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Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

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Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#791

Post by yawaworht1978 »

ramblerman wrote: post #785
yawaworht1978 wrote: post #502

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson aka Boris Johnson is not as clumsy as his haircut makes him look to be. The guy keeps fit, doesn't look like Rambo but he is fit with a bit a sticky build. He is intelligent, he survived the muddy waters of politics, affairs and is prime minister. Of course he always knew he is American dual citizen, a person like him does not handle an apartment sale himself, he has handlers and ad…

He might be smarter than he looks, but he certainly isn't "fit".

Apologies, I did not mean the English expression of fit, rather the status of sports fitness levels, he's doing ok for his age.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#792

Post by tim333 »

yawaworht1978 wrote: post #502
fmajid wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some are "accidental Americans" like UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, born in the US, who discovered as a US citizen he had to pay capital gains taxes when he sold his London apartment. Australia requires its parliamentarians to have only Australian citizenship and some discovered for the same reason they were not eligible. Furthermore, the burden of FATCA is sufficiently onerous that many banks etc. just refuse to d…

Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson aka Boris Johnson is not as clumsy as his haircut makes him look to be. The guy keeps fit, doesn't look like Rambo but he is fit with a bit a sticky build. He is intelligent, he survived the muddy waters of politics, affairs and is prime minister. Of course he always knew he is American dual citizen, a person like him does not handle an apartment sale himself, he has handlers and ad…

He's also not terribly organised or rule following. He probably just thought he could ignore the US tax and no one would notice. I'm not sure if he paid in the end or got around it by renouncing his citizenship?

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#793

Post by bakuninsbart »

markdown wrote: post #685
bakuninsbart wrote: post #672

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It got really awkward when the large minority of turkish Germans living in Germany with turkish citizenry overwhelmingly voted for Erdogan in the last elections. I'd really wish Germany was able to adopt an immigrant culture similar to the US, but the current situation is a semi-failure, but neither side of the political spectrum seems to be able to implement good policies to solve the issues.

> the current situation is a semi-failure WOuld you care to expand on that? I'm curious what in particular about the US immigrant culture you would like to see adopted, and what about the current German system prevents that culture from developing.

Sadly I can't find good polls on some of the things I want to talk about, so this has a bit of an anecdotal note. But I've been living in a majority turkish subdistrict for most of my life, and have many german-turkish friends, as well as friends and family teaching in schools with many turkish and arab descendant kids. But first some facts: "People with a migration background", which includes their children and children's children even if they were born here, make up 21% of the population. Half of these hold german citizenship. 40% of all kids have a migrant background. 12.5% of people with a migrant background are so called Spätaussiedler, ethnic germans who migrated to Germany after WWII.[1]

Attidudes of Germans at large towards immigration are very mixed: 71% think that it leads to higher strain on the welfare state, 69% think it leads to conflicts with "the natives", 63% think it leads to problems in schools. At the same time, 67% think that it makes life in Germany more interesting, and 64% think immigration is important to combat the effects of our quickly aging population.[2]

Now on to what I think is the biggest failure, which is now very hard to correct: Many second or third generation immigrants still don't feel like they are "real" germans. There's still a strong class divide, which in urban areas also leads to segregated communities. They are underrepresented in politics (except for the Spätaussiedler) and white collar jobs, and there is whitespread employment discrimination, especially against people of turkish, arab and african descent.[3] While the current government declared a "welcome culture" in 2015 during the refugee crisis, in the heads of the majority of the population, there's still a very clear picture of how a "real german" looks and acts. - While close to half of the population admits that "Islam is a part of german culture now", they will still ask Ahmed "where he is really from", and rather hire Oscar over him.

This also partially explains why Erdogan is so popular among turkish Germans: They feel disrespected here, so the vision (delusion) of Erdogan making Turkey into this powerful and strong state is very appealing to them.

I do think things are getting slightly better, but there's a long way to go, and there's also risks of things turning really sour: Anti-democratic ideology is relatively widespread among the muslim minority, in contrast to the rest of the population, their level of religiousness stays about the same, the current money policy of the ECB leads to an enormous rise in living cost in urban areas, and the divide between rich and poor in Germany is increasing.

[1]https://www.bpb.de/nachschlagen/zahlen-und-fakten/soziale-si...

[2] https://mediendienst-integration.de/integration/einstellunge...

[3] https://bibliothek.wzb.eu/pdf/2018/vi18-104.pdf

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#794

Post by roenxi »

opheliate wrote: post #253
roenxi wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're worried about people being oppressed, moving away from basic principles of freedom and liberty is probably not the path you want to take. If libertarianism would result in a great many oppressed people, any sort of centralisation of power will result in even more oppressed people. Beefing up government power is no solution to oppression; the worst oppressors are invariably governments. The worst of the grea…

> The worst of the great catastrophes and oppression of the last century were perpetrated by strong centralised governments. Absolutely. It's a good thing I'm not calling for massively beefing up government then, I'm just advocating that tax laws exist & are enforced, so as to redistribute wealth, which I don't view as oppressive. > If libertarianism would result in a great many oppressed people, any sort of centrali…

> I'm just advocating that tax laws exist & are enforced, so as to redistribute wealth, which I don't view as oppressive.

