Snopes erred both times. I quote from the later article: "Though Amazon’s actual U.S. tax filings are not public, a broad overview of their overall tax burden can be found in their SEC 10-K filing. In 2018, the company made over $200 billion in sales, but paid no money to the U.S. government in the form of income tax (in fact, the government actually owed the company some $129 million as noted in parentheses in the chart below):"
I couldn't copy and paste here the chart from the Snopes article, but it shows "current" U.S. Federal taxes of -$137 million for 2017 and -$129 million for 2018. Snopes ignored the $565 million deferred tax provision for 2018. $565 - $129 = +$436. Importantly, except to Snopes, closely above and below those numbers say that the numbers are provisions for income taxes. The numbers are not what Amazon paid both years, but what were accrued both years following GAAP accounting rules. There can be big differences between the two, especially since the main corporate income tax rate was reduced from 35% to 21% effective 2018.
Indeed, Amazon's 2018 10-K belies Snopes' answering True both years. Regarding Amazon's U.S. federal income tax, the same page of the 10-K says, "Cash taxes paid, net of refunds, were $412 million, $957 million, and $1.2 billion for 2016, 2017, and 2018" (my bold). Alex Kasprak, author of both articles, apparently does not know the difference between provision and paid or between accrued and paid. He ignored or missed what Amazon paid.
This ITEP blog makes the same mistakes about Amazon's 2018 taxes. With a name like Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, shouldn't it be more attentive to facts? With abettors like these, Bernie Sanders can lie "with authority" (link)!
The Snopes article adds that Amazon takes a tax deduction for the profits an employee gets from (exercising) stock options granted by Amazon. (Contra Snopes, the amount of the employee's salary need not exceed $1 million for this deduction.) The article says this like it is fishy, but current tax law allows it and there is an explanation. Suppose an X Corp employee's exercise price is $500 per share, and X Corp's share price at time of exercise and when the employee sells them is $1,500. To acquire the shares on the open market, the employee pays $500 and X Corp pays the other $1,000. The employee profits $1,000, and the $1,000 is taxable income for the employee. The $1,000 is a compensation expense to X Corp, like the employee's salary is.
The Snopes article adds that Amazon takes a tax deduction for the profits an employee gets from (exercising) stock options granted by Amazon. (Contra Snopes, the amount of the employee's salary need not exceed $1 million for this deduction.) The article says this like it is fishy, but current tax law allows it and there is an explanation. Suppose an X Corp employee's exercise price is $500 per share, and X Corp's share price at time of exercise and when the employee sells them is $1,500. To acquire the shares on the open market, the employee pays $500 and X Corp pays the other $1,000. The employee profits $1,000, and the $1,000 is taxable income for the employee. The $1,000 is a compensation expense to X Corp, like the employee's salary is.
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