AGRICULTURE/TAXES/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “Some agricultural companies are revamping operations to avoid being stung by the new U.S. tax law. Ethanol makers and family-owned grain companies are setting up new agricultural cooperatives to benefit from a provision in the law that gives farmers larger tax savings for selling crops to that kind of business. Executives say that if Congress doesn’t change the law or they can’t get their companies recognized as farmer-backed cooperatives, processing plants could run short of crops and small grain elevators could be driven out of business.
Green Plains Inc., the world’s second-largest ethanol producer by capacity, registered part of its business as a cooperative in January after studying the new tax law…
Lawmakers, including the provision’s authors, say they’re working to change it, but they haven’t reached a deal yet. Sen. Orrin Hatch, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, said Wednesday he was committed to ‘develop a solution to this issue that does not choose winners and losers and is fair to everyone involved.’…
A traditional cooperative helps farmers leverage their combined scale to sell crops and purchase supplies at better prices.”
-Jacob Bunge and Richard Rubin, “Tax Law Forces Revamps for Agriculture Firms,” The Wall Street Journal online, Feb. 15, 2018 08:28am