In offer negotiations with Amazon. During Amazon recruiter chat, he mentioned that the sign-on payments from Amazon are not taxed as bonus (e.g. a typical sign-on bonus). However I haven't been able to find much details on this. Can anyone shed some light on exactly how these sign-on payments are taxed?
Are bonuses not taxed the same as income?
My guess is since Amazon pays it's sign on bonus monthly for first 2 years instead of all at once, it will be taxed as regular income vs bonus. Generally for high paying jobs like tech it won't matter since regular income tax rate is high anyway. I think bonus tax is 30% in India while monthly salary has its own scale. In US I think both taxes are same.
Because the sign on bonus are paid across 12 months at Amazon
Just out of curiosity if you leave in the sign on bonus period do you have to pay it back if you leave?
No. Since they pay monthly, its like you worked for it.
Oh cool so you’d only have to pay it back if it’s a chunk at once?
They will match taxes and add on top of sign-on.
There is no tax matching. Also in US, the tax recruiter mentioned is just the tax withheld and doesn't have any difference on how much total tax you will have to pay
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