The Cost Of Brexit

[RJS]

1 hour ago, txomsy said:

FWIW, USA is not the only one. There are EU countries that do the same, if you are a national abroad you are requested to make a tax statement and declare your earnings in your local country as well.

 

It's very comfy to believe one's an exception and turn one's ire on our preferred target, but most of the time the reasons for demonizing someone are not clear cut no matter what anyone says. That's usually a tell tale of a scammer that wants to fuel our need for immediate reward with simple -but profitable for them- storylines.

 

Or, if you want to look at it in another way, it is very difficult that if one entity (government, company, whatever) comes up with a way to increase their income others will not imitate them quickly. Rarely are we the exceptions we are told.

Do any European countries do that, demand a share of income tax, if someone actually emigrates? I thought it was time limited.

[MoriartyR]

1 hour ago, txomsy said:

FWIW, USA is not the only one. There are EU countries that do the same, if you are a national abroad you are requested to make a tax statement and declare your earnings in your local country as well.

 

It's very comfy to believe one's an exception and turn one's ire on our preferred target, but most of the time the reasons for demonizing someone are not clear cut no matter what anyone says. That's usually a tell tale of a scammer that wants to fuel our need for immediate reward with simple -but profitable for them- storylines.

 

Or, if you want to look at it in another way, it is very difficult that if one entity (government, company, whatever) comes up with a way to increase their income others will not imitate them quickly. Rarely are we the exceptions we are told.

No, the US is really the only country in the world that taxes non-resident citizens on their global income. A few other countries tax non-residents for up to six months or a year after they leave, but not beyond that. Eritrea levies a 2% tax on non-residents, but that is small.

 

We’ve drifted off topic but I wanted to at least correct this.

[RJS]

It amused me how Boris Johnson ended up paying considerable sums of money to the US until a few years ago, for his income and house sales, until he finally decided to give up his dream of "becoming British Prime Minister and then getting promoted to American President", and handed back his passport.

[inkstainedruth]

On 1/4/2021 at 7:41 PM, RJS said:

The utterly ridiculous fees of the Global Shipping Program drastically reduced what I bothered to import from the States. Books that previously cost $5 to post suddenly cost $45 to post. I've never bought from any seller that uses that program.

Catching up on this thread.

I'm wondering if GSP is the reason for the spike in shipping charges from the UK to the US.  There are a lot of books I've been watching on eBay (things that are harder to get on this side of the pond -- or at least not easily gotten on eBay) but the shipping charges nearly double the cost in some cases.  So I just keep them on my watch list.

Of course I'm also wondering (with the discussion of how MUCH is being collected by eBay in sales taxes such as VAT) how accurate their system is.  I know that my mother used to have bloody war with mail ordering stuff, because the companies would often flat-fee NYS sales tax to the highest denomination (7% back then -- but that rate was only for NYC and maybe Long Island; where I lived it was 5-3/4% and my mother would carefully calculate that amount and remit that amount -- often with an explanatory letter SAYING why she was only including 5-3/4%).  You'd think that with high speed computers that would be easy to program in changes like that....  But perhaps not; after all, try doing a Google search in quotes these days and see what sort of extraneous hits they think you MIGHT want to see instead.  I've had that problem a lot with online retailers as well, to the point that I spent half of Monday going on various chat windows going "WHAT IS YOUR PROBLEM?  DID I ASK YOU TO SHOW ME "Y" WHEN I ASKED TO BE SHOWN "X"????"  (The worst was a shall remain nameless site who -- in spite of Google believing they carried the "X" item, not only DIDN'T, their website showed me, well, SEX TOYS.... )  Another site told me "Oh, the system thought you might have mistyped your search..." and I said "IT WAS IN QUOTE MARKS!"  And made rude noises about my opinion of "suggestive selling" (a practice I absolutely abhorred when I worked retail years ago, and even more so as a potential customer).  [No, I don't want to hawk the stupee tchotchkes that corporate bought for pennies on the dollar, marked on the packaging at $6.99, and then (every sale!) marked 30% off so the customers would think it was actually a sale....  Reminding customers that they needed thread and maybe straight pins and the right length zipper was one thing (I worked in a fabric store).  The other stuff?  Not so much....]

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[RJS]

The Ebay GSP bull*** ended international shopping from US to abroad. I bought tons of books from America on Ebay before it became a thing, only for GSP to come along, charging ridiculous taxes and duties that don't even apply to books!

 

I can only assume it was to stop an endless stream of people moaning at ebay that they got stung on import duties.

 

Edit: I think Covid has more to do with recent shipping hikes than Brexit, with freight prices soaring with so few planes compared to normal in the skies.

[RJS]

Had anyone ever had a refund on the GSP charge after buying a book? Theoretically they should refund fees they didn't actually pay...

[inkstainedruth]

5 minutes ago, RJS said:

Edit: I think Covid has more to do with recent shipping hikes than Brexit, with freight prices soaring with so few planes compared to normal in the skies.

