I assure you once you acquire U.S. citizenship you pay taxes to Uncle Sam until the day you die and its also very hard to renounce your citizenship, especially if you are wealthy since they don't want you to leave for a tax haven in the Caribbean. If you are a U.S. citizen working in Canada you are OK up to about $72K or so thanks to tax treaty, if I remember. At that point you start getting doubled taxed by Canada first, and then the U.S. starts double taxing you.
I am aware of this: the U.S. taxes on the basis of citizenship and not residence. Canada's solution was to make it extremely difficult to give up residence, thought that has softened recently. However, Canada is but one law from taxing on the basis of citizenship as well, so I don't see that as a big difference.
As for the $72k figure you mention, you probably mean the US$70k FEIE: foreign earned income exclusion, available to those subject to U.S. tax who reside outside the U.S. and its territories for 12 consecutive months. However, income beyond that (or below that if one does not qualify for the FEIE) is not "doubly taxed" particulary if one resides in a country with a tax treaty with the U.S. (e.g. Canada).
What happens is that one get's offsetting foreign tax credits for taxes paid to the other country -- the complexity arising from determining who gets "first dibs". Been there, done that.
But you keep harping on people who are not in my situation: I *do* have the gold-plated health insurance and can earn far more in the U.S. than in Canada. Granted, were I to become unemployed, I'd be uninsured once my resources ran out (and, unlike many, I sock away as much as I can "for a rainy day"). But the thing is, in Canada, I'd not get any services in a timely manner anyway *and* I'd be paying for them all the while when employed, not being able to save for an unemployment crisis.
To be honest if this is the best you can do in your crusade to crucify your homeland maybe you should go back to the drawing board.
I got sloppy with murder vs. gun-related deaths, yes.
But, having lived in Canada, I can't stand it, for the taxes, socialism, and general disregard for individual freedoms. I've made my decision to not want to live there any more than necessary. The ideals upon which the U.S. was founded appeal to me greatly, even as present-day implementation is lacking. This too will pass.
One stat you did not trot out is life expectancy. It's about two years longer in Canada than the U.S. Stillbirth and infant mortality rates are lower in Canada than the U.S. as well. I've always suspected that this reflect effective socialized medicine before the debt burden this caused resulted in the system starting to crumble, and the on-going focus on low-cost preventative care.
But, for me, the liberty and quality of life I had to give up for these benefits (can't afford a car AND a house, can't afford a lawn care company, can't afford a housekeeper to help my wife, etc), do not justify them. Furthermore, I find the idea that it is O.K. to let someone die who, left to their own devices might live because of the resources they saved (but were taxed away), even if more lives are saved is reprehensible: either you own what you earn or you don't. It's the state playing at God.
Jeez, my taxes are about triple in Canada than what they are in the U.S. My expenses are about the same, since I have to pay for things that the state would provide in Canada (health care, higher education, etc.), but I have the freedom to chose the quality I want. Now, my situation is not that common any more: I support a family with a non-working spouse on a single income, and we live in a home we own. Joint filing and mortgae deductability make all the difference. But, for those like me, life in Canada is pure hell, tax-wise.
At best you provide an argument for the price of the liberty that I cherish being high, and trot out stats to back that up. But, I would rather pay that price than live in what I see as a guilded cage. The differences you note are, in many cases, likely swamped by statistical uncertainty -- there isn't a order or magnitude difference in Canada's favor anywhere.
Now, I've met Americans who feel exactly the opposite: they like the idea of the Canadian nanny state. In an ideal world, we'd have a 1:1 swap of citizenry. However, Canada's ability to support that nanny state depends on taxing people like me: professionals who earn an above average income. And, increasingly, we do not wish to be a part of such tax-slavery. Ominously, the Canadian government is making it harder to leave.
The figures I was using were Moore's own: around 8000 gun-related deaths in the U.S. vs. 700 in Canada. Assuming the population of Canada is 1/10 that of the U.S. creates a ratio of 800:700, or about a 14% premium, easily explained away by the way he draws his statistics.
The discrepancy comes from my treating gun-deaths as the only source of murders, which, they are not.
Recent stats show that the murder rate in Canada is about 1/3 that of the U.S. That's cold comfort to women: violent crime against women is double in Canada, per capita, than what it is in the U.S.
And trust me, you sit these kids down with a real hacker and the guy begins teaching them politics and computer science, and you've got a good thing going on.
"Yeah, like maybe a reVUHlooshun! Can't have that!"
About the U.S. invasion of Iraq, we've had a misunderstanding. I quoted your paragraph
"I have long learned that one should not judge a nation simply by what it's government does do, but rather what it does vs. what it can do. From that perspective, U.S. "bullying" in the world is the model of restraint."
and asked for the evidence for what you learned, meaning the principle in the first sentence. If you're still interested, I am still interested in what led you to such a principle.
It's simple. Humans are assholes. We're the biggest assholes on the planet. Given the chance, many of us wreak all sorts of havok and create misery in our quest to improve our lot, regardless of the cost to others.
Surprisingly, this is an effective survival strategy for a species.
Given that, when restraint of action is evident, it stands to reason that some principle other than barbarism is at work, and that the place where this happens is likely to be further from a Hobbesian state of nature than other places.
I used to think that Canada was a pretty decent place. And, compared to a lot of other places in the world, it is.
But, the U.S. is far, far, better, even with the present shit that's afoot.
You know, there's another/. thread about excessive felony charges levied against high school kids "hacking" their school issued laptops by downloading iChat onto them. It represents paranoia and extremism in the application of laws in the U.S. and, I suppose, could be used to refute my perception that it is far better in the U.S. than Canada.
Except, that kind of excess, and "making examples" is a daily reality in Canada. The U.S. may be heading down a dark path these days, but, in many ways, Canada is already at the end of it.
For example, there's a fellow in Ontario serving a life sentence (the maximum) for posession of pot. Why so harsh? Well, he used to sell hemp seeds (which was legal), and the government hated this. So, when he was caught with three pot cigarettes, he was busted and had the book thrown at him.
Also, it is extremely difficult to fight such injustice. You can't sue the government, for example, except in extremely narrowly defined cases. You can't get a lawyer to take a case paid on contingency of success because that practice is illegal (so as to not have the "distasteful American practice" of ambulance chasers). Of course, this means the poor don't get justice. If you think they're receipt of welfare payments balances that out, you're entitled to that opinion. Clearly I disagree.
Jeez, if we were having this conversation in a coffee shop in Canada, remaining civil as we disagree, we (well I) would be thrown out for being "offensive", daring to criticize Canada. At least in the U.S. you can still sport a bumper sticker that says "Buck Fush!". Wearing a t-shirt reading "Achtung! Die Martin, die!" would likely get one arrested despite saying nothing more than "Attention! The Martin, the!" in German.
Perhaps you remember the stink when Conan O'Brien took his show to Canada, and had his "insult dog" insult Quebec? Geez, he insults everyone! I laughed as any sane person would. But, les Quebecois and les autres (Quebeckers and others, i.e. Canadians) were not amused.
Yes, I can't make threats, even in jest, against the POTUS, so you could argue that there is no "real" free speech in the U.S. But, you have no idea what critical and truthful speech gets censored in Canada. Ask about the list of banned books some time. (Yes, the list is censored).
Actually, what I've heard in numerous news articles, internet-based articles, and etc, is that Canada has a remarkably low murder rate.
It's on a par with the U.S., per capita.
"Bowling for Columbine" would put the per-capita "death by guns" rate in the U.S. at 14% higher than that in Canada. However, Moore distorts his stats (surprise, surprise): he includes justifiable homicides by police in the U.S. and excludes them when considering Canada (and I suppose other countries). Britain and Japan do have significantly lower gun-related crime rates, but violent crimes normally committed easiest with a gun are instead committed with a knife or other weapon.
