Now, more than ever, is the time to be in touch with your Congressional Representatives on issues that will affect WFIA members and business owners. Current legislative issues on the table include the Employee Free Choice Act, Food Safety, Credit Card Interchange Fees, as well as continuing the fight to maintain a level playing field for independent grocers through an economic stimulus, fair employee-employer legislation, federal regulation of an enforcement of antitrust laws. Please stop by WFIA's Federal Government page often to check in on updates, notices and important calls to action.

FMI Shares 2012 National Legislative & Regulatory Outlook:  The Food Marketing Institute (FMI), one of our great national partners, provided WFIA members with their 2012 forecast for issues before Congress as well as emerging regulatory issues.  Let’s just hope the federal agencies don’t repeat 2011’s obsession with more regulation as it was hard to even keep up with the reading and writings of the new regs let alone the implementation by our members.  Thank you FMI.

New Meat Labeling regulations from the USDA:

http://www.fsis.usda.gov/PDF/Nutrition_labeling_Q&A_060911.pdf

Federal Updates on the sale of tobacco regulations.

Protecting Kids From Tobacco -- Support Materials & Websites:

We Card eLearning Center

http://www.fda.gov/TobaccoProducts/ProtectingKidsfromTobacco/RegsRestrictingSale/default.htm

Implementation of New Interchange Fee Reforms:

To help retailers begin adopting the legislation’s new reforms, FMI issued an industry guidance document on implementing the interchange provisions that are effective immediately; available here. FMI also provided an implementation timeline of what to expect as the Federal Reserve begins its assessment of debit card transaction fees and issuing regulations on establishing standards for reasonable and proportional debit card interchange fees; available here.

WASHINGTON – The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has issued the newly revised payroll tax form that most eligible employers can use to claim the special payroll tax exemption that applies to many new workers hired during 2010. Designed to encourage employers to hire and retain new workers, the payroll tax exemption and the related new hire retention credit were created by the Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment (HIRE) Act signed by President Obama on March 18.

Employers who hire unemployed workers after Feb. 3, 2010, and before Jan. 1, 2011 may qualify for a 6.2-percent payroll tax incentive, in effect exempting them from the employer’s share of Social Security tax on wages paid to these workers after March 18. This reduction will have no effect on the employee’s future Social Security benefits. The employee’s 6.2 percent share of Social Security tax and the employer and employee’s shares of Medicare tax still apply to all wages.

In addition, for each qualified employee retained for at least a year whose wages did not significantly decrease in the second half of the year, businesses may claim a new hire retention credit of up to $1,000 per worker on their income tax return. Further details on both the tax credit and the payroll tax exemption can be found in a recently expanded list of answers to frequently asked questions about the new law now.

How to Claim the Payroll Tax Exemption Form 941, Employer’s QUARTERLY Federal Tax Return, revised for use beginning with the second calendar quarter of 2010, will be filed by most employers claiming the payroll tax exemption for wages paid to qualified employees. The HIRE Act does not allow employers to claim the exemption for wages paid in the first quarter but provides for a credit in the second quarter.

Instructions for the new Form 941 explain how this credit for wages paid from March 19 through March 31 can be claimed on the second quarter return. The HIRE Act requires that employers get a signed statement from each eligible new hire, certifying under penalties of perjury, that he or she was not employed for more than 40 hours during the 60 days before beginning employment with that employer.

Employers can use new Form W-11, Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment (HIRE) Act Employee Affidavit, released last month, to meet this requirement. Though employers need this certification to claim both the payroll tax exemption and the new hire retention credit, they do not file these statements with the IRS. Instead, they must retain them along with other payroll and income tax records.

These two tax benefits are especially helpful to employers who are adding positions to their payrolls. New hires filling existing positions also qualify as long as they are replacing workers who left voluntarily or who were terminated for cause and otherwise are qualified employees.

LIFO Repeal Negatively Impacts Independent Grocers; Repeal Could be Target of Tax Writing Committees in Coming Months
President Obama's budget has called for repeal of LIFO, but budget resolutions passed by the House and Senate don't include a line item calling for LIFO repeal. As the tax writing committees begin to consider reconciliation legislation to implement the budget in the coming months, repeal of the Last In, First Out accounting method may be on the table. WFI, the National Grocers Association (NGA) and our members that use LIFO are strongly opposed to repeal.  NGA is a steering committee member of the LIFO Coalition and has been actively working to block repeal of LIFO. N.G.A.'s Government Affairs team has already held and will continue to hold meetings with the staff of key Members of Congress over the coming weeks.

WFI and N.G.A. member companies using the LIFO accounting method are asked to take a moment to contact their Members of Congress and Senators to explain in real terms how repeal of LIFO would affect your company, including your ability to invest in capital projects and grow your business. Become part of the effort to educate Members of Congress, particularly those Members who sit on the House Ways and Means Committee (Congressmen McDermott and Reichert) and the Senate Finance Committee  (Senator Cantwell).

DISTRICT FINDER LINK

TOBACCO FLOOR TAX FORM 03-26-09