And that ship running aground in the Suez Canal didn't help, either.  

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[ParramattaPaul]

15 minutes ago, RJS said:

Had anyone ever had a refund on the GSP charge after buying a book? Theoretically they should refund fees they didn't actually pay...

Theory has it yes.  Reality on the other hand...

[ParramattaPaul]

Given that I know someone in the US who planned to buy some perishable goods from the producer on the other side of the country and promptly changed his mind when he found the shipping costs were well in excess of double the cost of the products, I suspect that the outrageous increases we see in shipping may for those in the  EU and UK may be influenced to a degree by Brexit, but are driven by other factors including COVID affecting work forces, and transportation.

[RJS]

2 hours ago, inkstainedruth said:

And that ship running aground in the Suez Canal didn't help, either.  

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

I wonder what is on board that ship, by the way? The contents (and crew) remain captive. If the ship belonged to a powerful or aggressive country Egypt would never have dared impound it and demand a ransom. It was an Egyptian pilot that crashed the boat after all... 

[ParramattaPaul]

2 hours ago, RJS said:

I wonder what is on board that ship, by the way? The contents (and crew) remain captive. If the ship belonged to a powerful or aggressive country Egypt would never have dared impound it and demand a ransom. It was an Egyptian pilot that crashed the boat after all... 

As a guess, and only as a guess, perhaps the Egyptian government is putting the bite on the ship's owners for reparations (the canal) and restitution for the salvage operation costs.

[RJS]

That's more than just a guess. It's happening. But it's like you being forced to lend your friend your car, who then crashes it into some other cars, only for your friend to demand more money from you as the owner of the vehicle than clean up of the accident and repairs will actually cost, because your car hurt his reputation. 
 

Edit: And your friend is holding your family members hostage until you pay up. 😬

[Tinjapan]

On 5/5/2021 at 9:05 PM, Ergative said:

It depends on where you are and how much you earn. (Source; American living abroad who just filed this year's US tax returns, and read the paperwork very carefully.)

 

f you live in certain countries that have agreements with the US (the UK is one such country), America only taxes income above a certain threshold. I think this year it's about $103k. I *ahem* do not earn that much, so I don't have to pay any US taxes. I just tell them my UK salary, show that it falls below the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion threshold, and send in my paperwork. 

 

I suspect the Americans who give up their citizenship are either earning so much abroad that they're well above the threshold, or else they're in countries that don't have that agreement with the US.

It’s a lot more complicated than that.  I too earn far below the FEIE, BUT my banks reports all changes in balance to the US and if not yet, will do so for my kids, born in Japan to a Japanese mother and are under the land of their birth and residence, Japanese citizens.

 

Those relinquishing include those who are far below the reporting/tax threats holds.  Many of us can no longer keep bank accounts unless we provide our banks with a CLN.  

[Tinjapan]

23 hours ago, MoriartyR said:

It’s when they live in low tax countries. UK income tax rates are similar to the US so it doesn’t make much difference. Countries like Singapore and Hong Kong have income tax rates around 15% on average so paying US tax on that is a massive hit. Expats tend to have higher paid jobs too and for that kind of job those countries are very high paying but also have very high costs for upmarket housing. It means the Americans can’t afford the living standards other nationalities enjoy unless their employers bear the huge cost of equalising their taxes (which means hiring an American costs maybe four times the cost of hiring someone else).

 

Mostly true.  American Citizens Abroad. Has in the past published data showing that most US expats do NOT have high earning jobs, are married to non Us citizens are struggling under the reporting requirements despite owning zero in taxes to the US.  We pay where we live. 

[Tinjapan]

20 hours ago, txomsy said:

FWIW, USA is not the only one. There are EU countries that do the same, if you are a national abroad you are requested to make a tax statement and declare your earnings in your local country as well.

 

It's very comfy to believe one's an exception and turn one's ire on our preferred target, but most of the time the reasons for demonizing someone are not clear cut no matter what anyone says. That's usually a tell tale of a scammer that wants to fuel our need for immediate reward with simple -but profitable for them- storylines.

 

Or, if you want to look at it in another way, it is very difficult that if one entity (government, company, whatever) comes up with a way to increase their income others will not imitate them quickly. Rarely are we the exceptions we are told.

No no no.  US Citizens are required to file the full income tax return, transmortifying our non US income and earnings into the US tax system.  There are only two countries that tax their expat communities on income earned outside their native lands, the US and Eritrea.  While not as up to date as I once was, I have been a student of this issue since 8 years ago until some what recently.    

 

That said, several years ago I warned non US citizens coworkers that if the US gets away with this, then other countries will follow.  Other countries have followed but on the reporting of accounts abroad, following the US FBAR, FATCA blueprint with the OECD Common Reporting Standard (CRS), but it still not what FATCA is.   I have yet to read a report of someone being locked out of banking in their own country due to the OECD CRS as people are over the US FATCA regime.  