The interesting thing about Canada is, everyone has a gun (because people like to go hunting) but almost nobody ever commits a violent crime with one.
False. It is extremely difficult and impractical to own a gun in Canada, particularly after the 1987(?) Ecole Polytechnique killings in Montreal (which would have been prevented had the requisite background checks been done). Getting an FAC (firearm acquisition certificate) is not that hard -- standard background check, but then you need a permit to transport it from the place you bought it to the place you intend to store it, and another such permit everytime you move it (like from home to the shooting range). Of course, there's a fee to keep your firearm registered as well (to the degree that when the law was enacted some small town police departments complained that the firearm registration fees would bankrupt them). One scandal involves the "cost" of this registration program actually having lost the government betweek CA$100 million and CA$1 billion, depending who you ask.
Hunting was prevelant and popular in the 1960s and 1970s (I enjoyed wild game every fall as a child in the 1960s and early 1970s because my father was an avid small game hunter (grouse, pheasant, quail, and rabbit, mmm!), but the laws are too burdensome, and the hobby to expensive, so many had given it up, save the wealthy.
I saw one piece in which a Canadian cop was asked how many murders had taken place in his city, and he had to think about it. I think he said something like, "Well... There was one last year..." ONE.
I'd like to know where that is. Are you sure he wasn't referring to gun-related murders?
Toronto is starting to become a battlefield with gang-warfare shootouts taking place in shopping malls. Google.
A friend of mine, who grew up on the border with Canada, said once that up there, the idea that guns are for shooting people is just considered silly. For Canadians, guns are for hunting, period.
Perhaps, but given the laws against shooting people, this is not surprising: you can't use force against a would-be assailant to save your life, or that of another, or property, and certainly not deadly force. Last year, a Toronto shopkeeper killed one of a gang of three armed (with guns) would-be robbers. The gun was legally owned and stored, but illegally used by him in his defense (he had been robbed several times in the recent past, and claimed that the robbers were threatening to kill him at gunpoint). One of the would-be robbers he shot crawled into an ally and died there from blood loss. This shopkeeper was facing murder charges and a life sentence. IIRC he was convicted, there being no right to kill in self-defense.
This extends to simple battery: if someone starts battering you and you fight back, you are both equally guilty of a crime against the state. You're supposed to cower and wait for the police (who the courts have ruled are not obliged to help you) -- this so it is easier to sort out the perp from the victim, so they say.
So, no, Canadians would not generally think to use guns to shoot people because it is illegal. Period.
The feds, with a minority government, perhaps not.
But, I find the mere existance of a nothwithstanding clause in a nation's constitutition disgusting: "these are your rights unless the government says otherwise". Might as well just rip the whole constitution up, and be done with it.
Also, Quebec appears all too eager to use the notwithstanding clause to steam roller a patient's right to pay a doctor directly for service when the Supreme Court upheld that right as a charter freedom.
What really bothers me is that, while any government can suspend civil liberties through sheer exercise of power, the notwithstanding clause legitimizes such a scenario. Constitutions should constrain government, as as severly possible so that it still might perform a useful service. Even then, power will corrupt, and people will get fat and lazy -- such words do not prevent the next popular revolution, they can just serve to delay it -- that not being a bad thing since revolutions tend to be bloody, sticky messes, that get in the way of everyone living their lives.
But, to actually put to words effective state omnipotence on the sheer faith in democracy, is horribly mind boggling: Hitler (oh, screw Godwin's Law) was democratically elected (barely, and under dubious circumstances, but that does not mitigate the horror he brought about). I do not place much faith in the belief that another Hitler will not someday arise to power in a western nation. Some have even held Bush II to that light, though that's an insult to those that perished and suffered throught Nazi Germany as it is the to the character of the U.S. president. Given that, the last thing I want to see is a constitution that empowers such a nutcase.
A. Socialized medicine in Canada with waiting lines, rationing etc
B. Being uninsured in America where a major illness will completely wipe you out or you may in fact be denied care all together.
I think I would take A. Obviously having gold plated insurance in America is best but ever larger numbers of don't.
You might want to rethink that. Imagine paying an extra $10k a year in taxes for health care, and the not getting any, and not being able to pay for any (or being allowed to), when that $10k would let a foreigner buy private insurance! Yes, it is that bad.
The bottom like is that in Canada, you pay through the nose and get nothing. In the U.S. you might get nothing either, but you won't be asked to pay for it. (And frankly, I can't see how someone working can't sock enough away to pay COBRA premiums if they need -- I think even 401(k) withdrawls to pay COBRA premiums don't attract the 10% penalty, but I'm not certain).
The only people who might be better off in Canada than the U.S., are those that are on the public dole. But, for most hard working people just trying to get by, it is brutal. Many, unless, they've lived and worked in the U.S. probably don't realize how hard they work and for how little.
I assure you that sounds way to good to be true. I hope it was a long time ago. They often send you the refund right away because if its wrong they charge you interest and penalties to make up for all the money they gave you temporarily. It often takes them a year or two before they really review your return and catch stuff like that. Then they send you a nasty letter asking for it back with interest and penalties. If you can't pay it then they start levying your paychecks and bank accounts, or seizing your property. I assure you the IRS is just as nasty as any tax collecting agency you will find in the world. You just haven't been here long enough to figure it out yet. I pity your naivete.
While I did my own analysis, I employed the services of a CPA (also EA) to ensure they were correct. Moving expenses to earn income (subject to time and distance limits) are deductible in they year they are incurred or paid, so long as the income earned is subject to U.S. tax. I leveraged the tax treaties to make myself subject to U.S. tax in 2003 so I could deduct the moving expenses I paid to earn that income in 2004. I took great care to ensure that the IRS also got "it's cut" of currency gains I made on the sale of my foreign home in Canada. Using a respected, bonded CPA puts him on the hook for fines and penalties. The worst case scenario is that I'd have to pay back the US$7500.
Also, returns like mine were being singled out for extensive review this year, so it appears it already got more than a cursory review.
That analysis is really hard to make.
I only compared tax burdens, true.
From personal experience, taking into account all the other expenses, our lifestyle is marginally better: we have a bit more disposable income and live in a comparable house. However, our access to healthcare is immensely better in the U.S. and I can max out our 401(k) and still save beyond that. I can hire a lawn care company and pay a housekeeper once a week.
Health care and pension costs and benefits are completely different between the two places and Canada's health costs are more in taxes, so if you do a head to head without allowing for it its not an accurate comparison. Health insurance isn't cheap though maybe your employer is covering it so you don't notice.
My employer pays about US$14k toward my health insurance premiums and I have no copays, deductables, or personal amount I have to pay for insurance. However, if I paid that out of pocket, I'd still be better off than in Canada, for the lower taxes would let me afford it, and I'd actually get to see a doctor and not wait for surgery. This has been the crux of my Canadian healthcare complaint: for the tax dollars paid, the service is abysmal. It is just plain bad value.
If you are in an upper bracket taxes are pretty cheap now thanks to Bush tax cuts in the last five years and the fact they are looting the Social Security surplus right now to cover some of the shortfall. The low tax rates are being paid for with borrowed money. Its nice while it lasts but its unlikely its a policy that will be sustainable. Medicare and Social Security are going to go in to the red, the U.S. can't borrow money at the rate it is much longer and then someting will give. When it does I doubt you will be so happy with American tax rates.
Well, unless i become a citizen (and I intend to), I can just leave and not pay U.S. taxes. However, what is more realistic, and what Bush II is pushing (admittedly against resistance), is clawing back benefits and changing the way they are indexed. I do think that Social Security and Medicare will be clawed back from those that have managed to save for a comfortable retirement. Of course, that already happens with CPP in Canada, and delivery of health care is non-existent (last time I checked there was a shortage of 1400 doctors in Toronto alone). U.S. taxes would have to go up a lot to be comparable to Canadian rates.
