Let’s say I become a citizen of a country that doesn’t allow dual citizenship. During naturalization, new country B tells me I have to renounce citizenship from old country A.
Does that have any effects back in country A? How would country A know? Would country A even care if they found out?
You must log in or register to comment.
Renouncing citizenship is a formal process done at the consulate or embassy, so country A almost by definition has to know about it
I’m working on some outdated memories, but IIRC:
Germany allows dual citizenship now, but used to not allow it in most cases. In those cases, if you applied for German citizenship, you had to express that you were willing to give up your old citizenship. Once you were granted citizenship, you had a certain amount of time (two years?) to show a certificate that you renounced your old citizenship. If you didn’t, your German citizenship would be revoked.
Actually, dual citizenship in Germany is only allowed for a few select non-EU countries. For everyone else: first you apply for citizenship. Then they say citizenship will be granted, under the condition that you provide proof of revoking your previous citizenship within 2 years. Then you revoke your previous citizenship and give the confirmation to the immigration department. They will process it (during those weeks you are practically stateless) and grant you citizenship on this basis. Source: did this three years ago
As of the end of June they significantly relaxed the rules around the path to citizenship, including dual citizenship. Anyone can now do it if the other country also allows dual citizenship.
Not like this:
I’m a dual citizen (Canada & USA, born Canadian). Part of naturalization in the US is the oath where you renounce citizenship from everywhere else. Thing is, most countries don’t care about that oath–Canada requires filing a special form and appearing before an official (IIRC) to renounce citizenship. I asked about the discrepancy–it turns out the US doesn’t actually care whether I’m a citizen elsewhere, largely because it’s difficult to figure it out and enforce it (this might have been the opinion of the immigration officer, not sure).
Well if you’re an American, expensively.
The IRS is determined to make sure that they juice every last drop out of you to make sure that you feel the hurt, because Americans denouncing their citizenship are one of two kinds typically, either A) Political migrants who are renouncing to make a statement about some great failing of the US, usually something the feds have dug their heals in over like Vietnam, or B) Financial migrants who are trying to escape tax increases.
Either way, the feds have a vested interest in deterring that behavior as much as possible and so the US is one of the few places that gets away with enforcing an arm and a leg exit tax and IIRC still makes you pay another 10 years worth afterwards basically to punish you for trying to skip your duty to your fellow citizens to support the country and her infrastructure and services that everyone shares.
Elizabeth Warren had actually proposed tightening the noose even harder during the 2020 primaries because where Republicans loose their shit over the idea of women being able to outsmart abortion restrictions, Dems, and especially progressive Dems, loose theirs at the thought of some Elon Musk type being able to take the bag they made off American infrastructure and labor and run away with it to avoid paying the fair share back.
People usually call it brain drain but really it’s all down to tax dodging, between the high rate of immigration and envy of the world higher education quality (so long as you can afford it), America is not running out of smart people without a 20th century style purge of the “intellectual class” by authoritarian militias because smart people aren’t dumb enough to go along with their strong man fetish.
Tl;Dr, the IRS REALLY wants to make sure you know that renouncing for financial reasons is gonna be way more costly than what you’re gonna save by fleeing to a tax haven.
Yeah you didn’t remember correctly at all. The fee to renounce citizenship is ~$2300 for everyone. For the IRS piece, you file a final tax return the year you renounce citizenship, and they check to see if you’ve been compliant and paid everything you owe for the previous 5 years, but the exit tax only kicks in if you’re worth over $2 million, paid an average of a shitload of taxes (like more than twice the US median household income, so most people aren’t going to qualify) over the previous 5 years, or don’t certify that you’re in compliance. IF you have a lot of money, they treat it as though you’ve sold everything you own and calculate what that would be worth, deduct $821,000 (as of last year), then tax the rest of the amount they calculated. Then you’re done, unless you happen to have US income after that.
I had no idea this was a thing. If you renounce your citizenship and you don’t yet have a new one… What a weird place to be in.
Yeah, being stateless is really bad. There’s a few international agreements to avoid the creation of more stateless people, but it still happens. You end up with people spending years in airports or jails as their visa expires and they have no way to renew it or get a visa for elsewhere, and asylum claims can take months to years to process, and get denied anyway.
Exactly what I was wondering, thanks. I assume you have to renounce before acquiring a new citizenship? No thanks.
Most countries tell you to renounce after you gain the new so it isn’t a problem. A few allos dual citizenhip. (maybe most allow dual? I seem to recall that but it is outside where I’m sure)
If you do that couldn’t you just not let them know about the new citizenship? How does that work?
It’s very difficult to enforce. I’ve heard of cases where people like show the embassy a passport of a citizenship they said they renounced by accident, and were just sternly told to renounce it, other cases where their new citizenship was revoked.
generally it isn’t enforced
No, other way around. Most countries won’t even allow you to renounce if you don’t have another citizenship.
The US also charges $10,000 dollars to accept your renunciation. The US is one of the few countries that taxes its citizens in foreign countries so there’s a big incentive to renounce when you get citizenship in a better place. There is a substantial tax deduction for the first ~150K you earn in another country, as long as you spend less than 10 days in America or traveling and pay taxes in that country, as long as that country has such an agreement with the US.
Countries typically don’t allow that. (Do any allow it?) For example, Canada requires you (at least) to be a citizen of another country and to live outside Canada.
The UN would likely consider it a violation of their human rights if a country knowingly allowed a citizen to become stateless. I would hope that at least all member states would not allow it, but I don’t know for certain.
You can renounce us citizenship any time you’d like. They don’t care if you’ll become stateless. But you definitely do not want to be stateless.
Now you have me wondering about legal juristiction of mermaids in international waters…
It’s easier to just s say they don’t exist than it is to deal with all the complications.
The USA allows it. Though I imagine the embassy staff will probably try to warn you.
