Mastodawn

Silversnapples Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 thank you.
This hit the nail on the head.

TC Won't Give In To Lies Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6

One could even say it is "unpatriotic" to abandon your country to avoid paying taxes that were increased thru a democratic process.

Seems like a clear choice of choosing money over society and democracy.

@TCatInReality @ChrisMayLA6

Every hyperwealthy person in existence has been hitting "DEFECT" on the prisoner's dilemma, over and over, from the moment they became an adult. We shouldn't expect them to behave any differently now. This is what money does to a mf.

Patriotism is just a lie they tell us to distract us from noticing.

TC Won't Give In To Lies Jun 22

@passenger @ChrisMayLA6

Good point. I have often wondered how it is that empathy-less sociopaths are so often the most successful.

@TCatInReality @ChrisMayLA6

To an extent I think there's some survivorship bias here: there are loads of empathyless assholes who achieve nothing in life, but we never hear about them.

But in an unequal society, where "success" is defined as the ability to tread on others, empathy is a disadvantage. We can build a better society in which this isn't the case, but we can't do so in a way that requires the buy-in from those who are "successful" under our current system. Master's house, master's tools, and all that.

Nicovel0 🍉Jun 22

@passenger @TCatInReality @ChrisMayLA6 unsuccessful empathy less sociopaths are basically criminals. Come to think of it, so are the successful ones.

@Nicovel0 @TCatInReality @ChrisMayLA6

You're only a criminal if the government decides what you're doing is criminal. Hence, in the UK, helping refugees is a criminal act while arming genocidaires isn't.

Criminality sounds pretty empathic right now, come to think of it.

@passenger @Nicovel0 @TCatInReality

Ha ha, yes I like this line of thought & used to use it with my students quiet a lot - crime (for the most part) is a definitional not a social category

Steven Heywood Jun 22

@passenger @Nicovel0 @TCatInReality @ChrisMayLA6
You're only a criminal if the government decides what you're doing is criminal and if it chooses to enforce the investigation and prosecution of that criminality. Thus the criminality of the rich and the powerful — if established officially at all — is generally established posthumously.

@Stevenheywood @Nicovel0 @TCatInReality @ChrisMayLA6

That is true and I concede the point. Powerful people being criminals is only established in hindsight (that is, once they stop being powerful, often when they stop being alive.)

Steven Heywood Jun 22

@passenger @Nicovel0 @TCatInReality @ChrisMayLA6
This is why governments hate collective action: politically weak individuals might become powerful entities.

Natasha Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 Clearly they don’t care about the country they live in, just their money, while asylum seekers are often desperate to give something back to the country that supports them to survive. Yet we lionise the one that would contribute, not the other.

@nusher

good point, well (and succinctly) expressed.... and boosted!

Ian Turton Jun 22

@nusher @ChrisMayLA6 as in most these things poor(er) people are much more likely to spend their money often in the local community while the wealthy will invest it where ever gives the best return.

@ianturton @nusher

Indeed, what Keynes referred to as 'effective demand'

Whiskers 🇦🇺Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 A lot of celebrities have become 'tax exiles' in the #USA over the past few decades.
'Choice' is a bittersweet thing.

djsf Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 but why do you want to punish them for being successful? /s

djsf Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 least unhinged right wing talking point

@ChrisMayLA6
https://taxjustice.net/press/millionaire-exodus-did-not-occur-study-reveals/

MostlyTato Jun 22

Millionaire exodus did not occur, study reveals - Tax Justice Network

The number of millionaires widely reported in the news to be leaving countries in "exodus" represented near-0% of all millionaires.

Tax Justice Network

@MostlyTato

Ah yes, I know this research - interestingly, the difference between the change the TJN focussed on & the Labour change is the extent of the shift in taxation... I have cited the TJN work before, but some are arguing (possibly correctly, possibly not) that the larger shift in NonDom rules has encouraged the rich to re-locate.... even if this is so, it remains a choice about not being willing to contribute, not an issue of being 'forced'

Jeremy Burgess Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 my heart goes out to the 0.3% of them* who feel like their life choices force them to move.

* I'm guessing that natural attrition would be about this anyway, and nobody is giving figures for millionaire net migration which, I would guess, more than balances the 1:300 who had been counted then left.

@Goldfigure

Agreed; net migration is the issue, not the consultants bleating on about their client being 'forced' to relocate to the suburbs of Madrid!

Rachel Lee Nabors Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 Yeah, it's like a manipulative partner saying "look what you made me do!" Dude, you did that of your own volition

A Fine Day to Return Home 🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍🌈🇺🇦🇵🇸Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 honestly, Apple can leave. Fuck off already.

pawkypaul Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6
The tax avoiding ultra rich are the people I think of whenever I hear that phrase 'citizens of nowhere'

David Chisnall (*Now with 50% more sarcasm!*)Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 But when they leave, you need to do a few other things:

Start properly taxing assets they have in the country.
Bring back limits on media ownership (no newspapers or TV stations can be majority owned by foreign nationals, for example).
Ban any direct or indirect contributions to political parties by them.

You want to leave? Leave.

Oh, and ideally do what the USA does and have a big exit tax. Have a reasonably high threshold, maybe £2M, but you pay 50% tax on all assets above that line when you leave.