You just sound bitter. As a Canadian, I'm very happy you're in the US
We agree on something. I am very happy to be here.
As for bitter, damn straight! My father toiled for forty years paying his taxes in Canada, including the period when medicare was universal. When he needed an aortic aneyrism repair, at a cost far less than what he had contributed vs. what he received in health care benefits over the years, even allowing for a 25% subsidy of the difference for "the poor", we was denied -- this being a death sentence. To try to keep personal bias out of it, I looked at the pure economics of what he paid vs. what he needed to try to save his life. Had he not been subject to "universal healtcare" and the taxes he paid for it, he could have saved ten times what he needed for the necessary surgery to be performed by the best surgeon in the world. Pretty shitty health insurance if you ask me: high premiums with low benefits, paid as if out of a lottery instead of an insurance policy.
So, the state played at God, chosing who lives and who dies, and killing those who would otherwise live had the state left them alone. I find that a far greater sin than not intervening to save lives that would be lost for their own misfortune. While sacrificing one life to save more, might be noble, that is the privilege of the life being sacrificed, or the purvue of God, and not the right of the state. Ever.
Of course, the very rich, and this includes Canadian politicians at the taxpayers' expense, do get to leave the country and get the care they need. If universal healthcare in Canada is so great, why do its politicials flock to the U.S.? Something stinks, and it isn't the Limburgher. Also, foreigners are allowed to purchase "covered services" in Canada, but citizens aren't. WTF?
That's one data point. If it were the only one, I could shrug it off to personal misfortune. Shit happens, and all that.
But, when I see Joe and Jane "barely out of high school" earning $30k each and getting lots of government subsidies, including tax-subsidised day care for their kids while they both work, and I earning the same from one job, so my wife can raise our kids and not be a burden on the taxpayer-subsidised $5 a day daycare which used to be the norm in Quebec, and get taxed more and get told "You're rich, we're clawing back social services to you" (i.e. child tax credit), I get mad. Fucking mad.
The U.S. is far more fair toward families by permitting married couples to file jointly, effectively splitting their income. (Granted, this perk is not granted to gay couples, since the federal government does not recognise gay marriage, but in Canada is is not granted to any couple). Canada has a huge bureacratic tax code to make any attempt at such income splitting illegal (i.e giving one's spouse money to invest -- the earnings are taxed in the hands of the giver if the principle was not loaned at market rates, etc.) Yes, one get's a non-refundable tax credit (at the lowest marginal rate) for a spouse. Whoopdee-fucking-doo: it's peanuts and amounts to about $100-$200 a month. It costs more just to feed my spouse, and is inconsequential to what joint filing saves one. Don't get me started on G.A.A.R.: General anti-avoidance rules. They forbid one to arrange one's affairs solely to minimize one's taxes despite Britian's hightest court (at a time when Canada was subject to it, and still is subject to the precedence of its rulings) clearly recognized this right.
When I hear of people "getting ahead" in healthcare queues because their kids go to school with their doctor's kids, I get madder.
When I learn that the CRA will not tell you of all the steps you can take to reduce your tax burden (the IRS goes out of it's way, by comparison -- look at its explanation of how to maximize overlapping foreign earned income exclusion eligibility periods, for example), I wonder why there isn't a revolution.
Working hard and "getting ahead" in Canada reduces one
First of all, you claim that life was good as a teen in the middle to late 70's. In the same paragraph, a few lines later, you claim that the situation got so bad in 1975 that your mother had to go back to working. Now now, correct me if I'm wrong, but 1975 is quite in the middle 70's, no?
Yes, and it takes time for things to go bad. In order to maintain a comfortable lifestyle, when I was 14, my mother returned to work. As this left me with more unsupervised time, it seamed like a good thing. But, by the end of the 1970s even her income could not keep up with our overall tax burden and our standard of living declined.
So, both statements are true: life was good in the mid to late 70s, and things started getting so bad that my mother had to return to work to pay an every increasing tax burden (more precisely, to preserve our after-tax income and lifestyle).
Second, how come your american daughter goes to school in Canada?
My daughter is not American. My son is. However, both attended school in Canada in 2003 and part of 2004. My daughter attended Raimerwood P.S. in Markham, ON until we pulled her out and homeschooled her until the end of the 2003 school year (it was that bad), and Dr. Robert Thorton P.S. in Whitby, ON for most of the 2003-2004 school year. We left Canada in May of 2004. My son attended a preschool in Whitby from July 2003 to May 2004.
It's pretty clear you have not moved back 'home' yet, because people were downright mean 'last time you were in Canada' and not 'last time I moved back to Canada'.
Grasping at semantics? I lived in Canada from 1961 to Novemner 1997, and from January 2003 to May 2004. As I had bought a house in Whitby, ON, in July 2003 (sold in April 2004) and reestablished bank accounts, spent more tha 183 consecutive days in Canada, I met the requirements of Canadian residence, and filed my taxes accordingly. Under the U.S.-Canada and U.S.-Germany tax treaties I also retroactively took advantage of continuing to file U.S. taxes, claiming FEIE in 2003 and FTC in 2004 and Canadian moving expenses paid in 2004 against 2004 U.S. source income.
As a sidenote, every province spends a lot of money on public education each year and we don't consider american schools as 'rich schools', really.
I noted this was the teacher's comment. Perhaps not typical, but it sure seamed that way. Geez, the schools didn't even have a hot lunch program, where students could purchase meals. (Well, Dr. Robert Thorton had pizza once a week or month, but otherwise there was no way for a student to eat a hot, relatively balanced, meal during lunch break). The American schools my kids attended had such a program for anywhere between US$30 and US$60 a month. Heck, assuming 20 school days a month, I can't feed my kid a hot balanced meal for US$3.00 (The school boards accept bids from catering companies who pass on their economies of scale -- it works extremely well, and low-income kids get a subsidy, I think every elementary school kid can get milk for free, at the very least).
As for spending money on education, perhaps. Ontario supposedly spends 45% of it's revenue on health care. But, in neither case, does it show! The mony likely pays for an inflated bureacracy.
Let me give you an idea (and this is just one data point) about what an "average" American community spends on education.
Schools are funded via property taxes, with some communities having a "Robin Hood" program to subsidize schools in depressed neighborhoods. When I lived in Allen, TX, we paid some US$5600 a year in property taxes on a $200k home. About 30% funded the local elementary schools. That's $1680. Take off 10% for "Robin Hood", and assume that each school is funded for the most part by the tax revenue of the subdivision it's in (there's about one school per subdivision). So, that's $1500 (rounded) per home per school. We had 420 homes in our subdivision. $635k per school. The school had around 300 students, so that's aboput $2k per student. It w
Dude the IRS is just as bad as Revenue Canada if not worse.
My experience with the IRS vs. Reveune Quebec and the CRA has been exactly the opposite.
The one thing I can say for Canada is their tax forms and laws are dramatically simpler, I way preferred them over U.S. tax filing, while it sounds like you enjoying working all the loopholes like deducting your mortgage expenses.
That by itself is very telling: you think that deducting mortgage interest expense is a "loophole" -- some kind of exotic tax dodge. Guess what? I get to split my income with my non-working spouse by filing jointly. Another "loophole"? Hardly, both are something millions of Americans do every day.
The problem with the U.S. tax code is its been so butchered by Congress that if you are a ruthless, rich SOB with a good accountant you pay nothing, while most ordinary people take it in the nose.
Wrongo. There is an alternative minimum tax in the U.S. much like in Canada. In a normal year (living in one country or the other), my taxes are quite simple. I do itemize my deductions, and sometimes have a Schedule D to report capital gains and losses, but that's about it.
