QBI includes items of income, gain, deduction, and loss from your trades or business, but only those effectively connected with the conduct of a trade or business within the United States.
When determining QBI, keep in mind that the idea is to allow deductions against “working” income. In other words, income attributable to services or production are typically included in QBI, but income attributable to investments are typically excluded. A quick and dirty rule is that active income is QBI while passive income is not.
Finally, QBI is determined on a per business, not a per taxpayer, basis. For example, if you have more than one business and you use the “simplified worksheet” , you’ll enter each as a separate line item:As I noted before, there’s a lot of nuance under Section 199A . If you have questions, check with your tax professional.