Citizenship

I see that France has already done this and I think other EU countries are planning on doing the same. In the UK, non-UK NHS workers are expected to pay over £1,000.

Edit: Ok - I did not expect so many positive replies! So thank you for that. If anyone knows how to set up one of those Government petitions could you please get in touch? Seems like this would be a good way forward.

I want you to poke holes in this simple if A and B then C must be true argument.

CMV: If you believe life begins at conception AND in birthright citizenship, then you must also believe that a person who was conceived in a country must be given citizenship to that country solely on that basis, regardless of where they were born.

The logic is the following:

1. X believes that life begins at birth
2. X also believes that a person who's first moments of life are in Y country, should automatically be considered a citizenship of that country or provided an accelerated route to become a citizenship of that country.
3. If you believe both those things then you must believe that people should be afforded citizenship based on which country they were first deemed "alive" and that would be the country of conception, not the country of birth.

CMV!

Anyone buy a 2nd passport once they hit a certain net worth? If so, what NW level, what country and why?

Nevis and St. Kitts, New Zealand, Grand Cayman, Turks and Caicos, Grenada, the Golden Visa for Portugal and others all have programs but there’s a trade off between quality of healthcare, tax laws, ability to travel etc.

Anyone who did this I would be interested in hearing why they chose the country they did.

Not interested in people who were born somewhere and then moved when young or had a grandfather in Ireland so just got 2nd citizenship there because it was easy. Looking for people who did this for a reason and were thoughtful, not for convenience.

Thanks!

TLDR at bottom

Confusing title but it’ll make sense later on. Me and my mom were planning to travel back to Asia to attend my sisters wedding pre COVID and noticed that my green card was gonna expire soon. Since it’s already long overdue, why don’t we just go ahead and file for my US citizenship. That was the exactly one year ago.

Well finally after one year, I finally got my letter for the interview on November 3rd. My interview was at 10:15 am so I made sure to get up early and arrive by 9:30 am. By the time I get past the security and get my information sorted, I’m finally waiting for the interviewer to call my name. It’s about 10:30 am at this point and I’m way past nervous.

I finally get called and we head over to his office. Get all my documents out for him and we begin with the civics test. Basically out of 100 questions, they ask 10 and you have to get 6 correct to pass. Easy enough. Next he asks about my current address, phone number, and finally if any of my parents were citizens. This is where the major fuck up begins.

I had told him my mom was a US Citizen through Naturalization and my dad was not. He asked how old I was and told him around 13-14. Well, he told me that under INA 320 if one parent is already a citizen, and the child is under 18 during that time, the child is automatically a US Citizen.

So with that all the time and effort I took, I was already a US citizen. I was speechless, embarrassed, and felt I had wasted everyone’s time. The guy who was interviewing me was nice enough to go ahead and continue with the interview and later told me what I could do next to get my US passport.

TLDR- Applied to be a US citizen, already a citizen.

Is it true that you cannot legally renounce your citizenship? How does this affect you? What if you move away and dont ever want to come back?

How can this realistically affect? Like if you moved away and got a new citizenship, can argentina still force you to do anything legally? Like could they still force you to pay taxes of any kind or force you to serve the military if there were a draft?

I have not ever heard of this type of policy from other countries and I just find it very fascinating. I am very curious what you think of these laws if they're true.

I’ll put the tl;dr first since this turned into a bit of a novel, sorry.

*tl;dr* – American who qualifies for German citizenship: it makes sense from a long-term tax perspective to give up my US citizenship, but is it worth giving up our Emergency Exit plan in case something drastic happens in Europe in the future?

I am an American married to a German and have been married and living in Germany long enough to qualify for German citizenship. When I started this process I had hoped to qualify for an exception to the renunciation requirement. During my informal first appointment regarding paperwork and requirements and we discussed any possible exceptions that would apply to me, wherein I would not be required to give up my US passport. Sadly, I don’t qualify for any. But lately I have come to see my US citizenship as more of a weight around my neck and am thinking it might be time to give it up altogether, since I have the opportunity to acquire another citizenship.

My main reason for wanting German Citizenship is honestly voting rights. My husband and I have no plans to return to the US to live, ever. But in Germany no matter how long I am a resident, I will never be able to vote in local, state, or federal elections. And if this is going to be my forever home, which is the plan, then I would very much like to have voting rights. I also feel very at home here, am employed full-time with a German company, and speak German.

