
Inside the Secretive World of Tax-Avoidance Experts (2015) - ValentineC
https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/10/elite-wealth-management/410842/?single_page=true
======
lordnacho
It's not actually all that secretive. There's two related levels though:
personal and corporate.

As soon as you're making more than a few hundred grand, or you become a junior
on a ladder that looks like you'll get there, people will get a hold of you on
the personal side.

On the corporate side, as soon as you touch offshore, one of the big 4 that
you already work with will suggest some tax optimization as a matter of
course.

It's always weird, requiring whole pages of A4 diagrams, and you'll never
really understand why these constructions work.

Some of the ones I've been offered have been downright ridiculous. One
involved setting myself up as an advisor on rap lyrics. Another required me to
publish my own poetry. IMO the weird ones are the most aggressive, and it's
always sold as a tax reduction, so I've never gone ahead with them. It just
seems too good to be true, and someone's gotta pay for social expenses.

On the corporate side, it's a bit less clear cut. You have a duty to
shareholders to more or less do what everyone else does. There's also the fact
that some governments actively court firms to set up shop with a discount,
which is a sort of mutually beneficial bargain.

~~~
PaulAJ
Terry Pratchett wrote a letter to The Times about taxes, reproduced in "A Slip
of the Keyboard". In it he says:

I have been enormously buoyed up, though, by hearing from journalists and
other pundits that ‘the rich won’t end up paying the 50 per cent income tax
because their smart accountants will find a way around it’. When I put this to
my own accountant, a senior member of a reputable London firm, he laughed and
said: ‘Unless you want to go and live abroad for a very long time, or
associate with some extremely unsavoury people, or invest in risky tax
schemes, then for someone like you there is really nothing that can be done.’

~~~
saiya-jin
That ain't true at all, there are tons of options in Europe where you can
hide, well anything. UK has their own Channel islands, for various purposes
you have Luxembourg, Malta, Switzerland, Monaco and so on. You only need to be
resident on paper, never physically set a foot there. Every politician, tax
attorney/advisor or tax collector knows this, if they claim they don't they
are lying to your face (or are utterly incompetent).

Why do you think normal flat in Monaco costs up to 20+ million eur? It is a
nice place, but not THAT nice (In MCO case you need only postbox which can be
rented cheaply as many professional athletes do... unless you are French
citizen, then you are screwed but can go elsewhere)

~~~
s3nnyy
> "You only need to be resident on paper, never physically set a foot there."

Not true for Switzerland: You have to be 6 months per year here to officially
/ taxwise "live here". Otherwise, you lose your permit. The same is true for
Singapore, I believe.

~~~
hyperpape
In the case of Puerto Rico, it's apparently the case that you can land your
jet there, refuel, step outside, and count that as a day on the island:
[https://www.gq.com/story/how-puerto-rico-became-tax-haven-
fo...](https://www.gq.com/story/how-puerto-rico-became-tax-haven-for-super-
rich).

~~~
Scoundreller
There must be a lot of demand for flights that leave at 12:30AM for the
mainland and return at 11:00PM (just in case there's a delay).

------
throw2016
The problem is lobbying and laws being written with the help of banks and
financial firms like Deloitte with intentional loopholes, who have large
wealth advisory services and then go on to market and sell their services to
wealthy clients.

This is brazen corruption and everyone knows it. There has been focus on
offshore havens for decades now with no resolution suggesting a lack of
interest in fixing the loopholes.

It's like saying every employee can sell their services to a marketing firm
which can then lease it out to employers. And the marketing firms can exist in
low tax regions. If the law allows this it is not 'tax evasion', merely 'tax
optimization'. The end result is is lower tax revenue but of course employees
as a group do not have this kind of clout so won't happen. But let us not
pretend we do not understand what is happening and muddy the waters in the
face of brazen opportunism and corruption.

~~~
provolone
Maybe the taxes are the problem. Laws are written by politicians and
bureaucrats. Naturally as officers of the government, they rationalize an ever
expanding government.

Speaking of a conflict of interest...

------
PaulAJ
See also "Moneyland":
[https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/sep/07/moneyland-
oliv...](https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/sep/07/moneyland-oliver-
bullough-review)

------
sevensor
So in this vein, what ever came of the Panama Papers / Paradise Papers? I
admit to not keeping careful track, but I don't recall any reforms resulting
in the U.S.

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seltzered_
Theres a decent interview of Brooke Harrington (article author) here:
[https://overcast.fm/+BvAG1UMFw](https://overcast.fm/+BvAG1UMFw)
[http://whomakescents.libsyn.com/brooke-harrington-on-
wealth-...](http://whomakescents.libsyn.com/brooke-harrington-on-wealth-
managers-and-the-one-percent)

------
Novashi
Has anyone moved from a pure software/hardware technical career to wealth
management? Do you find your skills useful there?

~~~
EADGBE
In my experience, wealth management is mostly about having great people skills
and being able to have a conversations with anyone.

Not saying everyone here is bad at it; but it's an extremely social industry.

------
Simulacra
Tax evasion is illegal; tax avoidance is not.

~~~
SmellyGeekBoy
Arguably they are both immoral, however.

~~~
roel_v
When you got your last mortgage, didn't your advisor tell you the 'best'
option, taking into account tax breaks and whether you are single- or dual
income family? Sure, it's less money we're talking about, but it's 'tax
planning' or 'tax avoidance' all the same. I find it weird that people
complain about 'them' not paying their full share, yet use their retirement
tax incentives to the max every December.

~~~
null000
Some schemes stretch credulity and fly in the face of the intent of the law.

If I choose to pay 22% down instead of 20% so I can qualify to write off my
interest payments, that's one thing. The schemes revolving around putting out
shitty books of poetry or what not mentioned above are an entirely different
beast.

My own way of looking at it is that it becomes more immoral the further out of
your way you go and the further you stray from the original intent of the law

------
Bucephalus355
Also known as “Deloitte”.

~~~
Paraesthetic
Thats a fairly big call, but highly likely to be accurate

~~~
lordnacho
Not a big call, it's what they do. They have huge departments for (legally)
optimizing your tax.

Source: I used them to do this for a firm I was working for.

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anon7429
Secretive? Hardly. Any deca-/centimillionaire can point you toward good tax
accountants whose job it is to minimize their client's tax burden within a
certain gray zone. For more wholesale tax avoidance, putting it in non-self-
destructing art would be far better than hiding it in gems or unstable
cryptocurrencies.

~~~
PaulAJ
A centimillionaire is someone with assets of $10k. Perhaps you meant a
hectamillionaire ($100M).

~~~
jasode
Depending on the word, The _centi-_ prefix can mean _multiply_ by 100 instead
of divide by 100.

The popularity of " _centimillionaire "_ to mean $100 million is reflected in
Google's top results.[1] Merriam-Webster dictionary, Wikipedia, and Forbes all
mention centimillionaire as $100 million.

Likewise, "centipede" means a creature with ~100 feet (even though no species
actually has exactly 100 feet).

Language usage is ultimately dictated by popularity instead of "correct"
scientific prefix rules and it looks like "hectamillionaire" is not the
widespread choice to label 10^8 dollars.[2]

[1] 18000 results for _" centimillionaire"_:
[https://www.google.com/search?q=centimillionaire](https://www.google.com/search?q=centimillionaire)

[2] only 1880 results for _" hectamillionaire"_:
"[https://www.google.com/search?q=hectamillionaire](https://www.google.com/search?q=hectamillionaire)

