Working Responsibly

Advocacy Expenditures

In compliance with regulations and our commitment to transparency, Microsoft regularly files and publishes reports that detail our advocacy activities. Our disclosures include consultant fees, lobbying expenses, and trade association dues spent on advocacy.

*The revised amount for FY2010 state-level expenditures now includes lobbying expenses for state government affairs work and state trade association dues spent on advocacy, in addition to consultant fees that were reported previously.

Political Contributions

Microsoft Political Action Committee

Microsoft sponsors the Microsoft Political Action Committee (MSPAC), to enable Microsoft employees and shareholders to participate more effectively in the U.S. political process. The committee, created in 1988, informs its members about important issues and government decisions that can affect Microsoft business. It also provides an opportunity for members to collectively support public policy positions that are important to Microsoft and the software industry.

MSPAC is a bipartisan organization that contributes to the campaigns of federal, state, and local candidates. MSPAC typically supports candidates who share Microsoft views on public policy, serve as congressional or legislative leaders, represent districts or states where Microsoft has a major business presence, or serve on committees that have jurisdiction over legislation that is important to the company.

The MSPAC Steering Committee meets regularly to evaluate candidates' public policy positions on issues that are relevant to Microsoft business or of particular interest to the computer software industry. The committee—composed of senior managers in Legal and Corporate Affairs at Microsoft—then decides which candidates and campaigns MSPAC will support. For the last calendar year (2011), MSPAC made political contributions totaling US$1,084,672.

MSPAC Steering Committee Members

Note: As of October 2011, Microsoft committed to publishing MSPAC spending reports on a semi-annual basis. The above table will be updated with a mid-year report in July 2012.

Corporate Funding

Under U.S. law, corporations cannot support candidates for federal office. However, many states allow corporate donations to state and local candidates or to ballot-issue campaigns. As a corporation, Microsoft makes political contributions to support candidates and ballot measures that are consistent with the company's public policy agenda and business interests. In 2010, Microsoft corporate contributions to state and local political campaigns totaled US$107,400.

Since July 2005, Microsoft has made no corporate contributions to any non-candidate or non-party political committee organized under section 527 of the Internal Revenue Code.

Beginning July 1, 2010, Microsoft will not pay for any independent expenditure or electioneering communication as those terms are defined by applicable law.

Note: As of October 2011, Microsoft committed to publishing corporate spending reports on a semi-annual basis. The above table will be updated with a mid-year report in July 2012.

Trade Association Memberships

Like all major corporations, Microsoft is a member of a number of trade associations (organized under section 501(c)(6) of the Internal Revenue Code) in the United States to help advance our public policy agenda and related business goals. We publicly disclose and update annually on Microsoft.com a list of those trade associations to which Microsoft pays dues and makes other expenditures through our US Government Affairs Group. Each year, Microsoft inquires and makes a reasonable effort to obtain from those associations where our dues and other expenditures total $25,000 or more, what portion of the company’s dues or payments were used for lobbying expenditures or political contributions. This information is publically disclosed and updated annually.