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They told the employees that if they got the programs to work with Windows, they could keep them. Of course, that makes them income, so the employees would hav
by Jiro 3y ago
They told the employees that if they got the programs to work with Windows, they could keep them.
Of course, that makes them income, so the employees would have to pay income tax on them. I wonder how many of the employees scrambling to get programs that they didn't already think were worth buying on their own, figured this out?
Also, the employees got to keep the programs after Windows shipped. Which meant that they were probably reported for income tax purposes at their full price (because Microsoft bought them at full price), but by the time the employees got to keep them, the programs were probably discounted in actual stores.
- waiwai933 3y agoI was going to suggest that the benefits would be _de minimis_ and thus nonreportable, but having read through some of the IRS guidance, I no longer think that's the case, as the ability to keep was conditional on the employees testing it. If it was instead "please take up to two programs home, and we'd appreciate any bug reports if you use them", I think that would qualify as de minimis through. In practice, I doubt the IRS would care even if they knw about it, and I suspect Microsoft's Finance/Compliance teams didn't even know about this as it seems like an Engineering Manager's own initiative. (There may of course be a different exclusion that applies -- I'm not going to read through the Internal Revenue Code to check...)