The following message is from SEMA President and CEO Mike Spagnola
Dear SEMA Member:
Nominations for the SEMA Board of Directors are
due on Wednesday, January 4, 2023.
A strong SEMA Board means wise leadership and an association that serves its members well. As a member of the Association, we are currently seeking your recommendation of industry leaders to serve on the SEMA Board of Directors.
The following seats are open for this year’s election:
Chairman-elect (one open seat)
Distributor/Retailer (one open seat)
Please take a moment and tell us whom you would recommend as a potential nominee for a board member position by completing and submitting a nomination form. To help the vetting process, please include brief information about the nominee’s qualifications, such as background, experience and achievements that would make that nominee an outstanding board candidate.
We urge you to take part in the nominations process—our industry has many individuals who would be an asset to the Board, but we need you to help bring them to the attention of the Nominating Committee.
Thank you for your attention to this important request.
Are you hunting for a new job? The SEMA Career Center has a comprehensive listing of automotive-related job openings around the country. Here are some of the latest jobs posted to the website.
AMS Performance is hiring a mechanical engineer to design new products for current and future vehicle platforms. This position is responsible for creating a well-scoped product charter and, once approved, create CAD parts, assemblies and drawings. Utilizing in-house rapid prototyping and computational simulation resources, you will validate that fit, form and function are aligned with the project intent. With the design work largely complete, you will work with vendors to produce sample and production components. Engineering support continues after the product is released via design revisions, vendor resourcing, and cost-save initiatives. The ideal candidate must be self-driven, hardworking and have a good understanding of mechanical systems. They must also have the ability to work efficiently and effectively to ensure all details are accounted for during the development process.
Wheel-1 is hiring an aftermarket wheel and tire salesperson with a proven history of “hunting” for new customers. Candidates must thrive in a fast-paced environment and communicate positively with customers and the sales team. Candidates must have experience in the automotive aftermarket wheel industry and be willing to travel. Bilingual (Spanish/English) is preferred.
Hellwig is hiring a director of operations to oversee management of all operations to produce products in the most cost-effective manner within quality standards. Responsibilities include overseeing maximum efficiency in design and production, ensuring inventory and deliverables operate at levels that meet customers’ needs and established financial benchmarks, formulating and recommending policies and programs that guide the company in maintaining and improving its competitive position and the profitability of the operation, and directing activities so that approved deliverables are completed on schedule and within quality standards and cost objectives. Candidates must have a bachelor’s degree in business administration or a related major or equivalent combination of education and experience; an extensive and diversified background with at least five years of industry experience; and knowledge of the industry, human resources laws and regulations and employee relations skills.
The young man on the floor, Speed Graphic camera in hand, is Robert E. Petersen, circa 1946–1947. Barely in his 20s, Petersen had returned to Los Angeles after serving in the Army Air Corps during World War II. He wanted to get his job back at MGM Studios, where he had worked in the publicity department. But with so many veterans looking to do the same, MGM couldn’t employ them all, and Petersen was caught up in a round of layoffs. He and another vet in the same situation, Robert Lindsay, decided to form their own PR agency, the Hollywood Publicity Associates. Among their first clients was the Southern California Timing Association.
Formed in 1937 to organize speed trials on Southern California’s dry lakes, the SCTA was facing a crisis: While their members were earnest young men and women in the quest for speed in organized competition, the media at the time were painting a lurid picture of the “Hot Rod Menace:” wheeled delinquents in souped-up jalopies wreaking havoc on public roads. In these newspaper accounts, hot rodders and hoodlums were synonymous terms. The SCTA needed a way to shift public opinion to something far more positive.
Association members came up with an idea to display their race cars in a show as a way to demonstrate that their motivations were far from the outlaw crowd the papers wrote about. They asked the HPA to promote the show, which would take place at the National Guard Armory in Los Angeles in January 1948.
Among the HPA’s tasks was the production of a show program, and Petersen took on the job of selling ads for the program. He called on the parts manufacturers and speed shops that made up the young speed-equipment industry, from Vic Edelbrock, Phil Weiand and Barney Navarro to Blair’s Auto Parts, Bell Auto Parts and SO-CAL Speed Shop. While getting to know those performance pioneers, Petersen saw an opportunity to promote this growing movement with a magazine. He knew cars—he had spent a lot of his youth helping his father, a mechanic for the Department of Water and Power—and he knew photography, thanks to Uncle Sam and his aerial reconnaissance photo training. His HPA partner Lindsay provided the publishing connections, as his father was the founder of the Tailwaggers dog club and produced the club’s magazine.
Petersen and Lindsay considered several titles for their publication, but decided to call it Hot Rod, despite the term’s negative meaning at the time. There was no use dancing around the topic, they felt. The magazine was about hot rods and hot rodding, so the title should be direct and to the point.
The first issue was published in January 1948. In their Editor’s Column, Petersen and Lindsay wrote that “Hot Rod is designed to inform and entertain those interested in automobiles whose engines and bodies have been rebuilt for better performance and appearance.” Those words have remained the guiding principle for Hot Rod editors, writers and photographers for 75 years.
The Internal Revenue Service has set the standard business-mileage deduction at 65.5 cents per mile for 2023, up 3 cents from the previous midyear increase, which set the rate for the second half of 2022. The mileage calculation includes the cost of fuel, along with other vehicle fixed and variable operating expenses, such as depreciation, insurance, tires etc. These rates apply to electric and hybrid-electric automobiles, as well as gasoline and diesel-powered vehicles.
Companies and individuals who use their automobiles (including vans, pickups, and panel trucks) for business have the option of using the standard rate in lieu of keeping records of their actual expenses.