In a dual tax-home year, it gets complex, but nothing my accountant can't handle -- the most complex my return has been involved $700 in preparation fees so that I could deduct repayed prorated Canadian moving expenses to my Canadian employer against U.S. income in the year I actually payed them, leveraging two international tax treaties (U.S.-Canada and U.S.-Germany). I actually saved money by making myself voluntarily subject to U.S. tax when I otherwise didn't have to. I suppose that was a loophole, but the IRS was quite happy with what I did, and refunded me US$7500.
I once did an analysis, and only over a very small range of incomes around US$10k-$15k are Americans taxed more than Canadians, though even here I may have erred since low-income Americans get an Earned Income Credit.
For the record, I'd rather be incarcerated in an American jail as a potential terrorist threat (When will a foreigner let into Canada finally cross the border and blow something up? With the lax immigration policy, I fear it's just a matter of time), than live free in Canada. It's a heinous, murderous place.
And it still is the best place on earth, if for no other reason than because you get riled up when the government steps to increase its powers and abuse the public trust. You are not alone in holding dear the values and principles that make the U.S. great. Values and principles that, from time to time, get trampled and torn.
"Bush II will pass..."
... into a history that includes war-time internment of citizens, eugenics, and Negro slavery (I use the adjective appropriate to the historical time to which it refers). Ain't no angels here.
But, there have been, and continue to be, ordinary, fallable people, who strive to build a nation built on worthy principles, nevertheless. Despite regresses into barbarism, and human sins and weaknesses, the U.S. does manage to progress.
Whereas, a nation like Canada, prides principles of "equality of outcome" and "peace, order, and good government" that I find, by contrast, reprehensible in their attach on individual liberty.
Other countries do not have such lofty principles that celebrate the individual. The U.S. may falter and fall into the quagmire of human evils from time to time, and fail in it's promise of "liberty, justice, and the pursuit of hapiness for all", but damn it, it won't be for lack of trying.
Canadians, in contrast, appear to be too busy eating their own bullshit to notice how bad it tastes.
As for the taxes, Google "Canadian Revenue Agency" and compare.
It's because anybody, regardless of their religion, color, family background or whatever can come here and become an American.
Actually, it's quite difficult for a Canadian: so many emmigrate to the U.S. each year that the Green Card lottery is closed to us.
However, one should not expect to wash up on the shore and be admitted -- it is not unreasonable to have to "pay one's dues" first.
And so, I plow my way through the H1B, LC, LPR, citizenship route. At least the INS is starting to become a bit more efficient with new fast-track LCs.
The comparison isn't direct, but I think you are saying that Canadians, unlike Americans, are asleep to some situation in their country so bad that it will get ugly if they ever wake up. That's a very strong claim to make, and replying to my criticism with "Canada can do it too" does nothing to support your claim of some vast difference.
People are dying because the government does not have the resources, despite decades of heavy taxation, to provide the health care it has promissed. People who, left to their own devices, would have had the funds to save their own lives.
Good God man, wake up! Recently a patient needing a double lung transplant was extremely fortunate to have compatible lungs available, and the damn hospital bungled things, lost the lungs (when they stopped being viable for transplant) because they didn't have an ICU bed? And the hospital claims that "Two out of three" (transplants performad that day) "isn't bad?"
You are being robbed and effectively murdered and don't even know it!
It is far better to let someone die through inaction than to dare play at God and pick and chose who gets to have their taxes used to save their life.
Since you "learned" that, I assume you can give me state the evidence for it you found compelling?
The U.S. has sent some 1800 servicepeople to their deaths in a conventional invasion of Iraq, instead of just nuking it off the fucking planet.
Frankly, I'm not opposed to the war in Iraq, regardless of the absence of any WMD. When some asshole dictator makes threats against you, it is perfectly acceptable to believe that he or his cronies are capable of carrying them out.
So, I *do* think the invasion was warranted.
That does not mean I think the U.S. executed its invasion plans wisely, of course. But, those particular chickens are comming home to roost.
You do have taxes in the US, don't you? Can you explain to me why they are at the magical sweet-spot compared to Canada and, say, Japan?
As a libertarian, I would say no level of taxation is acceptable, but there is a pragmatic sweet spot: that where the services received are worth the taxes paid when compared to what they would cost on an open market. And yes, this even allows for a small subsidy for the poor.
One would think that government run services would be very efficient, because of the economies of scale of an operation that serves all, and needs not make a profit -- just cover its costs. Compared to a competitive open market, with smaller players, there should be enough efficiency to provide a competetive good deal even when subsidizing some service recipients who could not otherwise afford to pay.
Governments in the U.S. come surprisingly close, particularly local governments, always at fear of being voted out since "Mayor Joe" does not have a big party aparatus behind him.
The biggest difference for me comes from three factors: 1) I can file jointly with my wife since she does not work outside the home. 2) I can deduct the interest on my home mortgage. 3) The marginal tax brackets start much higher when compared to those in Canada. This allows me to afford some luxeries: I can pay a local "mom & pop" lawn care company to take care of my lawn and pruning my landscaping. I can afford a housekeeper to come onece a month. I spend quite a bit in the small town we live in. In other words, instead of funding a welfare state to provide for the unemployed, I'm helping to employ them and keep small businesses afloat.
Can you spend your money on medicinal marijuana in the US
You can in California, and those taxpayers opposed to the idea can rest comfortably knowing that their taxes don't go to pay for the pot... unlike Quebec, for example.
There will always be some area where it might be beneficial to live in Canada vs. the U.S. Both governments are pigheaded in that they do not copy what the other does "better". But, on the whole, one has far more opportunity in the U.S. than in Canada, and far fewer repressive laws on the books.
Canada does not have to bother... it can torture people in its own prisons. Google for "Security Certificate".
I have long learned that one should not judge a nation simply by what it's government does do, but rather what it does vs. what it can do. From that perspective, U.S. "bullying" in the world is the model of restraint.
I was born and grew up in Canada and now legally work in the U.S. My son is an American. Perhaps, someday I will be too.
I remember as a child in the late 60s and a teen in the mid to late 70s that life was good: the Canadian dollar was at or above par with the U.S. dollar, people who worked had health care coverage through their employer, and Canadians had a reputation for being friendly -- at least that's what Americans seamed to say.
Then, Trudeau's brand of sweeping socialism set in. Medicare became universal for everything. Taxes soared and the government went into serious debt. The dollar fell. It was harder and harder to make ends meet -- not so much because of inflation, but rather because of the tax burden (Canadian couples can't file jointly, so traditional families with one income earner really got taxed badly -- my mother had to return to work in 1975 to help pay our family's income taxes!).
But, many thought this was a worthwhile price to pay for our nanny state.
Over the years, taxes rose, and all those government services declined in quality. Waiting lists for medical care grew and grew and grew. These days, what qualifies as a middle class lifestyle in the U.S. is but a dream of wealth for many Canadians: being able to pay a kid to mow one's lawn is a big luxery.
Last time I was in Canada, people were downright mean, espescially when they found out I had worked in the U.S. for several years -- how dare I not pay my share of taxes "at home" (Er, because I wasn't using any of the services, and had paid far more than the share I consumed when I had lived there?). My daughter was berated by her teacher in school for bringing in her previous year's (U.S.) public elementary school yearbook for show and tell: how dare she "show off the rich school yearbook" from a school that no other child present could ever hope to attend.
It appeared that those "nice to Americans" people had degenerated to the level of rats, scrambling to survive, amid a society in decay -- a dog eat dog world, envyious of anyone who might live better by working harder, never seeing the socialist system as the root of their malaise.
Particularly after Canada decided not to join the U.S. in it's "Adventure of the Willing", many Canadians I met appeared to have been emboldened beyond an indifferance toward the U.S. (always masking thinly some degree of envy) to downright hatred -- some to the point of praising known terrorists for their attacks against the U.S.
