Jobs & Economy

Business Incentives and Tax Relief

Along with tax relief for families, Senator Rockefeller has worked to provide small business owners with tax breaks that will allow them to grow their company, invest in new equipment, hire more workers, and invest in better benefits.

As part of the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007, Rockefeller fought for a small business incentives package that included tax credits and tax breaks for business capital investments. In the 2008 Economic Stimulus plan, Senator Rockefeller fought to include enhanced expensing and depreciation tax breaks to encourage West Virginia's small businesses to purchase new equipment.

Senator Rockefeller has also fought for expanded research and development tax credits for emerging new industries, such as coal-to-liquids, that will be crucial to West Virginia's continued economic growth. Senator Rockefeller has long-believed that clean coal must be part of the solution to our future energy needs which is why is he fighting to get the existing alternative fuel research tax credit to apply to the development of coal-to-liquids technology. To help spur research into clean coal technologies, Senator Rockefeller joined with a bipartisan group of coal state senators to advocate for new or expanded tax credits to encourage private corporations to invest in carbon capture and sequestration research. In addition he is working with fellow coal state senators to create a new ten-year tax credit for the depreciation of pipelines that will carry CO2 underground for sequestration.

And, Senator Rockefeller is the author of the New Markets Tax Credit, which is aimed at attracting private-sector capital investment into the nation's urban and rural low-income areas. The tax credits are used to help finance community development projects, stimulate economic growth, and create jobs. Communities throughout West Virginia have experienced the success of the New Markets Tax Credit, and Rockefeller is working to expand it until 2013.