Note 4 - Income Taxes

3 Months Ended

Mar. 31, 2021

Notes to Financial Statements

Income Tax Disclosure [Text Block]

(4) INCOME TAXES

The effective tax rate for the three-month period ended March 31, 2021 increased to 20.5% expense compared to a 3.4% benefit for the same period in 2020 mainly due to decreased tax benefits of $2.8 million from the exercise and vesting of share-based compensation awards and higher state income taxes.  

In March 27, 2020, the U.S. federal government enacted the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (the “CARES Act”). The CARES Act is an emergency economic stimulus package in response to the coronavirus outbreak which, among other things, contains numerous income tax provisions. As a result of the CARES Act, we have deferred $1,323,000 of employer social security tax payments of which $661,000 will be paid in December 2021 and the remainder in December 2022. We have had no other impacts to our consolidated financial statements or related disclosures from the CARES Act.

In 2021, we adopted ASU 2019-12, Simplifying the Accounting for Income Taxes (Topic 740). Among other clarifications and simplifications related to income tax accounting, this ASU simplifies the accounting for income taxes by eliminating certain exceptions related to the approach for intraperiod tax allocation, the methodology for calculating income taxes in an interim period, hybrid taxes and the recognition of deferred tax liabilities for outside basis differences.  The adoption of this standard had no material impact to our consolidated financial statements.