Planning Opportunities for New 3.8-Percent Medicare Tax Using S Corporations
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act implemented Code Sec. 1411, which imposes a new 3.8-percent Medicare tax on unearned income of higher-income individuals. The tax will take effect January 1, 2013, and applies to the net investment income of individuals, estates, and trusts that exceeds specified thresholds. Although the tax does not apply to corporations, it will apply to dividends and other passive income derived from corporations.
Because the tax on net investment income applies to individuals, it may apply to amounts received by individuals from passthrough entities, such as partnerships, limited liability companies, and S corporations. Under general principles, items of income that flow through a partnership, S corporation, or limited liability company (LLC) to partners, shareholders, or members retain their character. Thus, for example, interest income earned by a partnership is still characterized as interest when it passes through to a partner.
Net Investment Income
The tax, known as the Medicare contribution tax, equals 3.8 percent of the lesser of (1) an individual’s net investment income or (2) the excess of the individual’s modified adjusted gross income (AGI) over the threshold amount. The thresholds are $250,000 for married taxpayers filing a joint return; $125,000 for married taxpayers filing a separate return; and $200,000 for all other taxpayers.
Trusts and estates are subject to a much lower threshold. They should strive to distribute their income to their individual beneficiaries to minimize the tax.
The tax does not apply to non-resident aliens, charitable trusts, or corporations.
Net investment income includes gross income from interest, dividends, royalties, and rents, as well as net gain from the disposition of property, unless such income is derived from a passive activity. The tax also applies to other gross income from a trade or business that is a passive activity. Thus, the application of the tax depends on the character of the amounts and the treatment of amounts received from these entities.
Passive Activities
The tax applies to passive income, which is income from a trade or business that is a passive activity under Code Sec. 469. An activity is passive if it involves the conduct of a trade or business in which the taxpayer does not materially participate. Very generally, material participation exists if the taxpayer is involved in the operations of the activity on a regular, continuous, and substantial basis. Accordingly, if the individual materially participates in the entity’s business, the tax on net investment income does not apply to income from the entity. If the individual does not materially participate, the income is characterized as passive and may be subject to the tax under Code Sec. 1411(c)(2).
A sole proprietor by definition manages his or her business. Thus, the sole proprietor materially participates in his or her business and would not have to pay the 3.8-percent tax on income of the proprietorship.
Income from a partnership, S corporation, or LLC is often characterized as passive income if the individual does not materially participate in the business of the entity. In the past, passive income was seen as beneficial, because it could be used to offset passive losses. Thus, in the past, taxpayers have desired passive income and may even have planned for it. Now, because of the net investment income tax, certain taxpayers may prefer not to have income characterized as passive.
Social Security Taxes
Employees generally are subject to Social Security (FICA or SECA) taxes on their wage income, amounting to 7.65 percent contributed by the employee and the employer. This also applies to wages paid to partners. Self-employed individuals pay a similar tax (15.3 percent, which includes both the employee’s and the employer’s shares) on their business income. This income is characterized as net earnings from self employment.
The current payroll tax holiday has reduced an employee’s employment tax share to 5.65 percent (13.3 percent for self-employed). Absent further legislation, the rates will revert to their previous levels in 2013.
Net earnings from self-employment are specifically excluded from being characterized as net investment income (Code Sec. 1411(c)(6)). This eliminates the possibility of an individual being subject to Medicare taxes on both earnings and unearned income.
Partnership Income
Earnings or business income derived from a partnership, which flows through the entity to the general partners, is characterized as net earnings from self-employment. Therefore, it is subject to self-employment tax, and is not subject to the 3.8-percent tax on net investment income.
Income that flows through to the limited partners is not treated as net earnings from self-employment. It will be subject to the 3.8-percent net investment income tax, but not the Social Security tax.
If the same individual is both a general partner and a limited partner, the characterization of the income is not so clear and likely will be subject to greater examination by the IRS.
S Corporation Income
Unlike a partnership, an S corporation’s income that passes through to its owners (its shareholders) is not per se characterized as net earnings from self-employment, because dividends on shares of stock issued by the S corporation are excluded from this characterization. Similarly, normal distributions actually made by an S corporation to its shareholders are not treated as net earnings from self-employment. However, this contrasts with distributions that are payments of wages to shareholder-employees, which are subject to Social Security taxes.
Thus, shareholder-employees can avoid Social Security taxes by withdrawing funds from the S corporation as a distribution, rather than as wages. However, if the employee takes no salary or an unreasonably low salary, the courts generally have supported the IRS in recharacterizing at least a portion of the distributions as wages subject to Social Security taxes.
Income that passes through to S corporation shareholders, as well as distributions, will be subject to the 3.8-percent Medicare tax unless the shareholder materially participates in the business (i.e., the S corporation’s business is not a passive activity with respect to the shareholder). In the latter case, however, the income may successfully avoid both Social Security taxes and Medicare taxes. Furthermore, gain on the sale or redemption of the S corporation interest likewise should not be net investment income under this interpretation if the shareholder materially participates in the business.
Planning Strategies
With these consequences in mind, taxpayers may now be more inclined to establish an S corporation to run their business as long as they are materially involved in the operation of the business and pay reasonable salaries to shareholder-employees. This can be accomplished with a variety of structures.
The basic structure is to operate the business through an S corporation or through an LLC that elects to be taxed as an S corporation. The shareholder-owners must be materially involved in the business. Wages paid to shareholder-employees will be subject to Social Security taxes, but distributions, passthrough income, and net gains from the sale or redemption of the shareholder’s interest in the S corporation will not be subject to the net investment income tax.
If a shareholder does not materially participate in the business operations, the net investment income tax will apply to income items paid or distributed to the shareholder (other than wages).
Variations of this basic structure can be used, and the tax consequences should be the same. S corporations can only have one class of stock. An LLC with one class of interests and no preferred income allocations or distributions may elect S corporation treatment for tax purposes and secure this same treatment. Another variation can be used if there are varying interests. An S corporation owned by the business’s operators can become a member of an LLC with other investors who are not eligible to hold S corporation stock (e.g. foreign investors) becoming members of the LLC.
Another possible structure uses a corporation as the manager of an LLC. The corporate manager in this case would have the authority to bind the LLC. A member investing in the LLC as a limited partner would not be subject to self-employment taxes. If involved in the business, the limited partner would not be subject to the net investment income tax. It may not be so clear, however, how to treat an LLC member who is involved in the business for self-employment tax purposes. Finally, a limited partnership with an S corporation as the sole general partner could also obtain these benefits. Income would pass through and the limited partners would qualify for the limited partner exception to self-employment taxes.
The IRS has argued that LLCs should be treated as limited partnerships, but the courts generally have not accepted this analysis.
Under current law, it appears that investors may be able to use the S corporation structure to avoid most Social Security self-employment taxes and the net investment income tax. However, the IRS has yet to issue regulations on the 3.8-percent net investment income tax, and it remains to be seen whether potential IRS guidance on material participation in a business, or other interrelationships between the self-employment tax and net investment income tax provisions under the Code, will affect the use of these structures.