For more information, contact Eric Snyder at erics@sema.org.
SEMA-supported bipartisan retirement plan legislation was enacted into law as part of the FY 2023 omnibus spending package. Referred to as the SECURE Act 2.0, the provisions expand the SECURE Act 1.0 reforms enacted in 2019. The revisions include:
Automatic Enrollment: starting in 2025, any 401(k) or 403(b) plans established after December 29, 2022 will be required to automatically enroll workers at between 3% and 10% of pay, unless the employee chooses to opt-out. The savings rate will then increase by 1 percentage point a year until it hits 10% to 15%. The intent of the provision is to expand retirement plan participation.
Catch-Up Contributions: Catch-up limits for workers contributing to their 401(k) accounts who are 50 years and older will rise in 2023 to an extra $7,500 a year. The limit will rise to at least $10,000 a year for people 60 to 63 starting in 2025. The catch-up limits are also subject to inflation adjustments.
Tax Credits for Small Employers: Starting in 2023, employers with 50 or fewer employees, can qualify for a start-up tax credit of 100%, which was previously 50%.
Required Withdrawal: the age at which people must start withdrawing money from a retirement account has been raised from 72 to 73 starting on January 1, 2023, and to 75 starting on Jan. 1, 2033.
For more information, contact Eric Snyder at erics@sema.org.
When the 2017 tax law was enacted, it allowed companies to amortize certain tax deductions over one year, but the benefit was only temporary. The business community urged Congress to extend the provisions in 2022; however, despite widespread support in Congress, lawmakers did not enact the extensions. Of particular interest:
Until 2021, companies could take a 100% tax deduction for research and development spending in the year it occurred. Starting in 2022, companies have to deduct their R&D expenses over a five-year time period.
Under the 2017 law, a company could expense 100% of the cost of any Section 179 property (includes equipment, vehicles, and software) and deduct it in the year the property was placed in service between Sept. 28, 2017 and December 31, 2022. The law increased the maximum deduction to $1 million and increased the phase-out threshold to $2.5 million, adjusted for inflation. The Section 179 deduction now phases out over the next four years: 80% in 2023, 60% in 2024, 40% in 2025, and 20% in 2026. Unless the law is changed by 2027, the bonus deduction will disappear and companies will have to go back to spreading-out the depreciation over many years.
For more information, contact Eric Snyder at erics@sema.org.
When the 2017 tax law was enacted, it allowed companies to amortize certain tax deductions over one year, but the benefit was only temporary. The business community urged Congress to extend the provisions in 2022; however, despite widespread support in Congress, lawmakers did not enact the extensions. Of particular interest:
Until 2021, companies could take a 100% tax deduction for research and development spending in the year it occurred. Starting in 2022, companies have to deduct their R&D expenses over a five-year time period.
Under the 2017 law, a company could expense 100% of the cost of any Section 179 property (includes equipment, vehicles, and software) and deduct it in the year the property was placed in service between Sept. 28, 2017 and December 31, 2022. The law increased the maximum deduction to $1 million and increased the phase-out threshold to $2.5 million, adjusted for inflation. The Section 179 deduction now phases out over the next four years: 80% in 2023, 60% in 2024, 40% in 2025, and 20% in 2026. Unless the law is changed by 2027, the bonus deduction will disappear and companies will have to go back to spreading-out the depreciation over many years.
For more information, contact Eric Snyder at erics@sema.org.
The SEMA-supported INFORM Consumers Act became law as part of the FY 2023 omnibus spending package. This bipartisan law is critical in helping law enforcement, manufacturers, retailers, and online marketplaces of all sizes work together to protect consumers from bad actors peddling counterfeit and stolen goods. The INFORM Consumers Act increases transparency and accountability by requiring sensible verification and disclosure requirements designed to disrupt the sale of illicit goods. Below are key provisions of the INFORM Consumers Act:
Requires online marketplaces to verify certain information about high-volume third-party sellers of consumer products, which is defined as sellers who make 200 or more discrete sales or transactions totaling at least $5,000 during any continuous 12-month period in the last 24 months, including the seller’s bank account number, business tax identification number or a taxpayer identification number, and contact information.
High-volume third-party sellers with $20,000 in annual gross revenue through an online marketplace will have to disclose to consumers the full name of the seller or company, business address, and contact info (current working email address, phone number, or other direct electronic messaging for the seller) after each sale.
Empowers online marketplaces to suspend high-volume third-party sellers of consumer products who do not provide the required information within 10 days of the request from the online marketplace.
For more information, contact Eric Snyder at erics@sema.org.
Members of the SEMA Truck & Off-Road Alliance (TORA), Wheel & Tire Council (WTC), SEMA Businesswomen’s Network (SBN) and Future Leaders Network (FLN) are invited to a cross-council mixer on Thursday, February 9 from 6:00 - 8:00 p.m. at King of the Hammers.
Located inside the VIP tent, the event provides the ideal atmosphere for members to make new contacts and strengthen existing connections. It’s the ideal spot to watch the short-course race taking place that evening, and enjoy complimentary snacks and drinks.
King of the Hammers attendees who are not current TORA, WTC, SBN or FLN members but are interested in getting more involved are invited to attend, as it is a great way to introduce yourself and learn about what SEMA Councils and Networks have to offer.
Registration is requested so that event organizers can plan accordingly. RSVP now.
Members of the SEMA Truck & Off-Road Alliance (TORA), Wheel & Tire Council (WTC), SEMA Businesswomen’s Network (SBN) and Future Leaders Network (FLN) are invited to a cross-council mixer on Thursday, February 9 from 6:00 - 8:00 p.m. at King of the Hammers.