Do the majority still feel that dual citizenship, because of its many benefits, is a very good idea?
Some comments:
“I believe that people should be entitled to carry as many citizenship’s as they can obtain. It makes travel easier and then you are effectively not the ward of one state…If you have at least one more citizenship you are not beholden to any one state…I believe that you should have at least two if the option is available.”
“TOTALLY vote NO on “one-citizenship” rules. Citizenship should not be an issue…”
“No, dual citizenship should not be banned.”
“…What if they have to go back for a bit to look after elderly relatives (the U.K. does not allow people to bring their elderly relatives over). So, I think dual citizenship is fine, as long as people really have a foot in both camps.”
“I believe that multiple citizenship is a natural outgrowth of population movement and that it will be the norm by the end of this century…”
“…Dual or multiple citizenship keeps at least some power in the hands of the people where it belongs.”
“Good discussion. But there is little discussion of citizenship is or what it means…”
“…However, people often want to retain a second citizenship as a backup plan or alternative.”
“Why don’t we just eliminate citizenship? OK, not realistic ”
“Maybe we are being too egocentric here just like the Homelanders?…”
“…It is hard to understand why there is so much misunderstanding and prejudice around dual citizenship…”
“Amazingly not a single comment addressing the “obligations” of citizenship. Clearly since citizenship is regarded as having ONLY “benefits”, the time has come to abolish it in its entirety. It should be thought of as simply a “Club Membership”. You can work your way in and work your way out as desired. If somebody were reading this thread 50 years ago, he/she would be shocked.”
Original George, suppose a dual citizen of Spain and Portugal enters France. (No visa required, since all three are EU countries.) Would this be an exception to your dictum? (What this effectively means is that “master nationality” might take some working out if the issue ever arose in a French court.)
There is no need for dual citizenship if renouncing is simple and inexpensive. And if moving back to native country makes acquiring citizenship simple and inexpensive again. And all that with RBT.
You cannot ask us to revoke our citizenship, and then make it at an unreasonable cost. This wouldn’t even be an issue with RBT.
It’s not that simple. Some countries do not allow renouncing citizenship (i.e. you can renounce all you want but it has no effect since that country still considers you a citizen.)
Some people may not know they have another citizenship, since this depends on laws of another country, which are often quite complicated.
Third, the Canadian government may not know whether someone has dual citizenship.
@heidi @polly I am on the road. Will try to reply when I get to my computer. These phone keyboards r
“These phone keyboards r”
They sure r, rn’t they.
@Norman Diamond
Cracking up … me that is …. the keyboards are already crocked. Yep crocked not merely cracked.
@Heidi @Polly
Why should the provider of Havens NOT market their services? The US, Canada and elsewhere do so. More money has found a haven in North America and Western Europe over the years … and in London specifically for centuries than has found haven in Cayman or Bahamas. Piles of German money found its way into western real estate in North America for fear of USSR blitzkrieg across the North German plain … perfectly rational fear. This sort of thing should never be made illegal … that is not Just law. Don’t mix these things up with the theft of assets by Dictators and the breaking of unjust law (like CBT).
Financial Investment media like Hedge Funds, Unit Trusts and so on often lose less money to “friction” (non productive costs and taxes) by operating in a Haven like Cayman. Similarly Ship and Aircraft Registrations (assets that are used world wide) are often more efficiently done in such Havens. Estates of deceased persons or Trust for the benefit of two or three generations down the line are often more efficiently dealt with in the Havens. This is straight competition amongst jurisdictions.
If a Jurisdiction invents a crime (tax evasion or money laundering for example) then they must put on their “brothel creepers” and do their gumshoe work domestically to deal with their perceived “problem”. Work harder. Leave the rest of the world alone.
@Heidi @Polly
Why should the provider of Havens NOT market their services? The US, Canada and elsewhere do so. More money has found a haven in North America and Western Europe over the years … and in London specifically for centuries than has found haven in Cayman or Bahamas. Piles of German money found its way into western real estate in North America for fear of USSR blitzkrieg across the North German plain … perfectly rational fear. This sort of thing should never be made illegal … that is not Just law. Don’t mix these things up with the theft of assets by Dictators and the breaking of unjust law (like CBT).