You know what, crazyphilman? You should stop, kneel down, and kiss the ground you're about to walk on.
For all the crap and dubious decisionmaking that goes on in American government, including the present folly in Iraq, the U.S. remains the best place on earth.
Granted, there are few if any guarantees, when one is down and hard on one's luck.
On the other hand, no has to discover that those guarantees are hollow, and empty promises either, delivered to some pro-forma, but hardly guaranteed to all.
And, most of all, no one goes around robbing you blind (tax-wise) to pay for those undelivered guarantees, to the extent that you can't pay for them yourself even if you otherwise could (nevermind that spending your own money for your own welfare is illegal in some cases in Canada, particularly when it comes to "universal" healthcare -- unfair to the poor, you see).
Liberty doesn't come cheap -- it exposes one to all the risks and uncertainties life brings. But, it sure does taste sweet.
How long Canadians will continue to put up with their guilded cage, the gilt long worn off, is anyone's guess. But, if they wake up, 't ain't gonna be perty.
You're talkking about a country where the Provincial Psychiatrist (yes, there is such a government office) can "deem" you unfit, and sieze all your assets so that they can be administered "in your best interests".
No hearing, no trial, no independent psychiatric evaluation, no appeal, nada.
I wonder how much one has to criticize the government(s) before the Provincial Psychiatrist serves your bank with an order to turn over your money.
Slashdot Mirror
I am aware of this: the U.S. taxes on the basis of citizenship and not residence. Canada's solution was to make it extremely difficult to give up residence, thought that has softened recently. However, Canada is but one law from taxing on the basis of citizenship as well, so I don't see that as a big difference.
As for the $72k figure you mention, you probably mean the US$70k FEIE: foreign earned income exclusion, available to those subject to U.S. tax who reside outside the U.S. and its territories for 12 consecutive months. However, income beyond that (or below that if one does not qualify for the FEIE) is not "doubly taxed" particulary if one resides in a country with a tax treaty with the U.S. (e.g. Canada).
What happens is that one get's offsetting foreign tax credits for taxes paid to the other country -- the complexity arising from determining who gets "first dibs". Been there, done that.
But you keep harping on people who are not in my situation: I *do* have the gold-plated health insurance and can earn far more in the U.S. than in Canada. Granted, were I to become unemployed, I'd be uninsured once my resources ran out (and, unlike many, I sock away as much as I can "for a rainy day"). But the thing is, in Canada, I'd not get any services in a timely manner anyway *and* I'd be paying for them all the while when employed, not being able to save for an unemployment crisis.
I got sloppy with murder vs. gun-related deaths, yes.
But, having lived in Canada, I can't stand it, for the taxes, socialism, and general disregard for individual freedoms. I've made my decision to not want to live there any more than necessary. The ideals upon which the U.S. was founded appeal to me greatly, even as present-day implementation is lacking. This too will pass.
One stat you did not trot out is life expectancy. It's about two years longer in Canada than the U.S. Stillbirth and infant mortality rates are lower in Canada than the U.S. as well. I've always suspected that this reflect effective socialized medicine before the debt burden this caused resulted in the system starting to crumble, and the on-going focus on low-cost preventative care.
But, for me, the liberty and quality of life I had to give up for these benefits (can't afford a car AND a house, can't afford a lawn care company, can't afford a housekeeper to help my wife, etc), do not justify them. Furthermore, I find the idea that it is O.K. to let someone die who, left to their own devices might live because of the resources they saved (but were taxed away), even if more lives are saved is reprehensible: either you own what you earn or you don't. It's the state playing at God.
Jeez, my taxes are about triple in Canada than what they are in the U.S. My expenses are about the same, since I have to pay for things that the state would provide in Canada (health care, higher education, etc.), but I have the freedom to chose the quality I want. Now, my situation is not that common any more: I support a family with a non-working spouse on a single income, and we live in a home we own. Joint filing and mortgae deductability make all the difference. But, for those like me, life in Canada is pure hell, tax-wise.
At best you provide an argument for the price of the liberty that I cherish being high, and trot out stats to back that up. But, I would rather pay that price than live in what I see as a guilded cage. The differences you note are, in many cases, likely swamped by statistical uncertainty -- there isn't a order or magnitude difference in Canada's favor anywhere.
Now, I've met Americans who feel exactly the opposite: they like the idea of the Canadian nanny state. In an ideal world, we'd have a 1:1 swap of citizenry. However, Canada's ability to support that nanny state depends on taxing people like me: professionals who earn an above average income. And, increasingly, we do not wish to be a part of such tax-slavery. Ominously, the Canadian government is making it harder to leave.
The discrepancy comes from my treating gun-deaths as the only source of murders, which, they are not.
Recent stats show that the murder rate in Canada is about 1/3 that of the U.S. That's cold comfort to women: violent crime against women is double in Canada, per capita, than what it is in the U.S.
I know that list. You're comparing apples to oranges.
It is telling though, that "The Wall" was banned in half the "civilized world" when it was released.
"Yeah, like maybe a reVUHlooshun! Can't have that!"
Chuckle. Damn, you're on to something.
"I have long learned that one should not judge a nation simply by what it's government does do, but rather what it does vs. what it can do. From that perspective, U.S. "bullying" in the world is the model of restraint."
and asked for the evidence for what you learned, meaning the principle in the first sentence. If you're still interested, I am still interested in what led you to such a principle.
It's simple. Humans are assholes. We're the biggest assholes on the planet. Given the chance, many of us wreak all sorts of havok and create misery in our quest to improve our lot, regardless of the cost to others.
Surprisingly, this is an effective survival strategy for a species.
Given that, when restraint of action is evident, it stands to reason that some principle other than barbarism is at work, and that the place where this happens is likely to be further from a Hobbesian state of nature than other places.
I used to think that Canada was a pretty decent place. And, compared to a lot of other places in the world, it is.
But, the U.S. is far, far, better, even with the present shit that's afoot.
Except, that kind of excess, and "making examples" is a daily reality in Canada. The U.S. may be heading down a dark path these days, but, in many ways, Canada is already at the end of it.
For example, there's a fellow in Ontario serving a life sentence (the maximum) for posession of pot. Why so harsh? Well, he used to sell hemp seeds (which was legal), and the government hated this. So, when he was caught with three pot cigarettes, he was busted and had the book thrown at him.
Also, it is extremely difficult to fight such injustice. You can't sue the government, for example, except in extremely narrowly defined cases. You can't get a lawyer to take a case paid on contingency of success because that practice is illegal (so as to not have the "distasteful American practice" of ambulance chasers). Of course, this means the poor don't get justice. If you think they're receipt of welfare payments balances that out, you're entitled to that opinion. Clearly I disagree.
Jeez, if we were having this conversation in a coffee shop in Canada, remaining civil as we disagree, we (well I) would be thrown out for being "offensive", daring to criticize Canada. At least in the U.S. you can still sport a bumper sticker that says "Buck Fush!". Wearing a t-shirt reading "Achtung! Die Martin, die!" would likely get one arrested despite saying nothing more than "Attention! The Martin, the!" in German.
Perhaps you remember the stink when Conan O'Brien took his show to Canada, and had his "insult dog" insult Quebec? Geez, he insults everyone! I laughed as any sane person would. But, les Quebecois and les autres (Quebeckers and others, i.e. Canadians) were not amused.
Yes, I can't make threats, even in jest, against the POTUS, so you could argue that there is no "real" free speech in the U.S. But, you have no idea what critical and truthful speech gets censored in Canada. Ask about the list of banned books some time. (Yes, the list is censored).
It's on a par with the U.S., per capita.
