Tax-cut legislation includes $55 billion in benefits for a host of industries

By Dan Eggen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, December 16, 2010

A host of industries, from Caribbean distilleries to Hollywood producers, would gain billions in tax breaks and other subsidies under compromise tax-cut legislation now moving its way through Congress.

The $858 billion package approved by the Senate today is focused primarily on continuing the Bush administration tax cuts for two years, extending unemployment benefits and other large-scale expenditures. But buried inside the legislation are more than $55 billion in other giveaways and tax reductions for some of Washington's most influential industry groups.

The energy and agricultural industries, for example, would continue to receive a generous ethanol tax credit at a cost to taxpayers of about $6 billion in 2011. The 45-cents-per-gallon credit goes to fuel blenders - including large oil and gas companies such as Shell - who count it against income tax owed to the United States.

U.S. technology companies such as Microsoft would continue to benefit from a tax credit for research and development carried out in the United States, costing taxpayers about $6 billion. Rum-makers in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands would get another two-year extension of excise tax credits for their products ($235 million), while movie and television producers would enjoy special deduction rules for U.S.-based projects ($162 million).

(More here.)

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