The Price of Being Canadian

[hot enough]

16 hours ago, August1991 said:

WTF?

I strongly, strongly disagree.

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To me (and I have thought about this and I may have even violated my rule),

You have a rule against thinking, do you?

Quote

to be Canadian (in this modern world), you must pay taxes in Canada. And you must have a physical presence in Canada; I'd say, at least once every year. To clarify: To be Canadian, you must pay all taxes in Canada, and you must return to Canada at least once every year. Otherwise, you're not Canadian.

That is utter nonsense. CRA has an option for Canadians who want to, choose to live and work abroad. A Canadian is defined by the law and those rights cannot be taken away by some silly notions of what it means to be a Canadian.

[hot enough]

10 minutes ago, Goddess said:

It's a common tactic here.  Take that football and run all the way down the field towards the opposite end zone, and then claim that's where the person's football went, all on its'[sic] own.  

LOL 

This is one of you folks specialties, Goddess. Hit and then run away until things cool and your posts are buried in time.

[Stan]

27 minutes ago, hot enough said:

Your mistake, which you only sought to obfuscate. Does the right always get defended by lies and obfuscation?

Seems like he owned up to it without any arm twisting, and now you're on the attack for seemingly no reason.

[August1991]

On 7/24/2017 at 5:27 PM, hot enough said:

That is utter nonsense. CRA has an option for Canadians who want to, choose to live and work abroad. A Canadian is defined by the law and those rights cannot be taken away by some silly notions of what it means to be a Canadian.

As I say, I have a different definition of what is "Canadian" than the CRA, or even our current citizenship laws.

I prefer the Quebec rule: you are a Quebec citizen/resident if you have a health card (carte soleil). And occasionally, depending on circumstances, you must physically go to renew your card.

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Holding Canadian citizenship, a Canadian passport, is not the same as holding a platinum credit card.

BTW hot enough: The CRA has weird ways of defining "residency" for tax purposes. Be careful. 

 

Edited July 26, 2017 by August1991

[Wilber]

2 minutes ago, August1991 said:

As I say, I have a different definition of what is "Canadian" than the CRA, or even our current citizenship laws.

I prefer the Quebec rule: you are a Quebec citizen/resident if you have a health card (carte soleil). And occasionally, depending on circumstances, you must physically go to renew your card.

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Holding Canadian citizenship, a Canadian passport, is not the same as holding a platinum credit card.   

 

If Canada wants to tax its citizens on world wide income, it has that option (the US does). Canada chooses to tax according to residency. If you live in Canada but work offshore, you are subject to Canadian tax. If you move offshore and claim non residency according to the rules, you aren't. But that has nothing to do with citizenship. Citizenship is not something that can be taken away at the whim of a government. It is not the same as a driver's license.

I agree with suspending voting rights and financial benefits such as OAS for long term non residents but you can't strip their citizenship. For persons without dual citizenship you would be making them stateless and reducing them to the status of refugees.

[August1991]

40 minutes ago, Wilber said:

...Canada chooses to tax according to residency....

And Wilbur, I would define citizenship the same way: residency. If you choose largely to live abroad, without paying any taxes in Canada, without returning to Canada, then you are no longer Canadian. You have chosen to forfeit your Canadian citizenship.

 

Edited July 26, 2017 by August1991

[Omni]

I worked for a Canadian based company for a good number of years that earned virtually all of it's income through offshore contracts. I remained a resident and paid taxes in Canada, other than in Thailand were after three months of working there you had to pay Thai tax, which you could then deducted from your Canadian bill. I certainly never lost sight of my Canadian citizenship, and had I and many others not been allowed to work in this way, the CRA would have lost a hell of a lot of revenue.

[Wilber]

5 minutes ago, August1991 said:

And Wilbur, I would define citizenship the same way: residency. If you choose largely to live abroad, then you are no longer Canadian.

I will say it again, you cannot make a citizen stateless. No civilized country does that.

[August1991]

2 minutes ago, Wilber said:

I will say it again, you cannot make a citizen stateless. No civilized country does that.

No civilsed country does that? Of course we can.

We can deal with children born in Canada to foreign parents but forced to go abroad the same way that we provide indigenous people in Canada with fresh drinking water.

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Between the two, Wilber, what would you choose?

[Wilber]

18 minutes ago, August1991 said:

No civilsed country does that? Of course we can.

We can deal with children born in Canada to foreign parents but forced to go abroad the same way that we provide indigenous people in Canada with fresh drinking water.

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Between the two, Wilber, what would you choose?

They aren't stateless, they have their parents citizenship as well. But we aren't  discussing how we give people citizenship but how to take it away. Two different issues.

[SpankyMcFarland]

1 hour ago, August1991 said:

BTW hot enough: The CRA has weird ways of defining "residency" for tax purposes. Be careful. 

