House GOP to unveil small-business tax break

House Republicans on Wednesday plan to unveil their proposal to give small businesses a temporary 20 percent tax cut, Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) said Tuesday.

The bill has been in the works for weeks, and Republicans hope to time its passage off the House floor to coincide with Tax Day on April 15.

“This is a bill that goes directly toward making it easier for small-businessmen and -women to get back into the game, to keep more of their money so it can be invested to retain and create more jobs,” Cantor, who has led the push on the legislation, said following a GOP conference meeting Tuesday morning.

He said the proposal was particularly important at a time when Americans are struggling to afford rising gas prices.

“We want to make it easier for small-business people to operate, for families to afford to be able to go to the gas pump and do what it is that they want to do,” Cantor said.

The proposal is expected to gain broad GOP support, but the temporary nature of the bill could be a tricky sell with some in the party, who have long championed a permanent tax overhaul and criticized short-term tax cuts as “sugar-high” economics.

According to a summary of the proposal provided by Cantor’s office last week, the plan would give millions of businesses with fewer than 500 employees — one federal definition of a small business — the ability to essentially exclude 20 percent of their income from taxation. Democrats have criticized the plan by saying it would complicate the tax code and pointing out that it does not exempt professional sports teams and hedge fund executives who do not need a tax break.