States and local jurisdictions continue to grapple with novel tax issues in response to the COVID-19 outbreak. On Friday, March 27, 2020, President Trump signed into law the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (“CARES Act”), a $2 trillion federal stimulus package to provide fiscal relief in response to the COVID-19 outbreak. The CARES Act includes numerous tax relief provisions. States will need to consider whether, and how, they will conform to the federal provisions.
Following several failed attempts by Oregon voters and the Oregon legislature to pass a gross receipts tax (see Not Dead Yet: Oregon Voters Propose Another Gross Receipts Tax in the Wake of Market-Based Sourcing and Oregon Proposes “Gross” New Tax), Governor Kate Brown signed Enrolled House Bill 3427, Oregon’s corporate activity tax (CAT), into law on May 16, 2019.
The Illinois Department of Revenue has big plans this holiday season to bring different types of unitary businesses that use different apportionment formulas together under a single, combined Illinois corporate income tax return. Like many states, Illinois corporate income taxpayers are generally required to file a unitary combined corporate income tax return. This combined reporting method aggregates in one tax return the income, deductions and apportionment factors generated by commonly owned corporations operating as a unitary group.
On September 27, 2018, the New Jersey Senate and General Assembly passed legislation amending certain provisions of the New Jersey Corporation Business Tax (“CBT”) reform bill that was enacted earlier this year (“Technical Amendments”). In July, Governor Phil Murphy and the New Jersey Legislature enacted a $37.4 billion budget package (the “Budget Bill”) that implements sweeping changes to the CBT. Among these changes are mandatory unitary combined reporting, market-based sourcing, and a new four-year surtax on corporations with over $1 million of allocated taxable net income. The Technical Amendments, which are awaiting Governor Murphy’s signature, make several changes to the Budget Bill. A summary of the most noteworthy provisions contained in the Budget Bill and Technical Amendments is below.