MORE THAN A ‘MANUFACTURERS’ TAX BREAK
THE AMERICAN JOBS CREATION ACT OF 2004
By Mark E. Battersby

The American Jobs Creation Act of 2004, began as a bill to compensate exporters for the repeal of a controversial $5-billion annual tax break labeled as an “illegal trade subsidy’ by the World Trade Organization. Two years later, the law that emerged, the fifth major tax cut in four years, has ballooned into a $145-billion tax break for everyone. The centerpeice of that new tax law, a reduction in the tax rate from 35 percent to 32 percent, was designed to compensate ‘manufacturers’ for the tax breaks repealed by this new law. However, despite our lawmaker’s extremely broad definition of “manufacturers” it is unlikely to benefit many within the laundry industry. A final definition for qualifying ‘manufacturers,’ will come in the form of soon-to-be issued Internal Revenue Service guidelines.

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WHO’S KEEPING HOUSE?
By Eda Anne Galeno

The housekeeping and healthcare markets has grown over the last decade from pushing brooms, mopping floors and making beds to include various other activities including patient transportation, parking, valet, waste management and other environmental service duties. This accounts for an 11 percent increase in outsourced services in the environmental service field from 2002-2003.

This increase of duties has been the force behind many facilities outsourcing their environmental service and housekeeping departments. As a rule of thumb - but with exceptions – outsourced duties in nursing homes and senior living facilities are referred to as housekeeping and in healthcare the outsourced duties are under environmental services. But there is no exception in the fact that these “outside” companies are taking on more and new responsibilities to aid in the smooth operations of a facility by centralizing work demands and supplying facilities with qualified, trained management professionals.


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