Posted on 04/12/2010 8:19:59 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Edited on 04/12/2010 8:21:54 AM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]
Chile:
1) Violent crime rate in Chile is about 1/7 that of the US (don’t remember the source)
2) Bureacracy much worse than US.
3) Typically left of center type of governance.
4) I love Chile (8 years residence)
Not only the rich brother. We left last summer to WV. It was the silly taxes in Montgomery County that finally did the trick. Saving money now and happy we left.
It is buried in the latest $17.6 billion "jobs" bill.
The best I can find is at this link.
Looks like it basically makes it so people can’t pull their unrealized gains to some other country and then realize them there to avoid taxation. That actually doesn’t seem out of line to me.
I think explicit in the article was the idea that it wasn’t just American’s tyring to avoid taxes by using offshore accounts.
It was people actually LEAVING. As in renouncing their citizenship altogether, or in the case of Green Card holders, just turning in the Green Card and going home.
I think America has a moral right to not allow rich people to hide their income in offshore banks. I don’t think America has a moral right to tax people on money that make overseas, while they are living overseas, after they have reounced their citizenship for 10 years after they have left. (As I believe current law allows.)
That to me stinks of totalitarianism, and very much reminds me of the way the Soviet Union acted> “We OWN our citizens. You, citizen, are an assett of the state.”
Except there are many countries that don't engage in mutual back scraching agreements. These are known as "tax havens". Different ones have different methods for helping people avoid taxes. It must be working. The carribean tax havens are among the higest holders of US Bonds. (IE: There is A LOT of money in those places.)
And then, of course, just because there is some treaty in place doesn't mean that the jurisdiction in question will actaully live up to them. In many cases they were more or less blackmailed into accepting them, and feel a lot more loyalty to their many private banking clients than to the US diplomat who they are supposed to be cooperating with.
The USA is not the only place were bureacrats can fail to perform to expectations.
Welcome aboard! FReegards, Z
Well, that's the biggest problem with Singapore - and Hong Kong. Very capitalist places, but achieving anything close to the typical suburban American quality of life costs millions. Even professionals have to live like graduate students in New York City - tiny apartment, no car, contending with vast crowds of people.
Of course, Americans are probably on the verge of losing that quality of life, too.
If you have no intention of ever coming back (barring pardon, repeal of that law, or outright revolution), where’s the downside?
At least our liveaboard sailboat is paid off!
If we had to, we could become sea gypsies
I can still taste Bhame Bha...
(that's the "33" beer, BTW)
Who is John Galt?
Not really. The new law is designed to catch additional taxes, not to stop people leaving. They want to catch (a) tax-evading US citizens, (b) non-citizens who are making $s in the US and taking it home. They may net the illegals, as well as rich guys, with the last one.
I’ll never leave America. Never.
I’ll die here. One way or another.
At some point, I will make my consumption/tax footprint very small. I will try to contribute the least to the tax Monster that I possibly can. No matter how my beloved nation goes, I can’t leave her.
I will leave my lost State of California as soon as I retire, and good riddance. But America? No, I will never leave her, no matter the conditions. I will find a place in the lower 48 to hole up and keep pulling the R lever. I’ll do what I can for myself. I’ll do what I can for future generations.
But leave? I just can’t do that. Maybe it is is good I’m just a middle-class working stiff with a paltry net worth. I don’t have enough to lose to need to flee my beloved country.
I’m not going anywhere. One way or another, I’ll be buried here. I’ll make the best of what I can and if I have to fight at some point, then I have to fight.
We have lost some states. We haven’t lost the entire nation.
The backlash against the Democrats through 2012 should be epic. If we get the Depression I think we’ll get, we may make more than a few Conservatives among the idiot middle class liberals who can only learn their lessons the hard way. If we get enough of them, well the takers depend on the idiocy of those liberals to keep the swill flowing in the trough. So if we get enough of those idiot libs to see the light when taxes get too high and benefits get too small and they start to see how their young adult children have no chance to start in the world because those young adults are hamstrung by the idiot policies they voted for for decades, we may just see a lot more Conservatives come from their ranks, and then the takes will be SOL.
I’m not expecting it, but a good solid Depression could make many Conservatives from current liberals. I can only hope.
Either way, I’m not going anywhere. I am here to stay. America is my nation and I’m not going anywhere.
WV is Gods country. Beautiful state. I pass through it several times a year.
There's not a chance in Hell that the top 1% are significantly composed of the people you're talking about.
300 million Americans. So the top 1% is 3 million people. Let's say that only 1% of them are foreigners. That's still 30,000 people. Maryland noticed 1,000 millionaires leaving. I'm pretty sure there are 30,000 rich foreigners living in the USA on Green Cards. I'm pretty sure most of them understand moving to create and protect wealth.
That's what the math looks like to me, anyway.
Yeah, I love flying over West Virginia! / humor
Seriously: Can anyone recommend any books on "going Galt?" I'm not talking about survivalist manuals encouraging you to buy canned goods and howing how to dig your own latrines. I mean book which can help in relocating and/or converting assets, or in selecting "safe havens." (And no, I'm not super-rich!)
Regards,
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