Non Dom, or not Non Dom, that is the question

chewmylegoff

I agree that it is stupid that non dom status can be inherited. It also seems ridiculous to me that - given the status is supposed to signify that your permanent home is outside the UK - that you can still claim it when you have lived in the UK for decades. I think there is scope to reform the definition of non domiciled without damaging our ability to collect tax from certain individuals. Perhaps limit the length of time you can be non domiciled to 10 years or something, after which you are deemed to be ordinarily resident. Also non-dom status seems to me to be somewhat incompatible with being a British citizen...

ukcarper

Out of interest if they flea country what other countries can they go to where the rules are similar.

Graham_Devon

ukcarper wrote: »

Out of interest if they flea country what other countries can they go to where the rules are similar.

Monaco keeps getting mentioned.

I just don't see why they would flea the country in all honesty. They clearly like being here. These people are so rich they can go pretty much anywhere but choose to live here.

In many cases were talking about major wealth. Wealth which is unimaginable to most. Wealth they cannot possibly spend in their lifetimes.

So would they really decide to up and leave to save themselves some money? It's a bit like suggesting we'd all up and leave our own areas, leaving those we know, our friends, our entire way of life to save £5 a month on our council tax bill.

It just doesn't make sense.

Indeed, if they do leave out of protest, were they really that valuable to us in the first place? If asking someone to pay their share just like the rest of us have to has them upping and leaving, were they that great a benefit to us in the first place!? I don't believe so.

We need to remember that these people are so rich, the humble HGV driver will be paying many times more as a percentage of his income in taxes than a non-dom would ever be expected to pay.

Theres another issue to all of this though and that's the social segregation. The "gating off" of communities in London is, apparently, happening at the fastest pace it ever has.

If it's as simple as "they bring money" then why don't we target Mexican drug lords and encourage them to come here to live?

chewmylegoff

So, take the example of a hedge fund manager. They set up a Cayman based fund and then a Cayman company to provide the fund with fund management services. They also set up a UK company which the Cayman fund management company subcontracts some of its work to. The hedge fund manager lives and works in London and is non-domiciled for tax purposes.

The hedge fund pays the Cayman management company 2% of assets under management and 20% of gains on investments. The Cayman management company pays enough to the UK company to cover its UK operating costs and the pays the rest as an offshore dividend to the hedge fund manager.

Let's say that dividend is £10 million. UK tax on that would be about £3 million if the hedge fund manager was ordinarily resident in the UK.

Do you think that the hedge fund manager will (a) pay £3 million in tax cos it's only like paying an extra £5 council tax to him or (b) decide to be a non resident for UK tax and move to E.g. Jersey.

If he would have remitted £1m to the UK to fund his ridiculous lifestyle he would have paid about £450,000 tax on that as a non dom - as a non resident this goes out of the window. Do we care that the UK loses that revenue?

There are 115,000 non doms. 114,999 of them are not Roman Abramovich.

michaels

Graham_Devon wrote: »

So would they really decide to up and leave to save themselves some money? It's a bit like suggesting we'd all up and leave our own areas, leaving those we know, our friends, our entire way of life to save £5 a month on our council tax bill.

It just doesn't make sense.

So via this argument 47% of several million income is no different to a fiver on an income of 30k...do you really believe that?

N1AK

tincans6 wrote: »

How about we just say that it's wrong that one group of people can buy favourable tax legislation (not advice).

If people can't see that is wrong, god help this country.

Why not, most of us buy favourable tax treatment with our votes every election after all...

Non doms fit into an uncomfortable space for me. On one side I also find the idea that being sufficiently wealthy allows you to opt out of the 'normal' tax system uncomfortable, on the other these people are paying huge amounts of tax and making the country poorer (by forcing them abroad) is an obvious case of cutting off our collective noses to spite our faces.

Someone who is non-dom still follows the same rules as anyone else regarding UK income. The 'special' status is to do with earnings from abroad, which when looked at rationally isn't something that is self-evidently wrong to have allowances for.

Cyberman60

Non doms bring in 8.3 Billion in tax, so I hope Liebore have plans to fill yet another black-hole they will create !! :rotfl:


They had already created one enormous black-hole via the 160 Billion annual deficit, so whats another 8 billion. :rotfl:

They are truly useless.... :T

Cyberman60

ukcarper wrote: »

Out of interest if they flea country what other countries can they go to where the rules are similar.

FLEE !!!!!

N1AK

Graham_Devon wrote: »

So would they really decide to up and leave to save themselves some money? It's a bit like suggesting we'd all up and leave our own areas, leaving those we know, our friends, our entire way of life to save £5 a month on our council tax bill.

It's a stupid analogy on a number of levels. They clearly don't consider it as equivalent to a £5 or they wouldn't bother registering as non-doms in the first place.

N1AK

Graham_Devon wrote: »

You wouldn't get this sort of thing going on in say, Australia, and they attract the rich too.

Have you got any facts or figures comparing the number of people who would benefit from the existence of non-dom status that move to Australia vs the UK...

:rotfl: sorry, I forgot, ofcourse you won't. You're just making stuff up and passing it off like it's considered opinion as usual.

I doubt you even have a clue what the laws regarding this kind of thing in Australia are, but don't let that stop you using them as an example. Of course, it would be a terrible example that highlights your lack of knowledge because their non-resident tax rules allow for most (if not all) the shenanigans non-dom status does in the UK with very little change in behaviour for someone super-wealthy.