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FAQ: The One Big Beautiful Bill, Explained

24 min readBy: Garrett Watson

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On July 4, 2025, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA) was signed into law by President Trump, capping off the final step of the budget reconciliation process for the 2025 fiscal year.

While the taxA tax is a mandatory payment or charge collected by local, state, and national governments from individuals or businesses to cover the costs of general government services, goods, and activities. law is expected to grow the US economy by making pro-growth policies like 100 percent bonus depreciationDepreciation is a measurement of the “useful life” of a business asset, such as machinery or a factory, to determine the multiyear period over which the cost of that asset can be deducted from taxable income. Instead of allowing businesses to deduct the cost of investments immediately (i.e., full expensing), depreciation requires deductions to be taken over time, reducing their value and disco and research and development (R&D) expensing permanent, it misses an opportunity to address the growing deficit and focuses too heavily on political carveouts like the “no tax on” exemptions that further complicate the tax code.

We estimate the tax law will increase long-run GDP by 1.2 percent and increase the deficit by $3 trillion over the next decade when factoring in spending cuts and economic growth.

As America’s leading nonpartisan educational tax policy nonprofit, the Tax Foundation continues to educate lawmakers, journalists, and taxpayers on how this recent tax legislation may affect them and how policymakers can better improve the tax code. Below is a quick FAQ tax guide for the OBBBA.

Disclaimer: The information in this FAQ may not apply to your specific tax situation. Please direct any tax preparation and filing questions to a professional tax preparer or the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). The Tax Foundation cannot answer specific questions about your tax situation or assist in the tax filing process.

The Basics

For Individuals

For Businesses

Impact

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