"Bowling for Columbine" would put the per-capita "death by guns" rate in the U.S. at 14% higher than that in Canada. However, Moore distorts his stats (surprise, surprise): he includes justifiable homicides by police in the U.S. and excludes them when considering Canada (and I suppose other countries). Britain and Japan do have significantly lower gun-related crime rates, but violent crimes normally committed easiest with a gun are instead committed with a knife or other weapon.
The interesting thing about Canada is, everyone has a gun (because people like to go hunting) but almost nobody ever commits a violent crime with one.
False. It is extremely difficult and impractical to own a gun in Canada, particularly after the 1987(?) Ecole Polytechnique killings in Montreal (which would have been prevented had the requisite background checks been done). Getting an FAC (firearm acquisition certificate) is not that hard -- standard background check, but then you need a permit to transport it from the place you bought it to the place you intend to store it, and another such permit everytime you move it (like from home to the shooting range). Of course, there's a fee to keep your firearm registered as well (to the degree that when the law was enacted some small town police departments complained that the firearm registration fees would bankrupt them). One scandal involves the "cost" of this registration program actually having lost the government betweek CA$100 million and CA$1 billion, depending who you ask.
Hunting was prevelant and popular in the 1960s and 1970s (I enjoyed wild game every fall as a child in the 1960s and early 1970s because my father was an avid small game hunter (grouse, pheasant, quail, and rabbit, mmm!), but the laws are too burdensome, and the hobby to expensive, so many had given it up, save the wealthy.
I saw one piece in which a Canadian cop was asked how many murders had taken place in his city, and he had to think about it. I think he said something like, "Well... There was one last year..." ONE.
I'd like to know where that is. Are you sure he wasn't referring to gun-related murders?
Toronto is starting to become a battlefield with gang-warfare shootouts taking place in shopping malls. Google.
A friend of mine, who grew up on the border with Canada, said once that up there, the idea that guns are for shooting people is just considered silly. For Canadians, guns are for hunting, period.
Perhaps, but given the laws against shooting people, this is not surprising: you can't use force against a would-be assailant to save your life, or that of another, or property, and certainly not deadly force. Last year, a Toronto shopkeeper killed one of a gang of three armed (with guns) would-be robbers. The gun was legally owned and stored, but illegally used by him in his defense (he had been robbed several times in the recent past, and claimed that the robbers were threatening to kill him at gunpoint). One of the would-be robbers he shot crawled into an ally and died there from blood loss. This shopkeeper was facing murder charges and a life sentence. IIRC he was convicted, there being no right to kill in self-defense.
This extends to simple battery: if someone starts battering you and you fight back, you are both equally guilty of a crime against the state. You're supposed to cower and wait for the police (who the courts have ruled are not obliged to help you) -- this so it is easier to sort out the perp from the victim, so they say.
So, no, Canadians would not generally think to use guns to shoot people because it is illegal. Period.
Of course, that doesn't stop criminals.
I know some construction workers, with barely an elementary school education, who have done quite well for themselves.
They did it with damn hard work, and picking up on the job savvy. Heck, I have a mortgage on my home. Many of them don't (and live quite well).
But, I find the mere existance of a nothwithstanding clause in a nation's constitutition disgusting: "these are your rights unless the government says otherwise". Might as well just rip the whole constitution up, and be done with it.
Also, Quebec appears all too eager to use the notwithstanding clause to steam roller a patient's right to pay a doctor directly for service when the Supreme Court upheld that right as a charter freedom.
What really bothers me is that, while any government can suspend civil liberties through sheer exercise of power, the notwithstanding clause legitimizes such a scenario. Constitutions should constrain government, as as severly possible so that it still might perform a useful service. Even then, power will corrupt, and people will get fat and lazy -- such words do not prevent the next popular revolution, they can just serve to delay it -- that not being a bad thing since revolutions tend to be bloody, sticky messes, that get in the way of everyone living their lives.
But, to actually put to words effective state omnipotence on the sheer faith in democracy, is horribly mind boggling: Hitler (oh, screw Godwin's Law) was democratically elected (barely, and under dubious circumstances, but that does not mitigate the horror he brought about). I do not place much faith in the belief that another Hitler will not someday arise to power in a western nation. Some have even held Bush II to that light, though that's an insult to those that perished and suffered throught Nazi Germany as it is the to the character of the U.S. president. Given that, the last thing I want to see is a constitution that empowers such a nutcase.
B. Being uninsured in America where a major illness will completely wipe you out or you may in fact be denied care all together.
I think I would take A. Obviously having gold plated insurance in America is best but ever larger numbers of don't.
You might want to rethink that. Imagine paying an extra $10k a year in taxes for health care, and the not getting any, and not being able to pay for any (or being allowed to), when that $10k would let a foreigner buy private insurance! Yes, it is that bad.
The bottom like is that in Canada, you pay through the nose and get nothing. In the U.S. you might get nothing either, but you won't be asked to pay for it. (And frankly, I can't see how someone working can't sock enough away to pay COBRA premiums if they need -- I think even 401(k) withdrawls to pay COBRA premiums don't attract the 10% penalty, but I'm not certain).
The only people who might be better off in Canada than the U.S., are those that are on the public dole. But, for most hard working people just trying to get by, it is brutal. Many, unless, they've lived and worked in the U.S. probably don't realize how hard they work and for how little.
While I did my own analysis, I employed the services of a CPA (also EA) to ensure they were correct. Moving expenses to earn income (subject to time and distance limits) are deductible in they year they are incurred or paid, so long as the income earned is subject to U.S. tax. I leveraged the tax treaties to make myself subject to U.S. tax in 2003 so I could deduct the moving expenses I paid to earn that income in 2004. I took great care to ensure that the IRS also got "it's cut" of currency gains I made on the sale of my foreign home in Canada. Using a respected, bonded CPA puts him on the hook for fines and penalties. The worst case scenario is that I'd have to pay back the US$7500.
Also, returns like mine were being singled out for extensive review this year, so it appears it already got more than a cursory review.
That analysis is really hard to make.
I only compared tax burdens, true.
From personal experience, taking into account all the other expenses, our lifestyle is marginally better: we have a bit more disposable income and live in a comparable house. However, our access to healthcare is immensely better in the U.S. and I can max out our 401(k) and still save beyond that. I can hire a lawn care company and pay a housekeeper once a week.
Health care and pension costs and benefits are completely different between the two places and Canada's health costs are more in taxes, so if you do a head to head without allowing for it its not an accurate comparison. Health insurance isn't cheap though maybe your employer is covering it so you don't notice. My employer pays about US$14k toward my health insurance premiums and I have no copays, deductables, or personal amount I have to pay for insurance. However, if I paid that out of pocket, I'd still be better off than in Canada, for the lower taxes would let me afford it, and I'd actually get to see a doctor and not wait for surgery. This has been the crux of my Canadian healthcare complaint: for the tax dollars paid, the service is abysmal. It is just plain bad value.
If you are in an upper bracket taxes are pretty cheap now thanks to Bush tax cuts in the last five years and the fact they are looting the Social Security surplus right now to cover some of the shortfall. The low tax rates are being paid for with borrowed money. Its nice while it lasts but its unlikely its a policy that will be sustainable. Medicare and Social Security are going to go in to the red, the U.S. can't borrow money at the rate it is much longer and then someting will give. When it does I doubt you will be so happy with American tax rates.
Well, unless i become a citizen (and I intend to), I can just leave and not pay U.S. taxes. However, what is more realistic, and what Bush II is pushing (admittedly against resistance), is clawing back benefits and changing the way they are indexed. I do think that Social Security and Medicare will be clawed back from those that have managed to save for a comfortable retirement. Of course, that already happens with CPP in Canada, and delivery of health care is non-existent (last time I checked there was a shortage of 1400 doctors in Toronto alone). U.S. taxes would have to go up a lot to be comparable to Canadian rates.