Why my US citizenship feels like dead weight: taxes. At the moment filing my taxes is nothing more than a weekends worth of pain in my ass and paperwork. I don’t earn enough (and most likely never will) to be required to pay anything to the US gov’t. However, my hands are tied and my choices extremely limited when I comes to investing. Yes there are a few options, or I could try to fly under the radar, but honestly, it’s too much of a hassle. So my husband and I are finally in a position financially where we can save a decent chunk of money every month and it just sits there twiddling its thumbs and gaining 0 interest in a Sparbuch (savings account). Furthermore, we have started talking about buying an investment property, but then I would have to deal with Capital Gains Tax whenever we sell, or if I renounce after having purchased the property. Again, I could try and be sneaky about it and put everything in my husband’s name connected to accounts that I have no official access to, but that’s a ris

I know it's a bit unfashionable to say good things about the UK these days but I actually do love this country and I'm grateful for all the opportunities it's given me. The UK has enabled me to get an education, build a career and carve a decent life for myself and I'm happy I'm now one of you, officially :)

https://noahpinion.substack.com/p/why-immigration-doesnt-reduce-wages

Above is full of sources to back its claims up.

Legal immigration does not reduce wages, but actually increases them, because they increase demand, they want to have more things, buy more things, just like every person. But also, as there are more people, there is more specialization of people, meaning it takes less work to make the same number of goods, meaning all people need to work less to make the same amount of money, people who work as before make more money, meaning wages rise and prices of goods fall.

But illegal immigrants can lower wages. Why? Because of the threat of deportation, and becouse they cant prove that they are US citizen to employers, they can only work at low paying jobs, meaning they can buy less, meaning there is less demand to create more jobs.

So, if we give citizenship to all 11 million illegal immigrants living in the USA, they can now not fear deportation, and can work at high paying jobs, so they can buy more goods and property, increasing demand and increase wages of all Americans and create more jobs.

Also, lift US immigration cap to 5 million people per year!

Also, let me give you an analogy: in middle ages, let's say there is a village on the side of the river Nile. If more people come to live in that village, do all villagers get to eat less food, since there are more people to be fed? No, of course not! Because more people means more demand for food, and more people means there are more people to make food, meaning more people work at fields to make food to cover demand, meaning there is more food for everyone.

Why do you think Americans arent scared, thinking that they might start starving as population grows, but food production doesn't? Becouse America's land can feed up to couple billion people, but it is underused because there is no demand to produce that much food. This logic applies to every sector of the economy.

I always laugh at right wingers who say that they are capitalist and hate socialists, but oppose free market determining where people should live. Why not then take it further and support price control, since free market doesnt work? Oops, you became a socialist.

I'm from the US. This past year, I learned I was eligible for citizenship via descent from my father. I went to the embassy in Raleigh and was able to get citizenship in one appointment! Will be getting my passport soon.

Unfortunately I don't know much about Mexico. I was going to read Brian R. Hamnett's A Concise History of Mexico once my school's library opens, and hopefully visiting and backpacking the country once the pandemic is over. I believe I have family in Nayarit (Tepic I think)? But have never met them, not sure if they would welcome me.

Some things about me, if anyone could point me in the right direction of places I might enjoy or things for me to read or learn! -

• I prefer cold weather and mountains! Not sure how much of the former can be found in Mexico
• I prefer diverse communities, diaspora, immigrant, and expat communities are very interesting to me. I don't care so much for resorts or meeting others from the US.
• Most of my traveling experience is in Eastern Europe, mostly in small countries. Big cities / countries kind of overwhelm me, which is why I'm a bit anxious to explore a country this massive!
• My Spanish is out of practice, but I'll be able to pick it up before I travel. I don't expect to get around with only English.

Sorry this post was kind of long but I have no idea where to start with this country! Please recommend any books, (can only read English now but Spanish language recommendations are welcome). I love history and will read whatever you all recommend. Thank you!

Am i overreacting?

Edward Snowden just announced his daughter has been born in Russia, and he and his family are applying for Russian citizenship.

Snowden copied and leaked highly classified information from the National Security Agency (NSA) in 2013 when he was a Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) employee and subcontractor. His disclosures compromised numerous global surveillance programs, many run by the NSA and the Five Eyes Intelligence Alliance with the cooperation of telecommunication companies.

On September 2, 2020, a U.S. federal court ruled that the U.S. intelligence's mass surveillance program, exposed by Snowden, was illegal and possibly unconstitutional.

Considering the totality of his record, should Snowden be allowed to return to the US? If so, under what conditions? How will history regard him?