The Section 179 of the IRS tax code allows businesses to deduct the full purchase price of qualifying equipment purchased or financed during the tax year. That means that if you buy (or lease) a piece of qualifying equipment, you can deduct the FULL PURCHASE PRICE from your gross income. It's an incentive created by the U.S. Government to encourage businesses to buy equipment and invest in themselves.

Essentially, Section 179 works like this:

When your business buys certain pieces of equipment, it typically gets to write them off a little at a time through depreciation. In other words, if your company spends $50,000 on machinery, it gets to write off (say) $10,000 a year for five years (these numbers are only meant to give you an example.)

Now, while it's true that this is better than no write off at all, most business owners would really prefer to write off the entire equipment purchase price for the year they buy it.

In fact, if a business could write off the entire amount, they might add more equipment this year instead of waiting. That's the whole purpose behind Section 179

Limits of Section 179
Section 179 does come with limits - there are caps to the total amount written off ($250,000 in 2010), and limits to the total amount of the equipment purchased ($800,000 in 2010.) The deduction begins to phase out dollar for dollar after $800k, so this makes it a true small and medium-sized business deduction.

Note> Back in 2009, businesses that exceeded the $250k deduction limit could take a bonus depreciation of 50% on the amount that exceeded the limit. And then also take normal depreciation on the rest. Nice. ("Bonus Depreciation" didn't make it into the 'HIRE Act of 2010' but there's still hope that it will be retroactively extended in 2010 - check back here often to stay posted on the latest legislative developments.)

Who Qualifies for Section 179?
All businesses that purchase or finance less than $800,000 in business equipment should qualify for the Section 179 Deduction. In addition, most tangible goods qualify for the Section 179 Deduction. Also, to qualify for the Section 179 Deduction, the equipment purchased must be placed into service between January 1, 2010 and December 31, 2010.

The deduction begins to phase out if more than $800,000 of equipment is purchased - in fact, the deduction decreases on a dollar for dollar scale after that, making Section 179 a deduction specifically for small and medium-sized businesses.

Consult your tax adviser or accountant to determine if you qualify for these deductions and allowances. AEL assumes no responsibility with respect to assessing or advising the reader as to tax, legal, or other consequences.

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