Firms' paid leave eligible for tax credits
WASHINGTON -- Employers who offer paid family and medical leave to their workers earning up to $72,000 a year can receive tax credits under the new tax law, the government has affirmed.
The Treasury Department issued guidelines Monday for the tax credit, which is available to employers for leave paid this year and next. The credit was part of the $1.5 trillion package of individual and corporate tax cuts that Republicans in Congress enacted and President Donald Trump signed into law in December. It expires in 2020.
The idea behind the credit was to encourage companies to offer paid time to their employees for family responsibilities, relieving some financial pressure. Under the guidelines, employers can get a tax credit equivalent to a percentage of the wages normally paid to employees during any period -- up to 12 weeks -- that they are on family or medical leave.
Employers are allowed to take the credit for paid leave to workers who earned $72,000 or less in the previous year, 2017 or 2018. To qualify, an employer must have a written policy covering all workers employed for a year or more. The policy must provide at least two weeks of annual paid family and medical leave for each full-time qualified employee, and at least a proportionate amount of leave for part-time qualified employees.
It also must pay at least 50 percent of the employee's wages during the leave.
Paid leave can be provided for the birth or adoption of a child; caring for a spouse, child or parent with a serious health condition; a serious health condition that makes the employee unable to work, or a family emergency arising from a spouse, child or parent who is a military service member being on active duty.
-- The Associated Press
CARTI operating income put at $529,000
CARTI, formerly known as Central Arkansas Radiation Therapy Institute, earned $529,000 in operating income before depreciation in its fiscal year that ended June 30, an improvement over an operating loss before depreciation of $5.8 million in fiscal 2017, the cancer treatment center said Monday.
Within 12 months, CARTI has made "a dramatic turnaround" from fiscal 2017 to fiscal 2018, Adam Head, chief executive officer at CARTI, said in a statement.
"This variance shows more than a $5.2 million shift within 12 months of operations at CARTI," Head said. "CARTI is not only on solid footing, we are aggressively growing as we bring [together] the most sophisticated technology and incredible team in an epic fight against cancer."
Fitch Ratings of Austin, Texas, rates at BB+ CARTI's $48.3 million in 2013 Pulaski County Facilities Board health facilities revenue bonds, which is considered to be junk-bond status.
Fitch, an international bond rating service, has revised its ratings outlook for CARTI from negative to stable.
CARTI has cancer treatment centers in more than 10 Arkansas cities.
-- David Smith
Starbucks readies corporate shake-up
Starbucks is planning an organizational shake-up, including corporate layoffs that will start at top levels, as the coffee chain tries to reverse stagnant sales and rekindle investors' interest.
"We must increase the velocity of innovation that is relevant to our customers, inspires our partners, and is meaningful to our business," Chief Executive Officer Kevin Johnson said in a memo to employees viewed by Bloomberg News.
The leadership and organizational changes will begin this week and carry on into November, Johnson said. He sent the email after the company held its quarterly town-hall-style meeting in Seattle last week. Starbucks employed about 10,000 in U.S. support facilities, store development, and roasting, manufacturing, warehousing and distribution operations as of Oct. 1, 2017. A spokesman said the changes will entail an undetermined number of layoffs and include some employee shifts between company departments.
-- Bloomberg News
Mistrial declared in talc cancer case
Johnson & Johnson's latest trial over claims that its baby powder causes cancer ended in a stalemate when jurors couldn't agree on a verdict.
A state judge in Pasadena, Calif., declared a mistrial Monday after jurors deadlocked on Carolyn Weirick's request for at least $25 million in damages over her mesothelioma, a cancer linked to asbestos exposure. Weirick said she developed the disease from asbestos-laced talc baby powder.
In the last case to go to trial, a jury in Missouri awarded $4.69 billion in July to more than 20 women who blamed baby powder for their cancers. Johnson & Johnson is appealing.
"After five or six days of deliberations following weeks of hearing evidence, the jury still found that the plaintiffs couldn't carry their burden of proof on the very fundamental question of whether Johnson & Johnson had acted negligently, which I think fits with the fact that people have been using Johnson & Johnson baby powder for over a century with no problem," Christopher Vejnoska, one of the company's lawyers, said Monday.
A lawyer for the plaintiff declined to comment on the mistrial. The world's largest health care products maker faces more than 10,000 other suits claiming its baby powder caused cancer.
-- Bloomberg News
Analysts weigh in on Fed's rate plans
WASHINGTON -- The Federal Reserve is set this week to raise interest rates for a third time this year to prevent the economy from growing too fast.
But with President Donald Trump's trade fights posing a risk to the U.S. economy, the Fed may soon be ready to slow its increases, analysts say.
Many analysts expect the economy to weaken next year, in part from the effects of the conflicts Trump has pursued with China, Canada, Europe and other trading partners. The tariffs and countertariffs that have been imposed on imports and exports is having the effect of raising prices for key goods and supplies and potentially slowing growth.
Still, some analysts hold to a more optimistic scenario: That momentum already built up from the government's economic stimulus will keep strengthening the job market and lowering unemployment -- at 3.9 percent, already near a 50-year low.
Any light the Fed might shed on those questions could come in the statement it will make after its latest policy meeting ends Wednesday, in updated economic and rate forecasts it will issue or in a news conference that Chairman Jerome Powell will hold afterward.
-- The Associated Press
Business on 09/25/2018