The Hollywood actor is a prominent donor to the Democratic Party in the United States. In recent years, that has regularly led to criticism from President Trump, who has called him a “second-rate movie star,” among other things. According to Clooney, it didn’t bother him much. “It’s not my job to keep the President of the United States happy.”
“It’s not my job to keep the President of the United States happy.”
That’s Jeffery Epstein’s job
That was.
His children would have a good life anywhere. The joys of being incredibly famous and wealthy.
Wish I had the money to escape the United States too
How much does it take?
More than just a plane ticket. You need a marketable skill that is easily transferred, rent, food, utilities, new transportation, new licensing, and coverage for enough months until you can get the job. Also, the immigration fees. Basically, immigration is for the rich who can use money as a cushion or for the impoverished who have nothing to lose by assuming the risk.
More than just a plane ticket. You need a marketable skill that is easily transferred, rent, food, utilities, new transportation, new licensing, and coverage for enough months until you can get the job. Also, the immigration fees.
You’ll need a marketable skill, rent, food, and transportation if you stay, too. I’m not sure what you mean by licensing. Immigration fees is something that I haven’t looked into before, but it appears to be something like 800€ in here Denmark.
As for language, if you pick the Netherlands, Scandinavia or larger German cities, then English will be OK.
I’m not saying that I think it’s a walk in the park, nor that’ll be free, but it may be easier, and less expensive, than people think. Start by going on an extended vacation to the countries that you’re interested in. Maybe talk with potential employers. Then make plans afterwards.
You’ll need a marketable skill . . . if you stay, too.
Fair, but some skills are inherent to your placement within the home country, and transferring that skill to another country would actually add to the expense. A great example of this would be an American lawyer relocating to France. They go through law school and learn the American/English common-law system, then they relocate to France, which bases all its laws in a statutory context. So, not only would they handicapped by this new legal mantra, they’d have to then go to school again and pay to pass the bar again. So, there’s another cost.
To be fair it is expensive if you want into Europe or something, but to leave for example to some East-Asian country, the cost of living out there is so much lower compared to US you could probably sell everything you own, buy the flight ticket there, and still have enough to live off for a while. That’s obviously not sustainable in the long run unless you can figure out a source of income, but just leaving itself isn’t that expensive. It’s the where you’re going and how to keep staying away
I hear real estate in Iran will be cheap.
The rich and famous will live their lives in a bubble no matter where they reside. And Clooney is still going to hear about Trump’s criticisms no matter where he lives.
My family has been in that area he’s moved to for a couple generations. It’s really nice and it’s the south, but it’s very far away from the busy/fancy parts of the côte d’azur. I can definitely see why they’d choose going there. The only downside to this whole region is it votes pretty right wing and you can sometimes feel it in conversations with the locals, but since I’m sure they’re still pretty insulated they probably don’t feel that.
Sure
But he still keeps his US citizenship? Or did he give it up?
Probably not. Wealthy people like him have to pay an exit tax on their unrealized gains when they renounce their US citizenship
Wait, what? He has to pay the US government on potential taxable income he might have made and owed to the government if he were still a citizen? That doesn’t seem fair. Even if we weren’t talking about a movie star. I don’t want to pay the government when I divorce them for my new country.
I thought everybody had to pay.
There is a threshold. You only pay if you have a net worth of $2 million or more or earned around $200k or more per year in the last 5 years.
https://www.irs.gov/individuals/international-taxpayers/expatriation-tax
Correct
US accepts dual citizenship so I doubt he gave it up.
He could have saved a bit of taxes.
Depending on the intricacies of tax treaties you probably won’t pay much US tax after moving to a high taxation country. Relinquishing US citizenship when you are wealthy means paying the capital gains exit tax on your worldwide assets though so if you can afford good accountants, keeping both is probably easier
who the hell is still filing taxes?
What else?
In France they won’t be brainwashed into believing in White Jesus
Removed by mod
So he can meddle in French politics instead?
Stupid much?
Oh you have no idea
The American dream is now to escape America.
Damnit, another sequel?!
They tried 6 times to make a sequel, Kurt Russell keeps saying no.
I heard you were dead
I got better
It’s harder than you think to renounce American citizenship.
If you’re brown, they’ll do it for you
You don’t have to and it’s not clear whether or not Clooney did.
It would be a massive tax bill if he did.
It really isn’t. https://www.usa.gov/renounce-lose-citizenship
- Extensive forms;
- approval by the U.S. Department of State;
- In-person interviews with U.S. consular officer abroad (at least one in person).
- Renunciation in person;
- Exit tax for renouncing citizenship, on top of existing U.S. tax liabilities;
- Retain Selective Service obligations;
Yeah I don’t think that helps them make the point they thought they were making lol.
At least 3 of those things are kinda the same and would be covered in one visit.
The selective service won’t apply to people over 50 I don’t think.
The exit tax is probably the sticking point for many, I’m not sure how that works for mega rich like Clooney, but it might be really easy for a poor like me.
It must be a confusing time for Russian dissidants that just got here 👀
Yup, leave if you can.
Yeah I’m in the process of moving to France as well. Have been planning it before the current state of affairs and for work reasons but things like ICE and the Thought Police EO are expediting things.
Ultimately my family came here from Europe generations ago for better economic opportunities, more freedom, and virtually every one of us have served our country in some compacity. I no longer see anything on the list that is true anymore. Europe, and France, have their own problems but in the next 60-100 years they seem much more stable and democratic than the US.
