Bill > S00161

This bill establishes a new tax credit for individuals in New York State who develop open source or free software license programs. Specifically, taxpayers can claim a credit of up to 20% of their out-of-pocket expenses for developing such programs, with a maximum credit of $200 per taxable year. To qualify, the software's code must be released under an open source license recognized by the Open Source Initiative or a free software license recognized by the Free Software Foundation. This credit is elective, meaning taxpayers must choose to apply it for a given tax year, and they cannot elect it for the same program in multiple years. If the credit exceeds the taxpayer's tax liability for the year, the unused portion can be carried over to future years. The bill takes effect immediately and applies to tax years beginning on or after January 1st of the year following its enactment.