Jonathan Schofield Jun 22

@david_chisnall @ChrisMayLA6

a hand wavy addendum from me https://mastodon.social/@urlyman/114053345435114146

@david_chisnall

Ah yes, but that is on renouncing citizenship... I'm not sure the NonDoms are doing that - this is where the US's sovereign assertion to tax all citizens' income (wherever earned) is different from the UK tax code... for better or worse depending on how you see extraterritorial taxation

Schroedinger Jun 22

@david_chisnall @ChrisMayLA6 Border money controls are essential. 60% for those living in the UK, 70% for those outside, and ensure that a) people cannot hide all their money offshore before running away. And b) it will discourage people from taking all of their money out of the country.

Of course, this will be politically challenging, not least becasue all of the politicans will be impacted by this. And their paymasters.

Fish Id Wardrobe Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 and apparently there is little evidence that they leave, anyway…

@fishidwardrobe

see earlier reply in this thread

Steve Williams Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6
My wife teaches at a private school. Her wages have been frozen, so that parents don’t have to play the VAT, and can maintain their lifestyle.
FFS.

https://energyasicit.ca/MMT/

Icanbob Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 Is it possible that MMT is on to something and we are looking at taxes from the wrong lens?

Lisa DiFalco Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 What’s not being said is that the “wealthy” can only take their liquid assets with them - usually cash, which is probably held in offshore accounts anyway. Most of their wealth is derived from physical assets in their country of domicile. It’s not like they can pack a Kensington mansion in their suitcase.

@LisaDiFalco1

Ah yes, but they can sell it... and by private contract

@LisaDiFalco1

But, the issue is I guess how attached they are to such assets & their life styles - the TJN piece which is alluded to in this thread suggests the rich often don't leave for social/lifestyle reasons, which in the ned are more important to them than the tax issues....

Lisa DiFalco Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 In the end they miss proper fish and chips.

Alex@rtnVFRmedia Suffolk UK Jun 22

@LisaDiFalco1 @ChrisMayLA6 whilst neither of them have moaned in public about taxes, both Sir Rod Stewart and the drum and bass DJ/Producer DJ Rap fairly recently left the USA and returned to Essex in the wake of the fallout from the first Trump régime...

Lisa DiFalco Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 Even so the asset is still here, and, in an ideal world, triggers a capital gains event.

@LisaDiFalco1

fair comment....

Jochen Diekenbrock Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 there is also #citizenship-based taxation, which I think is worth to think about: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_taxation

International taxation - Wikipedia

Jennifer C J Radtke Jun 22

@diekenbrock @ChrisMayLA6 from experience - this is a pain for ordinary people who live abroad...

Strypey Jun 22

@diekenbrock
> there is also citizenship-based taxation

This is new to me, but I presume the idea that people pay tax on all their income, regardless of which jurisdiction its earned in (in practice or in theory). How does it work for those with dual citizenship?

@ChrisMayLA6

Emeritus Prof Christopher May Jun 23

@strypey @diekenbrock

The US tax system has (I believe) an allowance for claiming tax has been paid on earnings already (via various double taxation agreements) so that citizens whose earning are taxed by other countries only pay one slice of tax not two

Cynthia 💣🏳️‍⚧️Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6

Makes sense.

So how do we force them to leave?

Levka Jun 22

@la_sombra @ChrisMayLA6

More Luigis?

Sean Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 aren't the wealthiest individuals able structure their finances so that regardless of where they actually live, their wealth will be where there's the least tax liability with the most access to it? If I fund my black AMEX with my overseas bank account I can pay for everything in whatever country I'm in and my money will continue to be growing with interests and dividends with nominal taxes.

Sean Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 There's hundreds of global oligarchs who own billions of dollars in Manhattan real estate, the inverse is also true billionaires who live in Manhattan but their wealth is not in the US. Just repeat this for anywhere there are wealthy people.

@Sean

yes, that's why many prefer a wealth tax based on material property

Sean Jun 26

@ChrisMayLA6 most wealth is financial securities and those securities can be owned by foreign entities the owner of that entity is living in a high tax nation, making the bulk of the wealth untaxed. My first home that I owned was a condo, when my family got bigger (in-laws needed to snowbird with us during summer) we moved to stand alone house but kept the condo. As an asset owned by my LLC my tax liability fell drastically, I received this tax benefit unintentionally, others will seek it out

Dethrone Dog Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 what’s more, they largely do not actually do this. They threaten to leave when taxes are proposed, and then just grumble (and try to evade them) when the taxes are actually put in place.

@sanedragon

see earlier reply in this thread on the Tax Justice Network research... and a link to it

Robin Barton Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 The 1% are untethered to any country or moral code

Marcus Rohrmoser 🌻Jun 22

Hi @ChrisMayLA6,
…and those laws are - I suppose - the result of a democratic process. It's the rules the population gives itself. That's not an arbitrary individual with a grudge.

@mro

Indirectly; I'm not sure anyone really votes only the issue of modification to the tax code, but certainly the Govt. is (in a democracy) representative, and so these rule have been made (in a formal sense) for the common/social good - indeed that is, to my mind, the central purpose of taxation

Toni Aittoniemi Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 Correct, as long as they need your market, and most of the time they do.

Threats for them to no have access to your market any longer work especially well for big markets, like the EU.

Lose that market, lose the business. Goverenments have huge power over business. But the political narratives are spun otherwise.

Paul Lalonde Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 Tax their assets. Apply an exit tax to all their assets should they decide to leave. Solved.

Stoneface Vimes Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 not victims - yet😉

iantra Jun 22

@ChrisMayLA6 adding to this, wealthy people leaving the country is not the same as wealth itself leaving. Most of the wealth they have is in assets rather than cash, many of which necessarily can't be taken out of the country (real estate, natural resources, shares in companies). All of that wealth stays even if they do leave.