about taxes, housing, consumer protection ... the list could go on and on. Congress and the administration have proposed many solutions but seem to accomplish little.

On taxes, the alternative minimum tax (AMT) has taken top billing. For the past few years Congress has been passing annual relief measures, called patches, for the AMT; the last patch took care of 2006. Unless Congress acts again, 23 million or more taxpayers will be subject to the AMT for 2007 taxes.

The House has passed the Temporary Tax Relief Act, which would extend AMT relief measures and 32 expiring tax provisions for another year. Tax extenders include the research and development tax credit, 15-year depreciation for leasehold improvements and deductions for state and local sales taxes, higher education expenses and out-of-pocket teacher expenses.

The Senate was battling over an AMT bill. There was general agreement about the AMT patch and extension of the expiring provisions; however, senators were having difficulty deciding how--or whether--to find $50 billion to cover lost revenue. The House bill does offset the losses.

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) was pushing Congress to move. Acting IRS Commissioner Linda Stiff said it would take at least 10 weeks for the IRS to reprogram and test its systems to accommodate tax changes. Paul Cherecwich, chairman of the Internal Revenue Service Oversight Board, said that the IRS was ready to begin processing tax filings by Jan. 14. If reprogramming were to delay that start by two weeks, it would slow down 5.6 million refunds worth more than $17 billion. Even worse, a six-week delay would hold up 32 million refunds totaling $87 billion.

Legislation on Housing, Product Safety

The slowdown in the housing market and turmoil in the lending community had the Treasury Department working on a deal with lenders to temporarily freeze interest rates that are scheduled to reset this year. Several pieces of legislation to mitigate the impact of interest rates and foreclosures had been introduced in Congress.

The House has passed the National Affordable Housing Trust Fund Act to provide assistance for affordable rental housing and for down payments and closing costs for first-time homebuyers; the Mortgage Forgiveness Debt Relief Act to permanently exclude discharged home mortgage debt from gross income; and the Emergency Home Ownership & Mortgage Equity Protection Act to relax bankruptcy rules to protect home mortgages.

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In response to the large number of toy recalls because of lead contamination, the Senate was considering the CPSC Reform Act, which would increase staff levels at Consumer Product Safety Commission, update testing facilities, increase civil and criminal penalties, require third-party certification of children's products, ban all children's products that contain lead, increase public disclosure requirements by manufacturers, make it unlawful for retailers to sell a recalled product and establish whistleblower protections for manufacturers' and importers' employees. A similar bill has been introduced in the House.

Time to Post OSHA Summary

Employers who are required to keep Occupational Safety & Health Administration (OSHA) workplace injury and illness records must post the OSHA Form 300A summary from Feb. 1 to April 30 in a conspicuous place where employees are accustomed to seeing notices.

Most employers are required to keep OSHA Log 300 and post Form 300A. Exceptions include employers with fewer than 10 workers and those in certain industries including retailing. In general, hardware stores are not required to keep these records; lumber and building materials stores are required to do so as are most manufacturing and distribution companies.

This is a federal rule and applies to employers in states without state OSHA programs. Employers in states with state OSHA programs may have additional or different recordkeeping and posting requirements. More information on who is required to post the summary and what action is required is at www.osha.gov.