Taxes

Trump’s Stimulus End Run Fizzles as Firms Spurn Payroll Tax Halt

  • Major companies haven’t deferred payroll tax collection
  • Federal government is standout in moving on implementation
Photographer: David Paul Morris/Bloomberg
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A month after President Donald Trump moved to shore up workers’ incomes by giving employers the option of deferring payroll taxes, the effort has failed to energize a U.S. economy still reeling from the coronavirus pandemic.

No major private employer has stepped forward with plans to forgo withholding the levy from workers’ paychecks -- as Trump’s action allowed from Sept. 1 through year-end. Costco Wholesale Corp., with 163,000 U.S. employees at latest count, isn’t participating, and neither is United Parcel Service Inc. nor FedEx Corp.