Rural communities face a looming crisis if Congress allows certain provisions of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act to expire at the end of this year or soon after. These provisions are critical to ensuring that the positive economic impacts of that landmark legislation continue to be felt by rural families, businesses, and entrepreneurs.

The TCJA was one of the biggest, most popular, and most effective pieces of legislation passed during the first Trump administration. For rural families and small businesses, particularly family-owned farms, the tax cuts enacted by the TCJA provided much-needed relief by doubling the “death tax” exemption and tying it to annual inflation rates. This is just one of the many provisions set to expire at the end of the year if lawmakers don’t act. If that happens, it could force rural families to sell their farms or businesses and pay up to a 40% tax bill to boot.