Why should I care if they were criminals abroad? Just take their money. If they commit a crime here just pull their visa and deport them. No refunds!
We don't even have to bear the expense of a trial because pulling a visa doesn't require a criminal conviction.
> Something like 0.5-1% of households in Europe have >$1M in investable/liquid assets.
You say this like it's a bad thing. I welcome immigration from rich Europeans.
1% of European households have >$1M in cash. Of that fraction, I'd estimate that 0.0005% might consider, for more than 2 seconds, donating a huge fraction (in most cases the majority) of their wealth to the US government for expedited visa approval.
You're not going to get European immigration via this scheme, that's for sure.
The only people who are likely to pay are people who are exceptionally wealthy and exceptionally highly motivated to get out of wherever they currently reside. Fraudsters who won't be extradited, mostly.
Let's assume a high-net-worth individual with $1M of annual pre-tax cash flow split evenly among qualified dividends, long-term gains, and business income, and a $3M primary home. Let's also assume that this man lives in Texas, or he lives in Germany.
In Texas he'd owe about $304k in US federal income taxes (23.8% on dividends and gains; ~37% top rate on business income) plus roughly $54k of property tax at ~1.8%, for a total near $358k.
In Germany he'd pay ~26.375% on dividends and gains ($131.9k), a roughly 45% + 5.5% solidarity surcharge on the $500k business income (~$237.4k), and low property tax (~0.3% ≈ $9k), totaling ~$378k.
The difference comes out to just $20k. That said, all services are cheaper in Europe -- medical, telecoms, legal, etc. -- so life in Europe tends to be far less expensive in general.
And you'll note that I was extremely generous and picked a state without income tax. Many US states, perhaps most, are worse than Germany.
I also picked a middle-of-the-road European state. There are some that don't seem that interested in collecting taxes, e.g. certain Swiss cantons, some Baltic states, and Monaco. (No personal income tax on salaries, dividends, interest, or capital gains + no wealth tax!)
Dude, seriously. Think about these things before you post. The tax situation in the USA is way worse than you think it is, and it's way better in Europe than you imagine.
Agreed. I never understood why people are so against the rich immigrating to their country. Especially when they don't mind penniless undocumented migrants walking/floating across the border.
> Something like 0.5-1% of households in Europe have >$1M in investable/liquid assets.
You say this like it's a bad thing. I welcome immigration from rich Europeans.