I’m contemplating just going on our 90d visa, WFH with my American business, and simply renewing until I get a 1y long-term visa (which you can renew every year with proof of income and NOT working for a EU company). A lot of people on r/digitalnomad and r/getout do a variation of this in Fr.
If things get worse I genuinely think seeking political asylum may be on the table for some people. But I make enough money to not really consider that.
I know and quite frankly I probrally should. Not enough money to leave yet too much anger to die.
ITT: people not realizing his wife was born in Lebanon. Are they safer than your average non-pure-white family? Absolutely. But they have legitimate reasons to be scared.
Also apparently she’s a human rights lawyer so she’s bound to have pissed off republicans one way or another already.
What does her wife being from Lebanon has anything to do with this? She has British and French citizenship so it is easy for him to get the citizenship and I bet she is safe from ICE on virtue of having shit ton of money, other 2 nationalities and being an international lawyer.
What does her wife being from Lebanon has anything to do with this?
That she’s obviously not safe in the country and people are mad that they decided to uproot their family and leave?
I bet she is safe from ICE on virtue of having shit ton of money, other 2 nationalities and being an international lawyer.
I’m sure that being part of the team that being one of the authors of this article makes you popular with Netanyahu’s sock puppet’s pet anti-immigration criminal organization lmao. She’s also represented other people that the US government doesn’t exactly agree with. There are a LOT of good reasons for Trump to disappear her. She did exactly the one thing that the shit ton of money allowed her to do: Escaped. I hope everyone else who can and needs to, does as well. The bigger the brain drain, the better - Trump’s empire won’t last as long.
Neither him nor her or their family are in any danger in the USA, besides the usual due to the nature of the country.
She was a key part of the team prosecuting the war crimes case against Israel
Yeah I get hating rich people, because fuck inequality, that’s true, but the Clooneys seem like pretty decent people to me as far as rich celebrities are concerned.
He for sure has too much money(Google said $500 mill) but he’s small time compared to the richest and the corporations that are doing the most damage to the future. I doubt more than a few folks interested in eating the rich are champing at the bit to get at Clooney.
George Clooney did a pretty good job (just like all the other actors) in the 2000 Coen Brothers film “O Brother Where Art Thou”. Seriously!
My hair!
We’re in a tight spot!
Well, ain’t this place a geographical oddity! Two weeks from everywhere!
Must be nice to have “Buy Myself French Citizenship” kind of money.
He didn’t buy it, his wife has french citizenship so he can get it too although I bet the process was faster for him since he is rich and famous while I have been waiting 8 months for my wife to be allowed to enter the country.
He could do it for under $500K. He probably started the talent investor visa process during the 45 administration, as they take about 4 years to get approved.
Super easy for him to spin up some production company that makes 2 art movies a year, hire 3 French people he knows on 5-year contracts, and he’s basically at the minimum requirements. If he’s bought and invested more than a certain amount in a home as well, that also counts towards citizenship.
He could do it for under $500K.
Oh, is that all? Let me check my couch for loose change.
If he’s bought and invested more than a certain amount in a home as well, that also counts towards citizenship.
I’m sure he has a home in the South of France. Probably walking distance from the Cannes movie festival
I’m sure you’re correct. And yes, these are trivial amounts for him – and not exactly insane amounts if you simply owned a house in LA and sold it to flip it into EU citizenship. IMO the key point is that this is a 4-year process that I bet he started in mid-2021. Time is something he can’t buy.
The US has its own citizenship by investment schemes as well, well before the “Gold Card” or whatever scam that is. Usually the base investment levels on these things are $100K-$300K and then you’ll be on the hook for taxes and admin fees and a lawyer as well. It’s why so many UK cits bought property in Portugal or Greece as they had lower levels for investment to count.
You only need savings of about 1.5x the SMIC (minimum wage) - currently 1801.80€ monthly for 12 months and you can get a year visa. If you have enough the following year, you can renew. Do that four times and you can ask for a more or less permanent multi-year residency if you speak french by that time. So as you can see, you could probably sell a house in the US for a decent profit and invest time enough to gain French residency without needing George Clooney money.
Add I understand it, permanent residency also requires a language exam and doesn’t guarantee employment rights (because French voters don’t want people “stealing jobs”). So it’s more complicated than that.
The multi-year residency requires B2 proficiency as of this year, and also allows working in France. It is of course up to french authorities as to whether it is granted, taking into account your time in the country and your level of integration.
In the process of moving to Fr myself (diginomad). As I understand it you don’t even need 1.5x SMIC in savings just prove you earn 1.5x monthly x12. I could be wrong, still trying to work the plans out if you have any resources you can recommend would love to learn more!
The other big aspect to getting your temp long stay (1yr) visa, if you’re not being sponsored by a company, is to prove your income is solely from non-EU companies. Since I’m WFH American business, I basically just need to pay rent+insurance.
Yes, there seems to be some confusion in the french interpretation of non lucrative visa categories. The benefit of this is that some remote work may be tacitly allowed. The complexity comes really from French taxation and social charges. Nobody can really say whether you will be chased for 9% of your income, 17% of your income, or 47%.
The problem is nobody can actually give you a clear and definitive answer, so if you do things like stay past six months, get a permanent apartment, get rid of your home elsewhere, there is a risk you could be asked to pay even several years later. It makes for a complicated situation, and for this reason I think another country with a clearly specified digital nomad program and tax regime is a much safer bet.
I can get more detailed outside of a public forum.
Probably cheaper than a “Trump Card”
