If you’ve been holding off on buying capital equipment for your business, you may want to think about moving ahead now. The U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday passed a bill including a provision that will allow small businesses to immediately deduct from taxes the entire cost of capital equipment up to $500,000.

That means if you want to buy a new truck, excavator, skid-steer, or other equipment, you can deduct the full amount of the purchase from your 2010 taxes instead if having to take depreciation and spread the deduction over a number of years.

The Senate passed the same bill last week, and President Obama is expected to sign it into law on Monday. The $42 billion measure aims to create some 500,000 jobs and to make credit more available to small businesses.

The Small Business Jobs Act authorizes the Treasury Department to set up a $30 billion fund to deliver very-low-cost capital to banks with less than $10 billion in assets. The aim is to help community banks lend money to owners of Main Street businesses. The bill also includes about $12 billion in small-business tax breaks to encourage owners to buy equipment and motivate people to start businesses.

Of the most interest to contractors in the onsite installation business is the increase in so-called Section 179. This section of the tax code lets you write off capital expenditures immediately and quickly put cash in your pocket. Businesses had been allowed to write off up to $250,000 of equipment through 2009. The new bill extends the benefit through 2011 and raises the maximum to $500,000.

Watch for a more detailed explanation of these benefits in the November issue of Onsite Installer. To find out for sure how this new bill will affect your equipment purchases, consult your accountant or financial advisor.