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Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

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Re: Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

#261

Post by todd8 »

justincormack wrote: post #151
dragonwriter wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is no way to dodge taxes as a US citizen by moving abroad Well, no way to "legally avoid"; "dodge" is broader, and there are probably many ways of dodging taxes that are easier if the institutions you deal with in your daily life aren't subject to US jurisdiction and regulations designed to expose tax evasion to US authorities. Also, typically you want to have at least one national citizenship, so if you are…

you still have to pay exit taxes on renouncing, so not clear this is a good way of avoiding tax.

USA expatriation taxes are quite steep. I'm not a lawyer, but I believe that all unrealized gains of all assets are taxed upon exit as if the assets were being sold. Further, I think that income generated by through US companies (like investments) are taxed as US income for ten years after renouncing citizenship.

Also, forget about coming back (say for a friend's wedding or an important medical procedure), the laws assume that high net worth individuals are leaving to avoid future taxes.

Re: Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

#262

Post by cblconfederate »

FDSGSG wrote: post #18
cblconfederate wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do people think this is a "bad thing"? It's no different than buying an expensive home anywhere in the world, except it comes with a citizenship. I doubt he can use the favorable taxation - he would have to renounce his US citizenship for that.

FWIW Cyprus is kind of a shithole, so it's not exactly like "buying an expensive home anywhere in the world". These people want the citizenship, not the real estate. Not that I think there's anything wrong with this, probably half of my friends have these passports. Until recently this was the easiest way for Russians to move to the EU.

> kind of a shithole,

well not exactly

Re: Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

#263

Post by esarbe »

pembrook wrote: post #216
dragonwriter wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is no way to dodge taxes as a US citizen by moving abroad Well, no way to "legally avoid"; "dodge" is broader, and there are probably many ways of dodging taxes that are easier if the institutions you deal with in your daily life aren't subject to US jurisdiction and regulations designed to expose tax evasion to US authorities. Also, typically you want to have at least one national citizenship, so if you are…

> aren't subject to US jurisdiction Every single financial institution that transacts in US dollars (so, all of them) is subject to the power of the US Treasury. So many people want to believe all the rich are hiding their money abroad. For American citizens, this simply isn't true and hasn't been for a decade or more. It's not feasible. Also, American capital gains taxes (the ones rich people mostly pay) are extreme…

Did you somehow miss the whole Panama papers shebang? Yeah, the rich do hide their money abroad.

Re: Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

#264

Post by nitrogen »

samatman wrote: post #189
raspberry_pi wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems like straight up theft to me. Why is that not owned by the public?

It is partially owned by the public. All labor is partially owned by the public. Private IP makes corporations and people a lot of money. That money is taxed. That's how the government gets its share. The public-private partnership allows for researchers to claim most of the value of their labor, while the government can encourage areas of research which are in the national interest through grant funding. How much ta…

confiscate intellectual property if they fund it

"Confiscate" is a very loaded word to use here. You don't say that I "confiscated the farmer's tomatoes" when I trade money for those tomatoes, or that an employer "confiscated the employee's code" when they traded that code for salary.

How much tax money would be derived from the multitude of businesses that would arise if more government-funded IP was freely licensed instead of granted to a single spinoff company?

Re: Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

#265

Post by coredog64 »

ProAm wrote: post #208
pembrook wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not a tax dodge. There is no way to dodge taxes as a US citizen by moving abroad, the US is the only country in the world with a real global taxation system. EDIT further information I posted below: The US has the unique position of being able to actually enforce this due to the fact the USD is the reserve currency of the world and every country needs to stay on the good side of the US Treasury to transact in…

> This is not a tax dodge I bet he is well into only paying capital gains territory. Like Warren Buffet who said he pays less than his secretary [1] [1] https://money.cnn.com/2013/03/04/news/economy/buffett-secret...

Buffet says he pays a lower rate than his secretary, not a lower amount.

Re: Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

#266

Post by gnicholas »

jasode wrote: post #201
justincormack wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you still have to pay exit taxes on renouncing, so not clear this is a good way of avoiding tax.

Also... if the renunciation is motivated by avoiding taxes, the person is banned from re-entering the USA. excerpt[1]: If the Department of Homeland Security determines that the renunciation is motivated by tax avoidance purposes, the individual will be found inadmissible to the United States under Section 212(a)(10)(E) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1182(a)(10)(E)), as amended. EDIT REPLY to : "Wou…

Then COVID is the perfect cover for shifting citizenship. It gives a plausible non-tax reason for making the change.

Someone who is worth $15B would be very well-advised, and if he's been thinking about doing this in the past, his advisors may have decided that now is the right time to pull the trigger. Also helps to have plenty in the news these days, to avoid becoming 'the story' on a slow news day/week.

Re: Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

#267

Post by danenania »

esarbe wrote: post #256
danenania wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are there US citizens here who wouldn’t take dual EU citizenship if it was offered to them? Taxes and social stability aside, Europe is full of nice places to visit, do business, and live. The value of being able to do these things without restrictions seems self-evident. I don’t see why you’d presume a nefarious motivation.

As an US citizen you can already visit all these places without restrictions. Why would you need EU citizenship for that?

You can visit for a limited (aka “restricted”) period of time. You can’t live, work, or start a business without restrictions.

Re: Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

#268

Post by idrios »

chmod600 wrote: post #104
esarbe wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huh, why not? If not for people taking advantage of "the system", "the system" would not exist. I mean; here we have a guy that has taken all the advantage of all the benefits a developed industrial country has to offer and then in turn does everything in his power to give back as little as possible. Hell yeah I'm going to blame him. It's not moral behavior. I don't care whether it is legal or not, he's behaving like…

He should be forced to abide by the laws while he lives or does business here. But if he wants to live in a new place by a new set of laws in the future, I'm not sure what's wrong with that. It seems more like you regret the laws in the US during the decades he was here, and you are hoping future changes in the law will retroactively address your concerns. But I see no moral basis for that stance. If we want to chang…

Morality != Legality! No sane person is advocating for ex post facto laws but it's wrong even if it's not illegal. He's been given every opportunity in life, accrued a net worth equal to the sum of 140,000 median Americans, then gives barely any of it back and apparently may flee to dodge being taxed on it.

> If we want to change the law, we should be forced to consider the effects on the future

Of course. This is why it's taken so long to come up with laws that prevent the kind of exploitation that creates a couple dozen billionaires while stagnating the majority of America's incomes. It's morality that drives the lawmaking -- since everyone has different morals and we all live under the same laws -- and at least if everyone hates the guy for this then hopefully we see some laws that prevent more behavior like this in the future.

Re: Eric Schmidt has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus

#269

Post by ProAm »

coredog64 wrote: post #265
ProAm wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is not a tax dodge I bet he is well into only paying capital gains territory. Like Warren Buffet who said he pays less than his secretary [1] [1] https://money.cnn.com/2013/03/04/news/economy/buffett-secret...

Buffet says he pays a lower rate than his secretary, not a lower amount .

Absolutely. Im just saying Schmidt isn't an idiot and probably has his taxes in order. This Cypress citizenship might be an effort to evade taxes but I would be surprised if that was the major reason.
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