Financial Investment media like Hedge Funds, Unit Trusts and so on often lose less money to “friction” (non productive costs and taxes) by operating in a Haven like Cayman. Similarly Ship and Aircraft Registrations (assets that are used world wide) are often more efficiently done in such Havens. Estates of deceased persons or Trusts for the benefit of two or three generations down the line are often more efficiently dealt with in the Havens. This is straight competition amongst jurisdictions.
If a Jurisdiction invents a crime (tax evasion or money laundering for example) then they must put on their “brothel creepers” and do their gumshoe work domestically to deal with their perceived “problem”. Hit a brick wall? Work harder. Leave the rest of the world alone.
@nervousonvestor
“why shouldn’t the provider of Havens market their services”
I agree in principle to what you are saying, but having ‘plimsoles’ ( old English) physically on the ground in the form of agents and offices thus breaking the laws of another country is just plain stupidity. That is what UBS did to trigger this US nightmare reaction. At least Delaware waits for folks to come to them on their own soil.
PS nervousinvrstor
As you say money “has found its way’to these Havens. That’s a little different to the Swiss who sent their bankers/agents to UBS offices in the US touting for undeclared funds.
Not sure where to post this thought. Today I was listening in on the never ending chatter of my coworkers here in Belgium. One was describing friends — a married gay couple who had 2 kids born to a surrogate mother in the US (one from each father’s sperm). The kids are adopted by the 2 fathers and live in Belgium, and are taken to see their biological mother in the US from time to time. I refrained from comment so as not to dampen the light mood, but could not help but to ponder, what category does this fit in??? How much more accidentally American can you get?
However the Wikipedia page on surrogacy states that {The citizenship and legal status of the children resulting from surrogacy arrangements can be problematic. The Hague Conference Permanent Bureau identified the question of citizenship of these children as a “pressing problem” in the Permanent Bureau 2014 Study (Hague Conference Permanent Bureau, 2014a: 84-94).[15][16] According to U.S. Department of State, Bureau of Consular Affairs, for the child to be a U.S. citizen one or both of the child’s genetic parents must be a U.S. citizen. In other words, the only way for the child to acquire U.S. citizenship automatically at birth is if he/she is biologically related to a U.S. citizen. Further, in some countries, the child will not be a citizen of the country in which he/she is born because the surrogate mother is not legally the parent of said child. This could result in a child being born without citizenship.}
This seems unclear to me, since in my mind everybody born in the US save to diplomats was a US citizen.
If the Wikipedia page’s sources are correct, one could imagine that the child born to a US surrogate, in the US, but to foreign parents would not be a US citizen. However, the US birthplace would make this child a FATCA target.
@Zia’od, your scenario is explained on page 2 of this document;
https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/267945/dualnationality.pdf
@nervousinvestor
I`d just be relieved with RBT. That would solve the problem for my sentiments.
@fred(b)
Sounds like those kids are US citizens to me….. quite intentionally as the facts lay.
Fred (B) – That bit about children needing to be biologically related to get US citizenship applies when born OUTSIDE of the US. If they were born INSIDE the US then it doesn’t matter what the relationships are – they become US citizens (with the diplomatic exception).
“a married gay couple who had 2 kids born to a surrogate mother in the US (one from each father’s sperm).”
A surrogate mother is a labourer for a fertilized egg that came from the genetic mother and genetic father. This is described by the Wikipedia page as problematic. But if the kids were born in the US then they’re accidentals anyway.
Artificial insemination is when the mother is the mother and only the sperm come from the genetic father. So besides the possibility of the kids being accidentals by place of birth, they might be accidentals depending on how long the mother lived in the US and at what ages, and I don’t remember if her marital status still matters. This is also problematic but the Wikipedia page on surrogacy is irrelevant.
