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Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

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Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#31

Post by fourthwaveska »

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 country or are hiding in their bunkers. Been through that before.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#32

Post by anovikov »

djKianoosh wrote: post #8
rob_c wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

not just America, the 0.01% around the world are all learning this lesson...

so where are they all going?

UAE for effectively zero taxes.

New Zealand as it is rumoured although i don't believe it - for someone not rich enough to own a private jet where you can properly sleep, it is TOO far away from... just about anywhere.

Singapore. Some of the Southern and Eastern Europe for those not rich enough.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#33

Post by toomuchtodo »

magpi3 wrote: post #25
rory wrote: post #6

Without getting into the moral debate of taxing US Citizens globally... how could the US government stop this from happening? Surely these ex-citizens hold a lot of assets in the US, and most probably spend a lot of time in the country. Could the gov't effectively banish them or ban them from holding assets in US assets? What would be the side effects of such a law?

Perhaps a tax could be introduced for those who renounce their citizenship and which could work somewhat like the estate tax. Meaning it would only affect people who have considerable wealth.

This exists. It’s called an exit tax. Applies if you have assets over $2 million, or you haven’t been meeting your tax obligations over the past five years.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#34

Post by lr4444lr »

altcognito wrote: post #2

They’ve been allowed for decades to avoid paying for the infrastructure and management of the country while simultaneously holding most of the influence. “Renouncing citizenship” means they’ll give up none of the influence, lose the taxes, live how and wherever they want. The best thing to do is forbid them re-entry into the country nor to hold controlling interest in any company in the US. Faced with actual conseque…

Forbidding them reentry on what basis that you can legally uphold vis a vi their being a foreign citizen from another country we are friendly with? Controlling interest in any U.S. company... chances are their company is already by accounting principles registered somewhere else internationally, or they might move asset ownership to some sort of family trust, or form shell companies to hold US Stock that you'd never trace.

I think you're underestimating the legal maneuvers these people can afford to find that have got then to where they are.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#35

Post by igorkraw »

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).

I feel like you'd have to give some evidence for the claims you are making (voluntary, win-win, creating a company being collaborative...) as long as the US doesn't have free health care,free housing and/or some form of UBI. "Take job where you have to pee in bottles or live in squalor" doesn't seem that voluntary to me

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#36

Post by catillac »

alephnan wrote: post #11
altcognito wrote: post #2

They’ve been allowed for decades to avoid paying for the infrastructure and management of the country while simultaneously holding most of the influence. “Renouncing citizenship” means they’ll give up none of the influence, lose the taxes, live how and wherever they want. The best thing to do is forbid them re-entry into the country nor to hold controlling interest in any company in the US. Faced with actual conseque…

> while simultaneously holding most of the influence. There are 20 million millionaires in the states. This is not even 10,000 people year over year with assets, not even net worth, over $2 million. This is a tiny fraction of the population, most of whom are contrarian or pursue an alternative lifestyle, given that they are living abroad. I would hardly call someone with $2 million as having outsized influenced, they…

This is a fair point

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#37

Post by cpursley »

altcognito wrote: post #2

They’ve been allowed for decades to avoid paying for the infrastructure and management of the country while simultaneously holding most of the influence. “Renouncing citizenship” means they’ll give up none of the influence, lose the taxes, live how and wherever they want. The best thing to do is forbid them re-entry into the country nor to hold controlling interest in any company in the US. Faced with actual conseque…

> They’ve been allowed for decades to avoid paying for the infrastructure and management of the country while simultaneously holding most of the influence.

Maybe you didn't know this but Americans living overseas still have to file and pay US taxes, often getting double-taxed buy two different countries - and often by a higher tax country than the US.

In fact, the US is one of only two countries in the world with this arrangement. I'm an American living overseas and it's a bit of a logical nightmare dealing with all the requirements. Even opening a simple checking account is difficult now for Americans overseas.

Americans who haven't lived overseas or haven't traveled much often have difficulty empathizing. But when we were living in the US, I would have found it very strange if not absurd if my non-US born wife had to file and pay taxes to her country of birth.

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#38

Post by bellyfullofbac »

altcognito wrote: post #2

They’ve been allowed for decades to avoid paying for the infrastructure and management of the country while simultaneously holding most of the influence. “Renouncing citizenship” means they’ll give up none of the influence, lose the taxes, live how and wherever they want. The best thing to do is forbid them re-entry into the country nor to hold controlling interest in any company in the US. Faced with actual conseque…

Close to the top of the article:

> Between the lines: While the numbers are down this year, that's probably because many U.S. embassies and consulates remain closed for COVID-19, and taking this grave step requires taking an oath in front of a State Department officer.

So it seems these are American passport holders who already live in foreign countries, so contributing to American infrastructure, etc, but not benefiting of those things. Obviously having embassies you can go to for help anywhere around the world is useful, but if these are dual-passport holders they probably have the second embassy, for example any EU embassy would help any EU citizen [1].

But well, 2020 saw the worst of Trump saying "Everything is under control!" while ICUs (and morgues) overfilled, so maybe that's a reason for the renouncements. Or maybe was there some new law which was going to come to effect in 2021?

Anyway, I find "forbidding re-entry" is extreme and tinpot-dictatorship-esque.

[1] https://ec.europa.eu/info/policies/justice-and-fundamental-r...

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#39

Post by ren_engineer »

nxmnxm99 wrote: post #16
altcognito wrote: post #2

They’ve been allowed for decades to avoid paying for the infrastructure and management of the country while simultaneously holding most of the influence. “Renouncing citizenship” means they’ll give up none of the influence, lose the taxes, live how and wherever they want. The best thing to do is forbid them re-entry into the country nor to hold controlling interest in any company in the US. Faced with actual conseque…

It's probably pointless to discuss this with someone who insists on generalizing anyone above a certain net worth as being selfish, but - As it turns out, it's no longer the 80s, and there are increasingly multiple other countries were the super-rich can move their activities, wealth and lifestyle to without missing a beat. Hanging around financial circles, I've seen a large exodus of people through the pandemic star…

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 disgusting to most humans. The wealthy have abandoned any sense of duty to their fellow citizens and are somehow shocked people are angry about the situation

Re: Wealthy people are renouncing American citizenship

#40

Post by alephnan »

catillac wrote: post #36
alephnan wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> while simultaneously holding most of the influence. There are 20 million millionaires in the states. This is not even 10,000 people year over year with assets, not even net worth, over $2 million. This is a tiny fraction of the population, most of whom are contrarian or pursue an alternative lifestyle, given that they are living abroad. I would hardly call someone with $2 million as having outsized influenced, they…

This is a fair point

Hence, my point about the power-law / exponential distribution.

Take the logarithm of the number of people who renounce citizenship and you will have the number of people with outsized influence.

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