I would argue that this law does tend to unfairly target the tech sector which often pays their people in stock. This is compared to other professions who may make an equivalent or higher salary but will not be subject to the 7 percent tax.
That doesn’t seem quite fair. If we’re going to do this, we should have a 7 percent tax across the board for anything over 250k (or whatever) instead of strictly targeting a particular sector
I worked at Microsoft for several years. They did offer stock grants but it was never a significant portion of my pay. The actual value was significantly less than my annual bonus. Nowadays they don’t even do straight grants. They do vested grants. So the grant you get this year vests at 20% per year, meaning you have to work there 5 more years to get the full payout. The largest stock packages I was ever offered always came from small start-ups trying to tempt employees with the promise of a future IPO. Most of us learned after the early 2000s that this was almost never going to be the payout we hoped for. I haven’t see a stock offering in a job offer in almost 15 years.
Stock only becomes a significant portion of your pay at executive levels. Usually VP and above. That’s why these taxes don’t affect more than a tiny percentage of the population.
According to levels.fyi, Microsoft grants about 50-100k (25 percent of their pay?) in stock for their senior engineers each year. Amazon is closer to 200k (which makes up about 50 percent of their pay)
I guess you’re right in that it won’t really affect them, assuming the tax event occurs when the rsu gets vested and not at the sale.
It’d be more likely to affect folks who are in a pre-ipo company, gain a bunch of stock, and then sell it post-ipo. I know several folks at AirBnB who this would have impacted and several at stripe who this probably will impact.
The tech sector is responsible for the huge influx of people moving to the state, Seattle specifically. Our infrastructure was not able to handle that influx and is only now catching up, 2 decades later.
Tech came here because of our archaic tax laws that prevented an income tax from going through, I have zero empathy that this solution impacts them disproportionately.
That’s some drawbridge level thinking right there. Are you not also part of the problem? Because they arrived after you… they’re the problem? People moved there for jobs, same as anyone else who moved there. (For what it’s worth I don’t live in Seattle)
I would argue that this law does tend to unfairly target the tech sector which often pays their people in stock. This is compared to other professions who may make an equivalent or higher salary but will not be subject to the 7 percent tax.
That doesn’t seem quite fair. If we’re going to do this, we should have a 7 percent tax across the board for anything over 250k (or whatever) instead of strictly targeting a particular sector
I’ve been working in software development in WA state for about 25 years. I haven’t been paid (even partially) in stock since the mid 2000s.
It’s the bigger ones that tend to pay in stock. The googles, facebooks, Microsoft, and startups.
I’ve also been in software development for 20 years at various places in the country and I know a bunch of folks who get paid in stock.
I worked at Microsoft for several years. They did offer stock grants but it was never a significant portion of my pay. The actual value was significantly less than my annual bonus. Nowadays they don’t even do straight grants. They do vested grants. So the grant you get this year vests at 20% per year, meaning you have to work there 5 more years to get the full payout. The largest stock packages I was ever offered always came from small start-ups trying to tempt employees with the promise of a future IPO. Most of us learned after the early 2000s that this was almost never going to be the payout we hoped for. I haven’t see a stock offering in a job offer in almost 15 years.
Stock only becomes a significant portion of your pay at executive levels. Usually VP and above. That’s why these taxes don’t affect more than a tiny percentage of the population.
According to levels.fyi, Microsoft grants about 50-100k (25 percent of their pay?) in stock for their senior engineers each year. Amazon is closer to 200k (which makes up about 50 percent of their pay)
I guess you’re right in that it won’t really affect them, assuming the tax event occurs when the rsu gets vested and not at the sale.
It’d be more likely to affect folks who are in a pre-ipo company, gain a bunch of stock, and then sell it post-ipo. I know several folks at AirBnB who this would have impacted and several at stripe who this probably will impact.
The tech sector is responsible for the huge influx of people moving to the state, Seattle specifically. Our infrastructure was not able to handle that influx and is only now catching up, 2 decades later.
Tech came here because of our archaic tax laws that prevented an income tax from going through, I have zero empathy that this solution impacts them disproportionately.
That’s some drawbridge level thinking right there. Are you not also part of the problem? Because they arrived after you… they’re the problem? People moved there for jobs, same as anyone else who moved there. (For what it’s worth I don’t live in Seattle)