Word: switzerland
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Last year, when the International Monetary Fund published a paper on offshore tax havens, it included Switzerland, the Cayman Islands, Jersey, the Bahamas and several other countries where the rich stash their money beyond the reach of grabby governments back home. But there was one surprising new entry on the list: the United Kingdom. The IMF was merely recognizing what wealthy foreigners in Britain have known for years. While British citizens shoulder taxes of up to 40%, residents who weren't born there can take advantage of the nondomicile - or nondom - rule, which means they're only taxed on income...
Where will they - and their cash - go? They have plenty of options. Guernsey, Ireland, the Isle of Man, Jersey, Luxembourg, Monaco and Switzerland all boast no or low taxes for expats, and are all less than a three-hour flight from London. Cast the net wider and there are dozens of countries offering perfectly legal perks and breaks to attract tax exiles. There are more than 45 recognized tax havens, holding up to $7 trillion in assets, and these numbers are growing. According to the Boston Consulting Group, the number of households with assets of $1 million or more swelled...
...Switzerland, the most famous tax haven of all, that remains the global leader in attracting cash from overseas. The number of tax exiles living there shot up from 2,394 in 2003 to 4,175 in 2006, according to consulting firm KPMG, and they poured around $917 million into its tax system in 2006 alone. The central government lets foreigners negotiate how much tax they pay directly with whichever of the country's 26 cantons they move to; an annual lump sum is calculated, based on five times the rental value of the expat's Swiss home. Rates average around...
Another big draw is Switzerland's tradition of discretion. Its strict banking privacy laws are a bonus for foreigners who don't want anyone peeking at their accounts. But the European Union, worried about what it sees as rampant tax evasion, is pushing for more transparency in Europe's banking systems. The E.U. Savings Taxation Directive, which came into effect in 2005, demands that member states and their dependencies either automatically exchange information on the accounts kept in their banks by E.U. residents or start imposing a 15% withholding tax on any foreign-sourced interest paid into those accounts. Most...
...London is the latest stop in Musharraf's European tour, which also included a meeting with E.U. Foreign Policy Chief Javier Solana in Brussels and a visit to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland - a goal of this trip has been to allay any concerns that heads of state in the West might have about the upcoming election. Brown, for one, seems convinced. After the meeting, the prime minister confirmed he told Musharraf that "credible elections ... are essential" for Pakistan and that the president assured him "that all electoral processes are in place to ensure transparent, credible polling...