721–730 of 876 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ehhh not sure about that. America doesn't have high taxes compared to many other places to live. This isn't as clear cut as I think you think it is.
Not to derail, but surely you're aware that tax-funded services taken for granted in those "many other places" are separate fees in the US.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The last I heard, the Houthis let the Americans go. Navy SEALs from the Navy SMU parachuted into Africa in the dead of night to save a missionary kidnapped from a known conflict zone, killing 6 of 7 combatants (one wonders if they let the last guy go to spread Fear amongst his fellows). Perhaps some of you had different experiences (and/or perhaps the State Department really, really wanted you to leave), but that doe…
> to save a missionary That could have been just Trump pandering to his base. Moreover, from your link: > Additionally American aid worker Jeffery Woodke was kidnapped from Abalak in October 2016, and is believed to be held in Mali. How come no SEALs have parachuted to rescue Jeffery yet, huh? Reinforces my theory that it was just election-time pandering by Trump. You're telling me that the US will do that for every…
That's pretty weak, you have to admit. Wouldn't Obama send the same men in to save a citizen? I think he would. This is undeniably what our military is for, what those special mission units are for, and what those operators live for. They went in to do God's Work, and luckily this time it worked with no Good Guy casualties. Why would you doubt this?
> How come no SEALs have parachuted to rescue Jeffery yet, huh? Reinforces my theory that it was just election-time pandering by Trump.
Maybe because they don't have actionable intel to find and fix him? Maybe because the Bad Guys weren't so stupid as to use something that would show up on our various SIGINT collection platforms? It's not always a great big Trumpian conspiracy.
> But how did they get out? Who picked them up?
The Omani military, our allies. I suspect more than one person on that flight didn't have an Omani passport.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
These are people with a few million in assets. Enough to retire comfortably. These are not the "Power Elite". At least, there is no evidence that these people are "Ultra-Wealthy", only that they have reached a certain threshold that the US Govt keeps track of them. And it's peaked at around 7,000 persons per year. Hardly a tidal wave of capital flight. Have you considered that this story was titled in such a way to e…
I forgot I was on HN. Before we start discussing white papers on how emotionally gullible consumers of information can be, let's look at the article, shall we? "There are probably 20,000 or 30,000 people who want to do this, but they can’t get the appointment". And "A lot of people who take this drastic step are tech zillionaires: Eric Schmidt, the former Alphabet CEO, has applied to become a citizen of Cyprus."
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think it reached a point of no return. HK is still a very special place, but I see a lot of expats leaving for Singapore and Hkers leaving for overseas(BNO visa). Singapore is more stable, but has even less freedoms than HK though.
Depending on how bad it turns out I could see a wave of HK emigration to the UK. Similar how a lot of Asians living in Africa (Uganda Kenya etc.) did in the 1970's, Without the ethnic cleansing aspect.
My friend moved on that visa this week. Before Hong Kongers could get a BNO passport and it wasn’t particularly useful. The British government changed the conditions a year ago, and now it’s an open residence permit with a direct path to full citizenship.
There are at least a million people eligible for a BNO passport.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
What's the embassy doing for me as an American citizen living abroad who uses none of their services (except passport renewal but that's only because of the other ridiculous rule that US citizens must travel there on a US passport). Why am I paying for it?
What's the fire department doing for me, a citizen of my town who has not experienced any fires? Why am I paying for it?
I guess to fit in your analogy I live underwater?
Interesting facts about renouncing American citizenship: - There is renunciation fee that has to be paid and currently stands at $2,350 (the highest in the world).[1] - A final tax return will sill need to be filed. [1] - An Expatriation tax is payable if [..] Your net worth is $2 million or more on the date of your expatriation. you will be treated as having disposed of your assets the day before your expatriation a…
It's even more expensive than that since they don't refund you the money you paid into Social Security when you renounce.
https://www.aarp.org/retirement/social-security/questions-an...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
(you seem to have been shadow banned, might be working asking dang why - I couldn't see anything in your history from a mod)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23559004
I believe BLM to be led by Marxists and that is backed up by objective evidence. I'm not sure why that's controversial. It's also objectively true that George Floyd had a criminal record. Again, I'm not sure why that's controversial. One can be very socially aware and also recognize those two facts. It is indeed problematic that Floyd pointed a gun at the abdomen of a woman whom he thought was pregnant during a home invasion robbery, or that he had significant amounts of narcotics in his system when he died. That doesn't make his death justifiable, it's just the real life complications of a real life case (which tend not to be overly clean). When did we get afraid of objective facts?
EDIT: Downvoters: explain why. Simple Q. What is it about facts you don't like?
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…
This was to close certain problematic tax avoidance issues. People were fleeting from the US to avoid paying taxes, but kept all the benefits, or hid the money off-shore. The problem here is that they never raised the amount you must report, because in the past, 150k used to be a lot. Now that should be closer to 500k. But like the minimum wage and tax brackets, they haven't kept it up with inflation. Not in the way…
There's a heavy to push to make this available to anyone regardless of citizenship, claiming that providing proof of identity will be burdensome. This is the same group that touted election fraud, russian interference and other false narratives for 4 years after the prior candidate lost.
Pretty crazy with people like Eric Schmitt applying for Cyrus citizenship. The guy is worth $20+ billion. You'd think at that point you hate tax like the rest of us but recognise it makes zero difference to your own quality of life and this is what funds great nations. US and other countries need to come down hard on wealth movement in general. Biden's global tax minimums are a good start but government will need to…
And in other threads, I think people are expecting wealth to become hypermobile. Maybe even to the point that theft is so hard to reverse that digital money is only valuable given the protections of being a citizen of a certain kind of state.
People here have negative opinions about know-your-customer obstructions to personal banking, even though we are all hurt by money laundering.
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…
In case anyone is interested, the taxation on Americans abroad isn’t new but has its roots in the 1860s with the U.S. Civil War: https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2015-04-24/end-th... . FATCA is annoying. I don’t mind taxes. I want the process to be fair, predictable, and not exceptional. It’s a travesty the United States has been most of my adult life a failed state, which makes the tax treatment insult to…