"It's a heinous, murderous place."
We agree on something. I am very happy to be here.
As for bitter, damn straight! My father toiled for forty years paying his taxes in Canada, including the period when medicare was universal. When he needed an aortic aneyrism repair, at a cost far less than what he had contributed vs. what he received in health care benefits over the years, even allowing for a 25% subsidy of the difference for "the poor", we was denied -- this being a death sentence. To try to keep personal bias out of it, I looked at the pure economics of what he paid vs. what he needed to try to save his life. Had he not been subject to "universal healtcare" and the taxes he paid for it, he could have saved ten times what he needed for the necessary surgery to be performed by the best surgeon in the world. Pretty shitty health insurance if you ask me: high premiums with low benefits, paid as if out of a lottery instead of an insurance policy.
So, the state played at God, chosing who lives and who dies, and killing those who would otherwise live had the state left them alone. I find that a far greater sin than not intervening to save lives that would be lost for their own misfortune. While sacrificing one life to save more, might be noble, that is the privilege of the life being sacrificed, or the purvue of God, and not the right of the state. Ever.
Of course, the very rich, and this includes Canadian politicians at the taxpayers' expense, do get to leave the country and get the care they need. If universal healthcare in Canada is so great, why do its politicials flock to the U.S.? Something stinks, and it isn't the Limburgher. Also, foreigners are allowed to purchase "covered services" in Canada, but citizens aren't. WTF?
That's one data point. If it were the only one, I could shrug it off to personal misfortune. Shit happens, and all that.
But, when I see Joe and Jane "barely out of high school" earning $30k each and getting lots of government subsidies, including tax-subsidised day care for their kids while they both work, and I earning the same from one job, so my wife can raise our kids and not be a burden on the taxpayer-subsidised $5 a day daycare which used to be the norm in Quebec, and get taxed more and get told "You're rich, we're clawing back social services to you" (i.e. child tax credit), I get mad. Fucking mad.
The U.S. is far more fair toward families by permitting married couples to file jointly, effectively splitting their income. (Granted, this perk is not granted to gay couples, since the federal government does not recognise gay marriage, but in Canada is is not granted to any couple). Canada has a huge bureacratic tax code to make any attempt at such income splitting illegal (i.e giving one's spouse money to invest -- the earnings are taxed in the hands of the giver if the principle was not loaned at market rates, etc.) Yes, one get's a non-refundable tax credit (at the lowest marginal rate) for a spouse. Whoopdee-fucking-doo: it's peanuts and amounts to about $100-$200 a month. It costs more just to feed my spouse, and is inconsequential to what joint filing saves one. Don't get me started on G.A.A.R.: General anti-avoidance rules. They forbid one to arrange one's affairs solely to minimize one's taxes despite Britian's hightest court (at a time when Canada was subject to it, and still is subject to the precedence of its rulings) clearly recognized this right.
When I hear of people "getting ahead" in healthcare queues because their kids go to school with their doctor's kids, I get madder.
When I learn that the CRA will not tell you of all the steps you can take to reduce your tax burden (the IRS goes out of it's way, by comparison -- look at its explanation of how to maximize overlapping foreign earned income exclusion eligibility periods, for example), I wonder why there isn't a revolution.
Working hard and "getting ahead" in Canada reduces one
Yes, and it takes time for things to go bad. In order to maintain a comfortable lifestyle, when I was 14, my mother returned to work. As this left me with more unsupervised time, it seamed like a good thing. But, by the end of the 1970s even her income could not keep up with our overall tax burden and our standard of living declined.
So, both statements are true: life was good in the mid to late 70s, and things started getting so bad that my mother had to return to work to pay an every increasing tax burden (more precisely, to preserve our after-tax income and lifestyle).
Second, how come your american daughter goes to school in Canada? My daughter is not American. My son is. However, both attended school in Canada in 2003 and part of 2004. My daughter attended Raimerwood P.S. in Markham, ON until we pulled her out and homeschooled her until the end of the 2003 school year (it was that bad), and Dr. Robert Thorton P.S. in Whitby, ON for most of the 2003-2004 school year. We left Canada in May of 2004. My son attended a preschool in Whitby from July 2003 to May 2004.
It's pretty clear you have not moved back 'home' yet, because people were downright mean 'last time you were in Canada' and not 'last time I moved back to Canada'.
Grasping at semantics? I lived in Canada from 1961 to Novemner 1997, and from January 2003 to May 2004. As I had bought a house in Whitby, ON, in July 2003 (sold in April 2004) and reestablished bank accounts, spent more tha 183 consecutive days in Canada, I met the requirements of Canadian residence, and filed my taxes accordingly. Under the U.S.-Canada and U.S.-Germany tax treaties I also retroactively took advantage of continuing to file U.S. taxes, claiming FEIE in 2003 and FTC in 2004 and Canadian moving expenses paid in 2004 against 2004 U.S. source income.
As a sidenote, every province spends a lot of money on public education each year and we don't consider american schools as 'rich schools', really.
I noted this was the teacher's comment. Perhaps not typical, but it sure seamed that way. Geez, the schools didn't even have a hot lunch program, where students could purchase meals. (Well, Dr. Robert Thorton had pizza once a week or month, but otherwise there was no way for a student to eat a hot, relatively balanced, meal during lunch break). The American schools my kids attended had such a program for anywhere between US$30 and US$60 a month. Heck, assuming 20 school days a month, I can't feed my kid a hot balanced meal for US$3.00 (The school boards accept bids from catering companies who pass on their economies of scale -- it works extremely well, and low-income kids get a subsidy, I think every elementary school kid can get milk for free, at the very least).
As for spending money on education, perhaps. Ontario supposedly spends 45% of it's revenue on health care. But, in neither case, does it show! The mony likely pays for an inflated bureacracy.
Let me give you an idea (and this is just one data point) about what an "average" American community spends on education.
Schools are funded via property taxes, with some communities having a "Robin Hood" program to subsidize schools in depressed neighborhoods. When I lived in Allen, TX, we paid some US$5600 a year in property taxes on a $200k home. About 30% funded the local elementary schools. That's $1680. Take off 10% for "Robin Hood", and assume that each school is funded for the most part by the tax revenue of the subdivision it's in (there's about one school per subdivision). So, that's $1500 (rounded) per home per school. We had 420 homes in our subdivision. $635k per school. The school had around 300 students, so that's aboput $2k per student. It w
My experience with the IRS vs. Reveune Quebec and the CRA has been exactly the opposite.
The one thing I can say for Canada is their tax forms and laws are dramatically simpler, I way preferred them over U.S. tax filing, while it sounds like you enjoying working all the loopholes like deducting your mortgage expenses.
That by itself is very telling: you think that deducting mortgage interest expense is a "loophole" -- some kind of exotic tax dodge. Guess what? I get to split my income with my non-working spouse by filing jointly. Another "loophole"? Hardly, both are something millions of Americans do every day.
The problem with the U.S. tax code is its been so butchered by Congress that if you are a ruthless, rich SOB with a good accountant you pay nothing, while most ordinary people take it in the nose. Wrongo. There is an alternative minimum tax in the U.S. much like in Canada. In a normal year (living in one country or the other), my taxes are quite simple. I do itemize my deductions, and sometimes have a Schedule D to report capital gains and losses, but that's about it.
In a dual tax-home year, it gets complex, but nothing my accountant can't handle -- the most complex my return has been involved $700 in preparation fees so that I could deduct repayed prorated Canadian moving expenses to my Canadian employer against U.S. income in the year I actually payed them, leveraging two international tax treaties (U.S.-Canada and U.S.-Germany). I actually saved money by making myself voluntarily subject to U.S. tax when I otherwise didn't have to. I suppose that was a loophole, but the IRS was quite happy with what I did, and refunded me US$7500.
