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Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

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Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#121

Post by pwinnski »

rwmj wrote: post #60
tartoran wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This article is about wealthy people. We all know they are paying relatively no taxes or doing their best to. Yes, Americans who moved to Europe and are happily making a living there are also giving up US citizenship but end up paying taxes in 2 places or deal with a lot of hassle they’d rather not

No one's moving the Europe for the lower taxes.

On the contrary! The overall tax burden of many European may be lower than that of the US when you compare like for like. That is, the cost of all taxes in Europe and the cost of all taxes and the fees paid for equivalent services in the US.

For most people, that's taxes in Europe vs taxes + health insurance premiums in the US.

Even if the combined totals are equivalent or higher in Europe, government-provided healthcare provides cost predictability that doesn't exist in the US. One year I might pay a much lower amount in the US, while the next year a single medical procedure could easily double my expenses.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#122

Post by Thiez »

jkepler wrote: post #90
papito wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to the Bible, nowhere good.

What biblical reference are you alluding to? I'm not sure how its relevant to the question of where the rich who leave the USA go?

It's all terribly off-topic, but presumably they are talking about Matthew 19:24, which says (ymmv based on your exact translation):

"Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.”

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#123

Post by NoOneNew »

baxuz wrote: post #110
academia_hack wrote: post #42

It's so irritating to be an American that has moved overseas. Basically the only country in the world that charges taxes on money you make and spend somewhere else, just because of where you were born. Thanks to IRS regulations, 90% of investment firms will just reject me outright rather than deal with the paperwork. Getting someone to help file my inordinately complex taxes costs thousands of dollars more than I act…

I don't see how wealth has much to do with it. It's a question of citizenship and taxes. The other extreme is what we currently have in Croatia: A vast group of people who don't live here have citizenship and they express their patriotism by voting for the conservative right without exception for the past 30 years. If you want to be treated as a citizen — live here and pay your taxes. If you don't, the door's that wa…

>If you want to be treated as a citizen — live here and pay your taxes. If you don't, the door's that way.

Lol, that's considered "conservative right" ideology in the USA.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#124

Post by fourthwaveska »

sec400 wrote: post #81
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…

Greece + Italy golden visas also worth taking a look at.

I wish! Greece was my secone choice (I used to study Lyra in Crete, and Rembetiko Bouzouki (Rembetiko style) in Thessaloniki and Athens.

We almost bought a flat in the Exarchia neighborhood of Athens! Politically/Energetically It’s what Berkeley was like in the early/mid-90s.

The day Trump was elected we were in Barcelona, and decided never to go back to the USA, flipped a coin between Spain and Greece. I always lose coin flips!

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#125

Post by opheliate »

roenxi wrote: post #93
risaacs99 wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is classic libertarian thinking, and I used to subscribe to it, at least to some extent. The more you think about it, though, the more it doesn't hold up. It's just undeniably true that individual freedoms exist only to the extent that society allows them to. To think that you can opt out of society is fantasy. It's in everybody's best interest to make sure society works well for everyone, and that kind of think…

The observation that it is in everyone's interest for society to function is a core plank of libertarian thinking. If everyone was going to opt out then libertarianism would not work. The core argument is that the government doesn't need to step in to fix society, because the incentives are so strong that society will sort itself out through people realising that if the ship sinks they will drown so they have to keep…

IMO the ship "sinking/floating" analogy is far too simplistic for this discussion. Everyone has a different idea of what the ship "floating" looks like: If you're someone with a lot of wealth, the current state of things might look completely reasonable. If you're very poor, the fact that 0.1% of people control 25% of the world's wealth might look a lot less like society is functioning correctly. Society could easily "sort itself out" into a stable state which happily oppresses a great many people, just based on individual incentives.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#126

Post by luffapi »

cpursley wrote: post #55
ren_engineer wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the point is that generally there is some expectation of loyalty to the country that allowed you to become super-rich in the first place. In finance specifically many of these people participated in outsourcing a huge chunk of the American economy for short term profit and their own gain and are now abandoning ship abandoning your country for lower taxes so you can "live your lifestyle without missing a beat" is disg…

The wealthy in America cover the bulk of the tax revenue collected if the IRS stats are to be trusted.

The wealthy pay far less in taxes in proportion to their wealth than everyone else. Long term capital gains is only 10%.

The wealthy are only wealthy because the non-wealthy people who vastly outnumber the wealthy, allow them to keep their capital. I think massive wealth inequality is making a significant number of people rethink this generous position.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#127

Post by [deleted] »

ninja3925 wrote: post #23
amcoastal wrote: post #3

Its really a great system we have here --- get insanely wealthy off the backs of Americans who pay tons more for basic services and then when it's time to pay back run off and keep your change. No wonder America is doing so well.

“Off the back” sounds like the wealthy took advantage of folks when, in fact, they entered voluntary contracts in a win-win scenario. Creating a company is not exploitative but rather collaborative and mutually beneficial (with workers).

[deleted]

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#128

Post by mgbmtl »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #94
academia_hack wrote: post #42

It's so irritating to be an American that has moved overseas. Basically the only country in the world that charges taxes on money you make and spend somewhere else, just because of where you were born. Thanks to IRS regulations, 90% of investment firms will just reject me outright rather than deal with the paperwork. Getting someone to help file my inordinately complex taxes costs thousands of dollars more than I act…

> It's so irritating to be an American that has moved overseas. Basically the only country in the world that charges taxes on money you make and spend somewhere else, just because of where you were born. This is exactly why these people are renouncing US citizenship: They’re living overseas as citizens of another country and, like anyone rich or poor, don’t want to be paying taxes to a country they aren’t living in.…

> surrendering US citizenship is a logical choice

Only because of US laws. I have two citizenships, but one residency. In most Western countries, being a resident is associated with healthcare and pension, so having one residency is logical.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#130

Post by geomark »

fourthwaveska wrote: post #31
papito wrote: post #9

From the bottom of my heart, fuck off . If you get blackmailed, abducted, squeezed or raided in any way, the U.S. will have the privilege of not caring. These tools accumulated massive wealth by corrupting the U.S. political system, gutting the IRS, and bringing their effective tax rate lower than most other citizens' - and it is still not enough. I guess it's a tall order to ask to keep your grubby paws away and not…

> From the bottom of my heart, fuck off. If you get blackmailed, abducted, squeezed or raided in any way, the U.S. will have the privilege of not caring. Guess you have never lived abroad? If you think the US doesnt care about you when you’re in country, you dont even exist when you’re out of it. Imagine being in the middle of a coup, calling up your consulate for guidance only to find out that they all left the coun…

Imagine being an expat in the middle of a pandemic, the U.S. donating millions of vaccine dosages to the country you live in, vaccines that your tax dollars helped pay for, and you can't get vaccinated because the U.S. won't stipulate that some of those millions of doses should go to the approximately 30,000 U.S. expats in the country .
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