"Edwards to Crack Down on Wealthy Who Skirt Paying Their Share of Taxes"

“Edwards promised to crack down on wealthy Americans who skirt paying their share of taxes”

—July 26, 2007⁴³⁴

The quote above is from an article noting how presidential hopeful, John Edwards, pledged to crack down on offshore tax havens and on the rich engaging in tax evasion. It has been demonstrated that it is the rich who the rest of society milks for their wealth redistribution, and that they pay a majority of all taxes paid. Many rich people are so fed up with the rest of us stealing from them that they rightfully attempt to protect their assets. When they do, politicians and society call it not paying their “fair share.” They also make it a crime for one to keep property that is rightly theirs to begin with.

But if all rich people would hide their assets offshore, there would be much more capital available to provide us with increased productivity, jobs, and incomes. We should cheer tax havens and tax evasion — these things are highly patriotic, as they are the means by which society is best served by the rich.

The U.S. government has become militant about such things as hiding assets (i.e., trying to protect one’s property from being stolen). The U.S. has strong-armed so many nations into squealing on those hiding assets (and those not hiding assets) that it now has extradition treaties with over 135 countries. It is also legal for the U.S. to kidnap accused American tax evaders from other countries. And, the I.R.S. imposes so many regulations on international financial institutions that most of these companies will no longer deal with American citizens. Most Americans keeping money overseas do so legally, and they do so mainly because they want to 1) keep their money in a currency whose government does not devalue it and 2) keep their money in a banking system which is less liable to collapse and 3) have an increased amount of investment alternatives. These three things mostly cannot be done in America because the government 1) prints too much money and does not allow competing currencies, 2) has a more unsound banking system due to its printing of money and government-run financial system, and 3) imposes so much regulation and tax-oriented restrictions that it is either illegal or unprofitable for American firms to provide the investment choices other countries do (such as annuity insurance wrappers, hedge fund mutual funds, multi-currency money markets, etc.).

The U.S. continually and increasingly makes its citizens financial prisoners. For citizens of most countries there is always the option of moving abroad and taking up tax residency elsewhere. That is not possible for American citizens, who are subject to U.S. taxation no matter what country they move to. Due to this country’s extremely high personal and business tax rates, many citizens decide to leave the country all together. That option has now been made almost impossible or at least too expensive to be feasible. President Bush signed into law an exit tax on wealthy U.S. citizens and long-term green card holders who expatriate from the U.S., making it too costly to escape punitive taxation. John Edwards supports this Gestapo-like regulation, whose purpose is theft, simply because he had votes he needed to buy and the rich have the money that he could use to pay for the votes (via wealth redistribution programs).