Chuck Grassley: “we have had a victory--at least a temporary victory, but a good victory--with the IRS. Fifty-seven of us introduced a…”

“we have had a victory--at least a temporary victory, but a good victory--with the IRS. Fifty-seven of us introduced a bipartisan bill, Senator Dorgan leading for the Democrats, myself for Republicans. The bill was introduced to do for farmers what has been the law since 1981, that if deferred sales contracts were used, farmers were still taxed on the year that the money was received. The IRS made a ruling that for alternative minimum tax purposes that income would be taxed the year that the sale was made, not the year that the money was received. Well, obviously this, if it were to go forward, would create a tremendous hardship in the agricultural community because farmers would be taxed on two crops in 1 year, rather than the planning that normally goes on in cash accounting farming. Common sense and reasonableness have prevailed at the IRS. Last night at about 6:30 I received a telephone call from the IRS stating their decision to delay for 1 year the enactment of their latest rule so that farmers now will be able to do during the current tax filing system what they have been doing for the last 15 years, to just keep on accounting for their income for tax purposes the way that it has legally been done.”