There is almost nowhere on earth that does wealth redistribution. Most taxes are based on income. Wealth distribution has traditionally failed so hard that there aren't even serious attempts any more.

> I disagree with the implied premise that there is not a "centralisation of power" under libertarianism.

That is impossible so it isn't a premise of anything. Libertarianism is trying to minimise the centralisation of power.

> ... consider the United Fruit Company for example ...

I'll admit to not having researched the UFC particularly closely, but wasn't its mode of operation quite close to getting the government to do a lot of its dirty work? I'd assume typically it was co-opting taxes.

> ...or the current prevalence of child labour in tech company supply chains (e.g: Glencore, Zhejiang Huayou Cobalt)...

Look, if you have child labour in your mine you've mucked up and you're probably leaving a lot of money on the table. Children aren't good workers, by and large. Mining tends to favour experienced workers driving large, expensive, well maintained machines. If you put a kid in one of those they'll wreck it.

Particularly I doubt Glencore is seriously using child labour because they run their mines to make a profit. They'd be trying to keep them out. Not to mention the political backlash.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#795

Post by walkhour »

grumblenum wrote: post #495
fourthwaveska wrote: post #44

By most western standards my family teeters on the line between middle and upper middle clas. We sold all of our US property last year; and now we are shopping for 4-6 unit buildings within 100km of Barcelona to get our Golden Visas. Our goal is to get citizenship and access to the EU then renouncing my US citizenship. It isnt about money, I am juwt ashamed to have an American passport and know my tax dollars are bei…

>It isnt about money, I am juwt ashamed to have an American passport and know my tax dollars are being spent on war and murder in the name of christ and oil profits. You know Bush isn't president anymore, right? That hasn't been a a popular (and I would say erroneous, even when it was popular) talking point for more than a decade. I do find it interesting that expatriation trends seem to pivot in years with president…

> You know Bush isn't president anymore, right? That hasn't been a a popular (and I would say erroneous, even when it was popular) talking point for more than a decade.

The US performed military operations in eight different countries just during the Obama administration, some of the conflicts where not inherited, like the war in Syria and Yemen.

Those wars were payed by the US citizens regardless of whether they agreed with the war or not.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#796

Post by Aicy »

yawaworht1978 wrote: post #791
ramblerman wrote: post #785

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He might be smarter than he looks, but he certainly isn't "fit".

Apologies, I did not mean the English expression of fit, rather the status of sports fitness levels, he's doing ok for his age.

I don't think that term applies either. He appears to be quite overweight.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#797

Post by walkhour »

keewee7 wrote: post #82
fourthwaveska wrote: post #44

By most western standards my family teeters on the line between middle and upper middle clas. We sold all of our US property last year; and now we are shopping for 4-6 unit buildings within 100km of Barcelona to get our Golden Visas. Our goal is to get citizenship and access to the EU then renouncing my US citizenship. It isnt about money, I am juwt ashamed to have an American passport and know my tax dollars are bei…

Spain is a NATO country involved in many American wars in the past 30 years. If you oppose US wars and hegemony you should have followed Edward Snowden and moved to a country that actually oppose American influence in the world.

This is correct, Spain supported the wars in Irak and Afghanistan, both with hundreds of thousands of casualties, most of them civilians. It's an improvement over paying taxes in US but still a dubious moral choice if you claim concerns over your taxes being spent on wars.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#798

Post by lo136236 »

Good day,

I am Mr. Azim Premji Accountant, the Director of Credit & Marketing Chong Hing Bank, Hong Kong. Address is Chong Hing Bank Center, 24 Des Voeux Road Central, Hong Kong. Please send me an email now to ceo.azimhashimpremjis@gmail.com I have a business proposal for EUR 290,000,000.00 for you. All supporting documents to substantiate the claims will be made available to you prior to your acceptance and as soon as I have received your Email in return, thank you.

Regards,

Azim

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#799

Post by lo136236 »

Good day,

I am Mr. Azim Premji Accountant, the Director of Credit & Marketing Chong Hing Bank, Hong Kong. Address is Chong Hing Bank Center, 24 Des Voeux Road Central, Hong Kong. Please send me an email now to ceo.azimhashimpremjis@gmail . com I have a business proposal for EUR 290,000,000.00 for you. All supporting documents to substantiate the claims will be made available to you prior to your acceptance and as soon as I have received your Email in return, thank you.

Regards,

Azim

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#800

Post by fourthwaveska »

Izikiel43 wrote: post #709
fourthwaveska wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but my wife has spent the past four years learning Spanish and every time I suggest Portugal she gets a murderous look in her eyes. My preference is actually Denmark, but it is an order of magnitude more difficult to move there, and my wife hates the language :(

Portuguese is not that different from spanish.

This argument also gets me icy cold stares of death.

It also reminds me of how mind-blowing it is that a country whose land-area is 1/5 of California managed to conquer almost 1/2 of South America!

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