MOAR Tax?

October 16, 2018 Longrider Civil Liberties, General News, General Rants, misanthropy, Political 16

Or less tax?

A blacklist of 21 countries whose so-called “golden passport” schemes threaten international efforts to combat tax evasion has been published by the west’s leading economic thinktank.

Three European countries – Malta, Monaco and Cyprus – are among those nations flagged as operating high-risk schemes that sell either residency or citizenship in a report released on Tuesday by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development.

The Paris-based body has raised the alarm about the fast-expanding $3bn (£2.3bn) citizenship by investment industry, which has turned nationality into a marketable commodity.

To which I say “boo hoo.” Tax evasion is a concern for those countries in which it occurs and it is up to them to take the necessary action against those they find guilty. However, these nations that sell residence are sovereign nations. What they do is no one else’s business. That’s it, frankly. No one, neither individual nor nation has any right to interfere in the domestic arrangements of another sovereign nation.

As for international attempts to deal with tax evasion – tough. Every penny that does not go into the state’s coffers is a penny well spent, frankly. If people want to take the risk, that’s up to them. I really don’t care about it and won’t be losing any sleep over it.

But concern is growing among political leaders, law enforcement and intelligence agencies that the schemes are open to abuse by criminals and sanctions-busting business people.

Meh. Criminals use the telephone, the Internet, the post system… Pretty much anything is open to abuse. Deal with the abuse if you come across it. Otherwise fuck off.

After analysing residence and citizenship schemes operated by 100 countries, the OECD says it is naming those jurisdictions that attract investors by offering low personal tax rates on income from foreign financial assets, while also not requiring an individual to spend a significant amount of time in the country.

So what? Good for them. If it works in their interests, more power to their elbow.

Second passports can be misused by those wishing to “hide assets held abroad”, according to the thinktank.

As I said, anything can be abused. Think-tanks that are state sponsored should all be shut down anyway as they are a waste of my tax money. If these schemes reduce the amount available for such prolific waste, then they are a good thing.

The OECD believes the ease with which the wealthiest individuals can obtain another nationality is undermining information sharing.

And this is a bad thing? Far too much is shared already. More secrecy and less transparency is what we need. Data mining by an over-intrusive state needs to be kicked back.

Let’s put it this way: If the state (and it’s not just ours) wasn’t so greedy, so spendthrift, so fucking profligate, like a drunken sailor on shore leave after months at sea, they could afford to lower taxes to the point where evasion would be a waste of effort. But no, having got their hands on all that moolah – and spending other people’s money is so damned sexy – they can’t let go. They are no longer the drunken sailor they are the alcohol dependent soak who just can’t stop. This little scheme is simply the latest ploy to plunder other people’s bank accounts now that the pot has run dry.

16 Comments

  1. Dead right. Thieving little twats. Its the same old socialist drivel. “You’ve got it, and I want it, and I’ll take it by whatever means I can”

    Never mind that government spray it all over the place like a bloody hose.

    I’m chuffed all these places exist. I might even investigate further – to keep my hard earned spondooliks out of their grubby little mitts.

    • Hopeully, post-EU, there’ll be far, far less of this “spraying money about everywhere” business.

  2. Whereas the good countries are happy to adopt as citizens incomers who have zilch assets, income, skills and are a negative on a country’s books.
    Shurely shomething wrong there.

  3. As for international attempts to deal with tax evasion – tough. Every penny that does not go into the state’s coffers is a penny well spent, frankly. If people want to take the risk, that’s up to them. I really don’t care about it and won’t be losing any sleep over it.

    +1

    Lower taxes result in less tax evasion and avoidance. You’d think Gov’t would know that by now. Imho they do, but virtue signalling to buy votes considered more important.

    Trump, following in Margaret & Ronald footsteps shows lower taxes are a positive for all but spiteful Lefties who would never vote Con/Rep regardless of bribes and pandering

      • @Paul

        Also one that would reduce benefits by under 50% (instead of current 70% to over 100%) of what you earn to get off benefits?

        I would.

        • I’m genuinely disabled, so I wonder what work here would actually be for those of us.

          But yes, I would vote for a general reduction in taxation. You don’t want genuinely disabled people that can’t stand up for themselves serving you in the local ASDA, for nstance.

          • @Paul,

            Difficult problem to solve by state as so many variations of “disabled” exist.

            Allowing private sector to solve is best solution: Remove minimum wage and punitive benefits reductions on earnings, provide more help with independent transport (car) to get to work.

            Asda – they would employ if benefit/profit greater than cost.

            In past many received a Blue Three Wheeler. Left/SJWs stopped that – discrimination, insulting, unsafe blah.

            Unsafe etc – so what, I’m disabled, gives freedom. Bicycles & MCs are “unsafe” and give freedom. Life is “unsafe” – we all die.

          • The main point I was attempting to make here is that, yes, there is a difference between the different types of disabled people. A disabled person with very poor social skills might be brilliant in a non-public facing role, but you don’t want the genuinely visibly disabled serving customers in a café, a supermarket or a restaurant – there are some genuinely abusive and hateful people out there and we must protect these people from them. To make them be a public face in such a capacity would be an absolute national scandal.

  4. ‘… by offering low personal tax rates on income from foreign financial assets,’

    If they are paying tax, how can it be tax evasion?

    Bilateral tax agreements mean tax paid in one jurisdiction is offset against liability in another so tax is not paid twice. That can only be done by making a declaration in both jurisdictions, that is obeying the law.

    It sounds like evasion and avoidance, the former illegal, the latter not, are being conflated – a usual tactic for those who do not respect property rights and believe other people’s money belongs to the Government.

  5. It’s a problem because of the fact that the people they sell residence to might be criminal. Not only that, depending on what arrangement we cook up with Malta and Cyprus, those people might gain the right to live here.

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