 

Actually, from the little I understand of it, I think CRA's general definition of residency for tax liability, based on 'strength of ties', is a model for other countries to follow although I haven't found a single accountant in this country who agrees with me. In the U.K. and Ireland, where 'number of days' and other tests are used, many of the richest locals claim to reside abroad in low tax jurisdictions when they are clearly not exiles at all. Using some legal loophole, one Irish billionaire who claims to 'reside' in Malta has a Dublin mansion with no kitchen. You should reside for tax purposes where you live, and you live where your family lives. If you want to be considered to have left Canada, sever all ties with the country first. 

Edited July 26, 2017 by SpankyMcFarland

[August1991]

30 minutes ago, Wilber said:

They aren't stateless, they have their parents citizenship as well. But we aren't  discussing how we give people citizenship but how to take it away. Two different issues.

So Wilber, if I understand you, you favour foreign children over indigenous fresh water.

Edited July 26, 2017 by August1991

[SpankyMcFarland]

Here's a good citizen:

http://www.obj.ca/article/ottawa-real-estate-veteran-paul-hindo-wins-22m-lotto-649

 

[Wilber]

37 minutes ago, August1991 said:

So Wilber, if I understand you, you favour foreign children over indigenous fresh water.

No, you don't understand.

[Wilber]

17 minutes ago, SpankyMcFarland said:

Here's a good citizen:

http://www.obj.ca/article/ottawa-real-estate-veteran-paul-hindo-wins-22m-lotto-649

 

I agree.

[August1991]

24 minutes ago, Wilber said:

I agree.

Wilber and Spanky,

I fear that you are both typical of Ontario, English-Canadian supporters of the federal Liberals. Likely Catholic, possibly open-minded Protestant, but non-practicing whatever.

This is a different world, this 21st century.

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Between drinking water for Canadian-born children, and anyone born abroad - what do federal Liberals choose? 

 

   

Edited July 26, 2017 by August1991

[hot enough]

21 hours ago, August1991 said:

As I say, I have a different definition of what is "Canadian" than the CRA, or even our current citizenship laws.

But you opinion means squat. 

[capricorn]

1 hour ago, hot enough said:

But you opinion means squat. 

Look in the mirror and repeat.

[-TSS-]

Do expat-Canadians have a right to vote in the Canadian federal elections? If so, then in which constituency do their votes count? The latest address while still living in Canada?

[August1991]

On 7/25/2017 at 11:02 PM, Wilber said:

No, you don't understand.

Thread drift ahead: (Gawd I hate this forum's editing software. I wanted to post above a better edited cite/quote of his post... Sorry, Wilber. And d*mn, there's no button to report this post/problem to the moderators.)

Wilber, when push comes to shove, when you have to choose, which is more important:

-Fresh drinking water for indigenous people

-Helping foreigners live in Canada

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I fear that so-called progressives, with "politically correct", "civilised" language are creating a future Soviet, Venezuela, Islamic world in which my children will have to make just such a Hobson choice.

==

Make no mistake: America is great because successful Americans are not zero-sum thinkers. 

Edited July 28, 2017 by August1991

[Wilber]

By maintaining one must chose between two such rediculous examples, just who is engaging in zero sum thinking?

Edited July 28, 2017 by Wilber

[-TSS-]

Dual-citizenship should only be allowed in the case when one's parents are of different nationality.

[SpankyMcFarland]

On 7/26/2017 at 0:49 AM, August1991 said:

Wilber and Spanky,

I fear that you are both typical of Ontario, English-Canadian supporters of the federal Liberals. Likely Catholic, possibly open-minded Protestant, but non-practicing whatever.

This is a different world, this 21st century.

=====

Between drinking water for Canadian-born children, and anyone born abroad - what do federal Liberals choose? 

 

   

If such a choice existed I would choose safe drinking water.

[August1991]

On 7/31/2017 at 2:53 PM, SpankyMcFarland said:

If such a choice existed I would choose safe drinking water.

So, Spanky, you would give privilege to a million or so people (some 1.5 million Canadians claim aboriginal status, about 1 million Canadians in fact have "Indian Status" and do not pay any federal tax.)

https://www.aadnc-aandc.gc.ca/eng/1394032502014/1394032901691

Presumably, you prefer the privilege of a million rather than the hundreds of millions of children in Africa.

And you're a Leftist?

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I have a different thought: If the rest of us give $1 billion dollars ($100 dollars each, 10 million of us - roughly the cost of the Indian Act to most federal taxpayers) to someone, who should it be? An African dictator, a Canadian aboriginal chieftain/elder?  Or the kids?

But how, in what way? To help young kids in Africa or Canada, what is the best way to create an incentive?

And here's my thought: When any society has accurate incentives, the future is so much richer than the past.

Edited August 2, 2017 by August1991

[cannuck]

On 7/24/2017 at 2:50 PM, Stan said:

So if you are asked to work for the government providing services the public needs you add no value to the country?  Seems like a strange point to make.

I think of that more like Erik Nielsen did: there are more than 1,100 programmes and departments of the Federal government, and I forget how many employees, but the vast majority of things that these people do are hardly "NEEDED" by people, but often wanted by many groups of freeloaders.  If you happen to be one of the very few who do some of the the work for the very few departments that really ARE "needed", that could be true.  But the odds aren't very high that that would be the case.