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Despite this considerable investment of time, small business owners nationwide lament that they wish they had even more time to plan and prepare their taxes. In fact, 44 percent of those polled by TurboTax for Business reported that they do not allocate as much time as they would like to on planning that would reduce their tax burden.

With tax year 1998 making effective many of the sweeping tax law changes that Congress passed in 1997, many small business owners have more challenging tax returns than ever. It comes as no surprise that roughly half (49%) of small business owners said keeping up with the latest tax rules and regulation is a "major concern." What are the other top concerns that keep small business owners up at night?:

• Access to skilled labor  43%
• Keeping up with evolving technology  41%
• Health care benefits for employees  39%
• Access to capital   34%

"Using tax preparation software provides easy and simple relief from the burden of preparing and filing your taxes," says Larry Wolfe, senior vice president of the Intuit tax products division. "Software like TurboTax for Business customizes the tax preparation process to your business, eliminating needless work and allowing you to focus on what you truly enjoy to do - running your business."

Although the 105th Congresses enacted new tax breaks for small business -- most notably a home-office tax deduction -- the complexity of the tax code may contribute to the fact that more than two-thirds (69%) of those polled do not plan to take advantage of this deduction. In fact, of the small business owners (26%) who do plan to take a home-office deduction this year, only one-quarter reported that they were "very familiar" with all the rules and regulations governing this type of deduction.

Whether or not they plan to take a home-office deduction, small business owners appear to agree on one thing: the U.S. tax code needs a makeover. When asked about the Tax Code Termination Act in Congress (House Bill H.R. 3097) - a bill that if passed, would abolish the current tax code by 2003 -- nearly two-thirds (59%) of small business owners said they would favor it. Which system would they like to see replace the current tax code? Over one-third (36%) of those polled chose a national sales tax.

But, because the IRS Restructuring and Reform Act of 1998 is here to stay, more than half (58%) of those polled by TurboTax for Business plan to leave their tax preparation to an accountant. More than one-third of small business owners (34%) said they would jointly prepare their taxes with an accountant; and 8% said they would do it all themselves. And, with 13.3 million small business owners using PC's (Genesis Research, 1998), tools like TurboTax for Business can help get them through these historic tax law changes with ease - and save time in the process.

The TurboTax for Business survey was conducted by International Communications Research (ICR), which surveyed 501 small business owners in companies with 20 or fewer employees between October 9-22, 1998.