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Dear rss free blog,
To:
The Resident
1600
Pennsylvania Ave., N.W.
Washington,
D.C. 20000
United
States
Dear
Resident:
This
is to inform you that a large sum of money has been left in the will
of the late Alfred Nobel, deceased, to anyone at the above address
who is not named George W. Bush.
To
collect your prize, please provide us with your confidential bank account details.
There
are no conditions regarding the payment to you. It is made because we
at the Academy of Sciences in Stockholm did not have the opportunity
to vote for you and we would have liked to.
Our
vote is therefore being made with some Swedish kronor instead. We
would like to remind you why George W. Bush was not allowed to win
our prize.
-
He cut brush in Texas instead of traveling around the world and never made it to Scandinavia at all. You visited already even if you did not land the Olympics for Chicago.
-
His wife was a sensible WASP librarian with no Jackie-style glamour. Michelle is something else.
-
Bush did not rein in the Israelis enough. You may we hope.
-
He mocked global warming and climate risks. You won’t. Al Gore, your predecessor in winning, will make sure of that.
-
He cut taxes instead of adding Swedish-style social services for the people. You’re trying on health care.
-
He did not support freer trade and engaged in protectionist measures to satisfy some US industries. Don’t do it again.
-
He got the whole world into this mess. You may just extract us.
Mr.
Resident, note that the lower the dollar falls in the coming weeks,
the more your payment will be worth to you. Our fee for reserving
your place and tailcoat at the ceremony with our Tribal Chief of SEK
4000 should be paid as quickly as possible to avoid it becoming more
expensive in your currency.
Signed:
For the Nobel Peace Prize Committee.
Erik The Red
While
the Nobel prizes are a way for Sweden to gain global clout, the US
has its own system: tax imperialism. American law since the start of
the 19th century has claimed extraterritoriality. That
means our country likes to apply its laws to foreigners if their
actions affect the U.S. for example in anti-trust.
And
it is even keener to apply American rules to Americans wherever they
happen to live and work. The USA is almost unique in the world for
taxing its citizens on worldwide income, even if they are living in a
foreign country to earn it. (If they live in the US and win the Nobel
Prize, of course they have to pay taxes on it.)
Extraterritorial
tax burdens are relieved by double-taxation treaties with a bunch of
respectable countries, to make sure that the same earnings are not
taxed twice. But the issue is not just about earned income.
Some
Americans seek to escape the IRS by surrendering their passports. Sir
John Templeton became a Bahamian for that purpose. But nowadays,
renouncing your nationality incurs a disuasive tax too. Moreover,
ex-American tax exiles can still be taxed for some US assets:
property, gifts to American residents (like family), and for their
estates.
One
of the oldest banks in Switzerland, Wegelin & Co., decided
to say “genug”. It has pulled all investment out of the US and will turn any Americans who manage to find their discrete brass plate away from their doors. The
reason is simple: if it has a deceased client from a third country
whose heirs include ones who at one point in their lives were subject
to US taxes (as a student, say), the whole estate becomes subject to
US probate. There are rules against Americans leaving money to
foreign nationals in their wills. It is unclear if taxes can be
claimed; but the delays and costs would be hard on the other heirs.
Other
banks in Switzerland and even Britain say they are thinking about
turning Americans away too. I was sent a form by the Social Security
Administration this week seeking information about other countries’
pension plans I might have contributed to in the course of my
peregrinations around the globe, to make sure I did not benefit from
a “pension windfall” from payments made after 1952 as a result.
This was worrying because my late mother, who had paid into the
German pension system before the Nazis came to power, was flush in
her later years because she collected so many payments (Social
Security for herself and as my father’s widow; her pension from her
US employer; and a German “Rent” for her own working days in
Schluechtern and as my father’s widow.)
Actually,
because of having to file for US income taxes while living in Paris,
I also paid U.S. Social Security tax, both sides in fact since as a
free-lance journalist I was self-employed. I was exempted from earned
income tax because I did not earn $70,000, the limit at the time. But
that limit is falling along with the dollar today.
This
note appears at the insistence of Paul Renaud, a Franco-Swiss
national living in Thailand, who covers Thai stocks for us. He thinks
something has to give.
What
do we know about God? One thing scientists tell us is that the Deity
has an inordinate fondness for beetles. He also may like flu germs.
Scientists in Kyoto Japan, they have discovered that rivers
downstream from Japanese sewage plants are all contaminated with
Tamiflu (oseltamivir phosphates) from urine. Birds, which are the
frequent vectors for transmitting flu, may pick up drug resistant flu
from the water.
Some
news for our companies and our fund picks follows for paid
subscribers.
