Ex-American citizens are suing the US government because they say the $2,350 fee they paid to renounce their citizenships is too high.
  • Hyperreality@kbin.social
    7·
    1 year ago

    Thereby handily ignoring the rest of my comment, because you’d prefer to think of anyone who wants to renounce citizenship as a rich tax evader, rather than admit that there are plenty of reasons why someone might not want to have American citizenship, because shock horror not everyone wants to be American, live in the US, or loves the US. Especially if they’ve never lived there or visited.

    Imagine having been born in Italy during a long holiday, and for the rest of your life being forced to fill in Italian tax forms, despite working a minimum wage job and having no idea how the Italian system works and barely speaking the language. And when you try to get a loan from a American bank, they say no, because they’d have to file relevant paperwork with the Italian equivalent of the IRS.

    • givesomefucks@lemmy.worldEnglish
      3·
      1 year ago

      In that example it would cost $0 to renounce citizenship…

      I don’t think repeating it again is going to help you bro, either read the link or just accept you don’t get it. I do t need constant updates that you still don’t understand

      • Hyperreality@kbin.social
        2·
        1 year ago

        Imagine a scenario where you gained Italian citizenship through an accident of birth. Your parents were on holiday, your mother went into labour a bit earlier than expected.

        Is the only reason you wouldn’t want to be Italian that you want to avoid paying tax there?

        • givesomefucks@lemmy.worldEnglish
          1·
          1 year ago

          If they wait till after they make six figures and get taxed…

          Yeah, that’s a safe assumption. If it wasn’t taxes, they’d have done it sooner, it’s not like people jump straight into six figures buddy

          • Hyperreality@kbin.social
            3·
            1 year ago

            If it wasn’t taxes, they’d have done it sooner,

            The Guardian:

            By some calculations, there may be as many as 30,000 people among the estimated 5 million to 9 million US citizens living abroad who would like to begin the renunciation process but can’t.

            …

            Marie Sock, the first woman to stand as a presidential candidate in the Gambia, was forced to pull out of the race recently after she failed to get any response to her request to renounce her US nationality from the US embassy.

            …

            He became disillusioned when he learned that because his son was born outside the US he would not be eligible for US citizenship, and yet because of James’s citizenship he would treated as if he were a US taxpayer. That struck him as a modern form of taxation without representation. For the past year he has been trying to get through to an official who will help him renounce his citizenship, without success. “I never asked for US citizenship, and now I’m not even allowed to give it up.”

            https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/dec/31/americans-seeking-renounce-citizenship-stuck

            • givesomefucks@lemmy.worldEnglish
              1·
              1 year ago

              Your article is talking about specific delays during COVID because stuff was shut down because of COVID…

              Which, since you didn’t know, fucked up a lot of shit.

              For almost two years, since the pandemic struck in March 2020, most US consular missions around the world have suspended their expatriation services for those wishing to give up US citizenship. The US embassy in London, the largest of its sort in western Europe, announces on its website that it is “currently unable to accept appointments for loss of nationality applications” and is unable to say when services will resume.

              The US state department says giving up citizenship requires a face-to-face interview with a government official, and that it is too risky given coronavirus.

              If that COVID denying trump supporter would have done it at some point of the decade abroad before a worldwide pandemic, it would have been easy. Everyone is that article is talking about how COVID affected it, not how it normally is.