Congress’s Tax Bill Keeps Subsidies for Private Activity Bonds

The final version of the tax bill struck by Congressional negotiators would continue to subsidize municipal bonds that help businesses to finance infrastructure projects such as airports and toll roads, dropping one provision that threatened to cut sales of tax-exempt debt by tens of billions of dollars starting next year.

The compromise legislation, hashed out by a committee of lawmakers from the Senate and House, would keep the tax preferred status for private activity bonds “that are used to finance valuable infrastructure projects,” according to highlights of the final measure obtained by Bloomberg News.

The document doesn’t say if the ...