Pest Management Family Businesses Get Down to Work as New Year Offers Optimism, Skepticism, and Hope for a Strong 2025

By Pat Soldano, President of Family Enterprise USA, and the Policy Taxation Group. 

The New Year is shaping up to be one of getting down to business fast and alleviating worry, especially when it comes to tax and economic policies for family businesses in the pest management industry. 

Recently, I spoke with several of the staff members and leaders of the House Ways and Means Committee “Tax Teams.” I asked them what their first one hundred days looked like, specifically when it comes to tax legislation, an issue on every pest management family business leader’s mind.

I spoke with senior staff members (the people who do the nitty-gritty tax-writing work) for Rep. Vern Buchanan (R-Fl), Chair of the “American Manufacturing” Tax Team, Rep. Darin LaHood (R-IL), Chair of the “American Workforce” Tax Team, Rep. Mike Kelly (R-PA), Chair of the “Community Development” Tax Team, Rep. Adrian Smith (R-Neb), Chair of “Rural America” Tax Team, and Rep. Lloyd Smucker (R-PA), Chair of the “Main Street” Tax Team, among others. 

Their messages, and priorities, were clear: “We need a tax code to help family businesses operate with certainty and permanency.”

This was good to hear, considering the specific issues that came up focused on items like lower personal taxes, the extension of the 199A, and restoring R&D expensing. All are on board, it seems now, with keeping these provisions. More importantly, they want to make them permanent. 

Stability in the tax code is the most important factor they are weighing, but they also understand keenly that by extending much of the Tax Cut and Jobs Act (TCJA) the country runs the risk of increasing the national debt by over $4 trillion.

This is an unenviable balancing act we will be watching closely, to see how it will affect the pest management industry.

One key issue is education, that is, educating new and old Congress members on the importance of family businesses to the U.S. economy. This is what we do at Family Enterprise USA. 

Another big challenge is that only a small number of the new Congress members were in office in 2017, when the TCJA was passed. 

We need to educate these new members fast, not only on the helpful provisions in TCJA, but on the size and scope of family businesses in general.

If you don’t know, according to research, America’s multi-generational family-owned businesses contribute $7.7 trillion annually to the U.S. gross domestic product. Family businesses are the largest private employers in the country, accounting for 83.3 million jobs, or 59 percent of the country’s private workforce, the research shows.

In our first 100 days, this is the message we will get out, especially during the year’s first Congressional Family Business Caucus meeting to be held March 11, on Capitol Hill.

Getting The Word Out

At Family Enterprise USA, we’ve seen a year of significant gains in getting our messages out on Capitol Hill and letting our policy makers know about the importance of the economic engine that are family businesses in America, especially those in the pest management industry.

The movement of economic and tax policies is often maddeningly slow and challenging in Washington, D.C. Educating our legislators on the importance of family businesses is a multi-year process spread across multiple administrations and political parties. 

It takes time, and a lot of work.

Despite these barriers, we’ve seen significant progress and media attention to such important subjects as the continuation of favorable provisions in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, restoring R&D expensing and bonus depreciation, and adding new members to the Congressional Family Business Caucus.

Our goals in 2024, as in previous years, were to educate our lawmakers on Capitol Hill on the many harmful proposals under consideration by Congress, by the old and new Administrations, and by our regulatory agencies. 

Actions Speak Volumes

Our actions this year and next year will continue to hammer away on these issues. If we don’t, no one else will. We are your voice on Capitol Hill.

Here are just a few of the key issues we worked on this year and will continue to work on in 2025.

• Educate existing and new legislators on Capitol Hill on the size and power of America’s largest private employer, Family Business
• Use the Congressional Family Business Caucus as a platform for education, dialogue, and one-to-one meetings with key policy writers
• Get the message out encouraging Congress to extend, retain, and improve key portions of the Tax Cut and Jobs Act (TCJA)
• Promote the Restoration of the R&D Expensing, Bonus Depreciation, and Other Pro-Business Tax Policies
• Secure an Estate Tax Rate reduction and/or prevent a reduction in the Lifetime Exemption
• Avoid the Elimination of Step-Up in Basis
• Stop any movement to Eliminating Valuation Discounts or limitations on Valuation Rules for Estate Tax Purposes
• Curtail and lessen taxes on Passthrough Business Profits (199A)
• Prevent an increase in the Top Income Tax Rate
• Avoid an increase in the Top Capital Gains Tax Rate
• Implementation of a Surtax on Income, Mark-to-Market Regime, and/or Other Taxes on Successful Individuals and Wealth
• Stop Elimination or Limitations on Grantor Trusts and/or GRATS
• Prevent Limitations on Retirement Accounts and/or Elimination of Holding Private Stock in IRA’s
• Avoid elimination of Like-Kind Exchanges
• Work with Congress to introduce and add co-sponsors for the Estate Tax Rate Reduction Act
• Support the work of the Family Business Estate Tax Coalition and the estate tax repeal bill
• Grow the Congressional Family Business Caucus and continue to work with Congress to hold 3 meetings a year.

We look forward to reporting back to you on our progress throughout 2025. It should be an interesting year for family businesses in the pest management industry and for all family businesses in America.  

NPMA has partnered with Family Enterprise USA, and the Policy Taxation Group, non-partisan organizations advocating for family enterprises of all sizes to provide information for family-owned businesses. Both groups are organizers of the Congressional Family Business Caucus and of the Family Enterprise USA Annual Family Business Survey.