I once did an analysis, and only over a very small range of incomes around US$10k-$15k are Americans taxed more than Canadians, though even here I may have erred since low-income Americans get an Earned Income Credit.
For the record, I'd rather be incarcerated in an American jail as a potential terrorist threat (When will a foreigner let into Canada finally cross the border and blow something up? With the lax immigration policy, I fear it's just a matter of time), than live free in Canada. It's a heinous, murderous place.
Two words:
Notwithstanding Clause.
And it still is the best place on earth, if for no other reason than because you get riled up when the government steps to increase its powers and abuse the public trust. You are not alone in holding dear the values and principles that make the U.S. great. Values and principles that, from time to time, get trampled and torn.
"Bush II will pass..."
But, there have been, and continue to be, ordinary, fallable people, who strive to build a nation built on worthy principles, nevertheless. Despite regresses into barbarism, and human sins and weaknesses, the U.S. does manage to progress.
Whereas, a nation like Canada, prides principles of "equality of outcome" and "peace, order, and good government" that I find, by contrast, reprehensible in their attach on individual liberty.
Other countries do not have such lofty principles that celebrate the individual. The U.S. may falter and fall into the quagmire of human evils from time to time, and fail in it's promise of "liberty, justice, and the pursuit of hapiness for all", but damn it, it won't be for lack of trying.
Canadians, in contrast, appear to be too busy eating their own bullshit to notice how bad it tastes.
As for the taxes, Google "Canadian Revenue Agency" and compare.
Actually, it's quite difficult for a Canadian: so many emmigrate to the U.S. each year that the Green Card lottery is closed to us.
However, one should not expect to wash up on the shore and be admitted -- it is not unreasonable to have to "pay one's dues" first.
And so, I plow my way through the H1B, LC, LPR, citizenship route. At least the INS is starting to become a bit more efficient with new fast-track LCs.
People are dying because the government does not have the resources, despite decades of heavy taxation, to provide the health care it has promissed. People who, left to their own devices, would have had the funds to save their own lives.
Good God man, wake up! Recently a patient needing a double lung transplant was extremely fortunate to have compatible lungs available, and the damn hospital bungled things, lost the lungs (when they stopped being viable for transplant) because they didn't have an ICU bed? And the hospital claims that "Two out of three" (transplants performad that day) "isn't bad?"
You are being robbed and effectively murdered and don't even know it!
It is far better to let someone die through inaction than to dare play at God and pick and chose who gets to have their taxes used to save their life.
Since you "learned" that, I assume you can give me state the evidence for it you found compelling?
The U.S. has sent some 1800 servicepeople to their deaths in a conventional invasion of Iraq, instead of just nuking it off the fucking planet.
Frankly, I'm not opposed to the war in Iraq, regardless of the absence of any WMD. When some asshole dictator makes threats against you, it is perfectly acceptable to believe that he or his cronies are capable of carrying them out.
So, I *do* think the invasion was warranted.
That does not mean I think the U.S. executed its invasion plans wisely, of course. But, those particular chickens are comming home to roost.
As a libertarian, I would say no level of taxation is acceptable, but there is a pragmatic sweet spot: that where the services received are worth the taxes paid when compared to what they would cost on an open market. And yes, this even allows for a small subsidy for the poor.
One would think that government run services would be very efficient, because of the economies of scale of an operation that serves all, and needs not make a profit -- just cover its costs. Compared to a competitive open market, with smaller players, there should be enough efficiency to provide a competetive good deal even when subsidizing some service recipients who could not otherwise afford to pay.
Governments in the U.S. come surprisingly close, particularly local governments, always at fear of being voted out since "Mayor Joe" does not have a big party aparatus behind him.
The biggest difference for me comes from three factors: 1) I can file jointly with my wife since she does not work outside the home. 2) I can deduct the interest on my home mortgage. 3) The marginal tax brackets start much higher when compared to those in Canada. This allows me to afford some luxeries: I can pay a local "mom & pop" lawn care company to take care of my lawn and pruning my landscaping. I can afford a housekeeper to come onece a month. I spend quite a bit in the small town we live in. In other words, instead of funding a welfare state to provide for the unemployed, I'm helping to employ them and keep small businesses afloat.
Can you spend your money on medicinal marijuana in the US
You can in California, and those taxpayers opposed to the idea can rest comfortably knowing that their taxes don't go to pay for the pot... unlike Quebec, for example.
There will always be some area where it might be beneficial to live in Canada vs. the U.S. Both governments are pigheaded in that they do not copy what the other does "better". But, on the whole, one has far more opportunity in the U.S. than in Canada, and far fewer repressive laws on the books.
As for Bush, "this too will pass".
I have long learned that one should not judge a nation simply by what it's government does do, but rather what it does vs. what it can do. From that perspective, U.S. "bullying" in the world is the model of restraint.
I remember as a child in the late 60s and a teen in the mid to late 70s that life was good: the Canadian dollar was at or above par with the U.S. dollar, people who worked had health care coverage through their employer, and Canadians had a reputation for being friendly -- at least that's what Americans seamed to say.
Then, Trudeau's brand of sweeping socialism set in. Medicare became universal for everything. Taxes soared and the government went into serious debt. The dollar fell. It was harder and harder to make ends meet -- not so much because of inflation, but rather because of the tax burden (Canadian couples can't file jointly, so traditional families with one income earner really got taxed badly -- my mother had to return to work in 1975 to help pay our family's income taxes!).
But, many thought this was a worthwhile price to pay for our nanny state.
Over the years, taxes rose, and all those government services declined in quality. Waiting lists for medical care grew and grew and grew. These days, what qualifies as a middle class lifestyle in the U.S. is but a dream of wealth for many Canadians: being able to pay a kid to mow one's lawn is a big luxery.
Last time I was in Canada, people were downright mean, espescially when they found out I had worked in the U.S. for several years -- how dare I not pay my share of taxes "at home" (Er, because I wasn't using any of the services, and had paid far more than the share I consumed when I had lived there?). My daughter was berated by her teacher in school for bringing in her previous year's (U.S.) public elementary school yearbook for show and tell: how dare she "show off the rich school yearbook" from a school that no other child present could ever hope to attend.
It appeared that those "nice to Americans" people had degenerated to the level of rats, scrambling to survive, amid a society in decay -- a dog eat dog world, envyious of anyone who might live better by working harder, never seeing the socialist system as the root of their malaise.
Particularly after Canada decided not to join the U.S. in it's "Adventure of the Willing", many Canadians I met appeared to have been emboldened beyond an indifferance toward the U.S. (always masking thinly some degree of envy) to downright hatred -- some to the point of praising known terrorists for their attacks against the U.S.
It is very true that "you can't go home again."
For all the crap and dubious decisionmaking that goes on in American government, including the present folly in Iraq, the U.S. remains the best place on earth.
Granted, there are few if any guarantees, when one is down and hard on one's luck.
On the other hand, no has to discover that those guarantees are hollow, and empty promises either, delivered to some pro-forma, but hardly guaranteed to all.
And, most of all, no one goes around robbing you blind (tax-wise) to pay for those undelivered guarantees, to the extent that you can't pay for them yourself even if you otherwise could (nevermind that spending your own money for your own welfare is illegal in some cases in Canada, particularly when it comes to "universal" healthcare -- unfair to the poor, you see).
Liberty doesn't come cheap -- it exposes one to all the risks and uncertainties life brings. But, it sure does taste sweet.
How long Canadians will continue to put up with their guilded cage, the gilt long worn off, is anyone's guess. But, if they wake up, 't ain't gonna be perty.
No hearing, no trial, no independent psychiatric evaluation, no appeal, nada.
I wonder how much one has to criticize the government(s) before the Provincial Psychiatrist serves your bank with an order to turn over your money.