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Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

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Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#441

Post by ElFitz »

emodendroket wrote: post #332
simonh wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh well, that's alright then. As long as it's only successful people getting screwed I suppose we're good.

I mean, am I supposed to feel sorry for high-income people because they have to pay tax to continue to benefit from US citizenship and US embassies? I don't really, nor do I consider it getting "screwed." I think it is only fair that well-to-do expats should pay into the system like everybody else. If they don't want to, I welcome them to take the article's lead and give up their citizenship.

From what I’ve read, the US is possibly one of the worst countries to have to file taxes with, paperwork-wise.

And that’s for the simple scenario of someone actually living in the US.

But is also is another issue altogether. How US citizens can bear with this and the lobbying that spawned it is beyond me.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#442

Post by 1024core »

aerostable_slug wrote: post #422
marcosdumay wrote: post #399

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most countries grant those same benefits.

But they don't have a MEU sitting off conflict zones waiting to leap into action. The United States will literally send the Marines to save a citizen. A person from, say, Ecuador probably doesn't enjoy the same amount of risk coverage. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marine_expeditionary_unit

You've been watching too many movies, I'm afraid. The reality is (and it happened in Yemen recently) that the US will just shrug and tell you to go ask some other country for help. No MEUs set foot in Yemen when things went south there.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#443

Post by cactus2093 »

ggggtez wrote: post #309
fourthwaveska wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Spanish golden visa will require a €550k housing investment, then the normal amount of accrued in-country time for citizenship. Maybe we’re sort of upper midde-class then. We gross about $200k consulting. Not rich, not poor. We live in the developing world now so here we are definitely upper middle class/rich, and do not have millions in assets.

You are upper class. Yes you're not rich, but you're not middle class. The middle class American dream is a house in the suburbs with a white picket fence, 2 cars, and a dog. You're talking about buying a half million dollar house in Spain because of a moral concern about global geopolitics. You're not middle class.

The amount of the US where you can buy a detached single family home with a white picket fence and 2 car garage for significantly under half a million dollars is probably not as much of a majority as you seem to think.

Not everywhere is the bay area, where you'll struggle to find this for under $1.5M. But $500k is not that much for a house these days in a lot of the markets where huge percentages of the population live (from the tri-state area, to Boston, to Seattle, LA, Austin, etc.) and lots of middle class people live in houses valued at more than this.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#444

Post by depressedpanda »

trutannus wrote: post #289
papito wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, now, let's not paint "authoritarianism" as "lefty". Some Marx-reading student on campus is not exactly a threat, is it? The ultra-left sentiment is, indeed, anti-liberal at its core, but it is still an irrelevant fringe . The actual, viable threat of authoritarianism is coming from the opposite side, which is a spit away from holding absolute power, here in the States, at least. And then, it's on.

This is a complete misrepresentation of my point. I never tried to 'paint "authoritarianism" as "lefty"'. I specified there's an issue with lefties who are also authoritarians . If you don't think that can exist and if you think it's not that big of a deal, I suggest you take a look at the latter-half of the 20th century. It's pretty uncharitable to paint my argument as being afraid of a student on a campus who's rea…

> Both kill just as many people

Let's be honest here, lefty authoritarianism has historically killed way more people in total.

Fortunately, righty authoritarianism was stopped; unfortunately lefty authoritarianism wasn't.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#445

Post by ihattendorf »

bingohbangoh wrote: post #364
ihattendorf wrote: post #354

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And then you slip up, the IRS finds out, and on a connecting flight on your way to another country you get arrested for tax evasion.

It's a misdemeanor to not file, its a felony to lie when you do file. Ergo, they can't call Interpol to get you for not filing. (correct me if you're a tax accountant, but I'm 99.999% positive on that first statement and 80% confident on the second)

Not a tax accountant, but while just failing to file is a misdemeanor, if you actually owed money and it can be shown that you willfully attempted to evade paying taxes owed, that's a felony (I.R.C. § 7201).

Now, chances are they don't find out, or if they do you can play innocent and pay a fine. Personally, if I were in this situation I would either file, renounce, or never set foot on US soil.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#447

Post by s1artibartfast »

rory wrote: post #278
engineer_22 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no reason to stop it. Their assets are still paying taxes.

I'm asking simply as a thought experiment. And the reason to stop it is obvious-- to procure other taxes from those people. For example, many jurisdictions don't have an inheritance tax, and the US Gov't would likely want that cut upon the (ex?)-citizen's death.

>how could the US government stop this from happening.

Lots of simple solutions if we look at other countries that restrict emigration. USSR and North Korea had models that worked pretty well. High boarder security, labor camps, family punishment, and asset seizure.

These could all keep people working and generating tax revenue in the US when they want to leave.

On a practical level, I think the idea of coercing people to stay in the USA would be unpopular, especially when contrasted with the current wealth tax on exit.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#448

Post by AdamN »

aerostable_slug wrote: post #422
marcosdumay wrote: post #399

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most countries grant those same benefits.

But they don't have a MEU sitting off conflict zones waiting to leap into action. The United States will literally send the Marines to save a citizen. A person from, say, Ecuador probably doesn't enjoy the same amount of risk coverage. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marine_expeditionary_unit

I remember being in Kenya before the election that followed post-election violence previously (scores dead). Ambassador said point blank, "You need to take care of yourselves. We only have a handful of marines and they'll be spending their time protecting or destroying classified documents."

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#449

Post by bingohbangoh »

ihattendorf wrote: post #445
bingohbangoh wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a misdemeanor to not file, its a felony to lie when you do file. Ergo, they can't call Interpol to get you for not filing. (correct me if you're a tax accountant, but I'm 99.999% positive on that first statement and 80% confident on the second)

Not a tax accountant, but while just failing to file is a misdemeanor, if you actually owed money and it can be shown that you willfully attempted to evade paying taxes owed, that's a felony (I.R.C. § 7201). Now, chances are they don't find out, or if they do you can play innocent and pay a fine. Personally, if I were in this situation I would either file, renounce, or never set foot on US soil.

It’s difficult to renounce and you never know if being in the US may become necessary.

People who renounce their American citizenship do so with the funds to overcome this or because they’re committed to living somewhere else.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#450

Post by goodpoint »

oblio wrote: post #408
goodpoint wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

10% is a gross exaggeration but "the average ratio would be closer to 2-3x" sounds equally exaggerated in the other direction.

The median US gross salary for US software developers is $108k. I imagine that's $60k net or less. The median Romanian net salary for software developers is RON 7000 per month. That's about €1400 or $1600 per month, so $19.2K, net. 3x. You were saying?

3x != 2x, and I suspect 3x is still too low; also comparing median salaries is not enough.
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