La. Exempts Virus Relief From Personal, Corp. Income Tax

Louisiana will exempt federal and state aid granted as a response to the coronavirus pandemic from individual and corporate income tax under a bill signed by the governor.

S.B. 11, which Democratic Gov. John Bel Edwards signed Friday, will apply the exemption to any coronavirus-related grants, loans, rebates, tax credits, advance refunds or qualified disaster relief benefits granted to corporations directly or indirectly on a state or federal level if those benefits were included in a taxpayer's federal annual gross income.

The bill will also exempt individual state and local virus relief benefits from individual income tax if the benefits were included in the taxpayer's federal gross income.

The bill was introduced April 12 by Sen. Kirk Talbot, R-River Ridge, and will take retroactive effect to apply to past virus benefits.

--Editing by Vincent Sherry. 

For a reprint of this article, please contact reprints@law360.com.