[MoriartyR]

16 minutes ago, Tinjapan said:

It’s a lot more complicated than that.  I too earn far below the FEIE, BUT my banks reports all changes in balance to the US and if not yet, will do so for my kids, born in Japan to a Japanese mother and are under the land of their birth and residence, Japanese citizens.

 

Those relinquishing include those who are far below the reporting/tax threats holds.  Many of us can no longer keep bank accounts unless we provide our banks with a CLN.  

Yeah, the banking admin is a terrible pain these days, and filing tax returns in multiple countries is a big burden. I never lived in the US but I understand US tax returns are among the most complicated in the world due to all the politically expedient tax breaks and exceptions that have crept into legislation over time.

 

I used to be angry with America because they forced everyone to file W8-Ben forms with their banks periodically, even if, like me, you have never had any connection with America or its tax system. I used to refuse and most banks reluctantly accepted that in the end. But now this has spread everywhere and there is just no avoiding filing loads of forms and documents with your bank every few years or every time you change your address. I wish you hadn’t mentioned FATCA; I’m having an anxiety attack now.

 

You would think the world would become more accommodating to people who live international lives, as more of us have done so, but in recent years it has only become much more complicated and burdensome. One of my pet peeves!

 

[Tinjapan]

1 minute ago, MoriartyR said:

Yeah, the banking admin is a terrible pain these days, and filing tax returns in multiple countries is a big burden. I never lived in the US but I understand US tax returns are among the most complicated in the world due to all the politically expedient tax breaks and exceptions that have crept into legislation over time.

 

I used to be angry with America because they forced everyone to file W8-Ben forms with their banks periodically, even if, like me, you have never had any connection with America or its tax system. I used to refuse and most banks reluctantly accepted that in the end. But now this has spread everywhere and there is just no avoiding filing loads of forms and documents with your bank every few years or every time you change your address.

 

You would think the world would become more accommodating to people who live international lives, as more of us have done so, but in recent years it has only become much more complicated and burdensome. One of my pet peeves!

 

Boy, ain’t that the truth.  

 

I have to ask, how is it that you had to file a US W8 even though you have never lived in the US nor had any connection to the US?  No matter how much I have studied the issues surrounding all this mess, there is still so much more out there to learn, which is in large part why I stopped a while back.

[Tinjapan]

17 hours ago, inkstainedruth said:

Catching up on this thread.

I'm wondering if GSP is the reason for the spike in shipping charges from the UK to the US.  There are a lot of books I've been watching on eBay (things that are harder to get on this side of the pond -- or at least not easily gotten on eBay) but the shipping charges nearly double the cost in some cases.  So I just keep them on my watch list.

Of course I'm also wondering (with the discussion of how MUCH is being collected by eBay in sales taxes such as VAT) how accurate their system is.  I know that my mother used to have bloody war with mail ordering stuff, because the companies would often flat-fee NYS sales tax to the highest denomination (7% back then -- but that rate was only for NYC and maybe Long Island; where I lived it was 5-3/4% and my mother would carefully calculate that amount and remit that amount -- often with an explanatory letter SAYING why she was only including 5-3/4%).  You'd think that with high speed computers that would be easy to program in changes like that....  But perhaps not; after all, try doing a Google search in quotes these days and see what sort of extraneous hits they think you MIGHT want to see instead.  I've had that problem a lot with online retailers as well, to the point that I spent half of Monday going on various chat windows going "WHAT IS YOUR PROBLEM?  DID I ASK YOU TO SHOW ME "Y" WHEN I ASKED TO BE SHOWN "X"????"  (The worst was a shall remain nameless site who -- in spite of Google believing they carried the "X" item, not only DIDN'T, their website showed me, well, SEX TOYS.... )  Another site told me "Oh, the system thought you might have mistyped your search..." and I said "IT WAS IN QUOTE MARKS!"  And made rude noises about my opinion of "suggestive selling" (a practice I absolutely abhorred when I worked retail years ago, and even more so as a potential customer).  [No, I don't want to hawk the stupee tchotchkes that corporate bought for pennies on the dollar, marked on the packaging at $6.99, and then (every sale!) marked 30% off so the customers would think it was actually a sale....  Reminding customers that they needed thread and maybe straight pins and the right length zipper was one thing (I worked in a fabric store).  The other stuff?  Not so much....]

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

So I am NOT the only one having trouble with web searches!?  Not sure if that knowledges reassures me or depresses me......   Try searching for something Japanese!  Oh the hours of enjoyment that can bring!

[Tinjapan]

16 hours ago, RJS said:

Had anyone ever had a refund on the GSP charge after buying a book? Theoretically they should refund fees they didn't actually pay...

I have never gotten a refund from them on anything I bough through the GSP.  

 

[Tinjapan]

13 hours ago, RJS said:

I wonder what is on board that ship, by the way? The contents (and crew) remain captive. If the ship belonged to a powerful or aggressive country Egypt would never have dared impound it and demand a ransom. It was an Egyptian pilot that crashed the boat after all... 

Sadly for the Captain, the Captain is always responsible, even when the pilot wreaks his ship.