Potential perils if a dual – (accidental or unaware) is in the other country of citizenship;
http://narrative.ly/how-one-american-citizen-was-forcibly-drafted-into-the-south-korean-army/
Perils of changing laws re acquiring citizenship via parentage, etc. if born ‘abroad’
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/jul/28/malcolm-roberts-citizenship-explainer-one-nation-or-more
Further to above;
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/mp-dual-nationality-fiasco-extends-to-bloodlines/news-story/5ad03ba3d47cf4eae0a5b1066ea5c59b
@Heidi I knew the footware as plimsols as a child. LOL. Also as “tennis shoes”.
The US markets all sorts of things with or without feet on the ground, feet in the TV or Radio station or feet in the website … or agents creeping undercover around the world. This is just so. To be discriminatory about who is doing the marketing is unjust. Competition! Matters.
The US is in process of making US ba is the only banks capable of operating. Threatening now to cut off correspondent banking relationships with banks outside US. All domestic banks in Caribean are now under threat. This evil is called “de-risking”. Another catchy name for an evil and discriminatory activity.
@heidi @polly
For many countries around the world it has been illegal to do some things over the years .. such as for their citizens to own assets outside their jurisdictions. Did that stop US, Can and other countries vacuuming up as much as they could into investments in those countries? Of course not, Wall Street, Toronto London and elsewhere push their investments, con games and ponzi schemes du jour relentlessly. Fair enough but this can not be a one way street. This is why countries like Columbia and Ghana in retribution for FATCA and CBT are now seeking to tax the capital values of investments (including homes) owned by their citizens overseas (mainly in US).
@heidi @polly
The thrust by US Cad, UK, EU to make transactions in cash illegal worldwide is itself another and related evil. I would guess that fully half the world do not have bank accounts and are incapable of obtaining such accounts under AML and similar regulations being pushed by US etc. Thus for a Jamaican market vendor who has no bank account to take cash each week from her produce sales and make installments on a vehicle totalling over the life of the tranaction an aggregate in excess of US$8,000 would earn her and the dealer up to 10 years in prison each. Clearly an evil construct.
I used to have dual citizenship, British because of birth there in WWII Britain and Canadian because i arrived with my War Bride mother and brother in 1946 to join my father, repatriated home from service with the Canadian forces in Europe. But in 2004, the Canadian government stripped it from folks like us and many others, for ridiculous reasons, none of which involved criminality or fraud. Many of us are still trying everything we can think of to get it back. However, our adult children, all born in Canada and good Canadian citizens, are also entitled to British because of having a parent born there and grandparents serving in the Canadian WWII military. I enquired about renunciation, when I learned that Bill C-24 put my children at risk of revocation. The British government told me that, unless the person who wishes to renounce commits a crime in Britain such as “high treason”, he would still be always entitled to getting that citizenship back.
Sorry, have not figured out a way to go back in time and be born in Canada, to Canadian parents. My father, incidentally, despite 15 years here as a Home Child from Scotland, working hard on farms, and then 6 years with the Royal Canadian Artillery in WWII, D Day and all, is not now considered to have ever been eligible for citizenship, he was out of the country for over 5 years before 1947 (fighting the war).
I have lived in Canada all my life and had citizenship for 58 years. My brother served a lifetime career with the Canadian Navy and then a police force, yet today has no citizenship here. I have never even travelled to Britain and certainly my loyalty is with Canada.
It is hard to understand why there is so much misunderstanding and prejudice around dual citizenship.
@marion vermeersch it is indeed astonishing the way bureaucrats think. Quite mad when one thinks about it.
Amazingly not a single comment addressing the “obligations” of citizenship.
Clearly since citizenship is regarded as having ONLY “benefits”, the time has come to abolish it in its entirety.
It should be thought of as simply a “Club Membership”. You can work your way in and work your way out as desired.
If somebody were reading this thread 50 years ago, he/she would be shocked.
Just who or what is citizenship supposed to benefit, the individual or the State?