RPF0648-Friday_QA-Sell_Crypto_to_Pay_Debt_Adjust_Investments_for_Economic_Uncertainty_Adjusting_Finances_for_Divorce_Birth_Tourism_Living_Abroad

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00:00:30.560 | Today on Radical Personal Finance, it's live Q&A.

00:00:33.560 | ♪

00:00:49.700 | Welcome to the Radical Personal Finance podcast, the show dedicated to providing you with the knowledge, skills,

00:00:53.780 | insight, and encouragement you need to live a rich and meaningful life now, while building a plan for financial freedom in 10 years or less.

00:01:00.320 | My name is Joshua, I am your host, and today it's a live Q&A show.

00:01:03.720 | These shows have been AWOL for about a month and a half, as I have been dealing with a colicky baby,

00:01:09.000 | and helping my wife, and traveling quite a bit, and been kind of all over the place.

00:01:13.340 | But I'm excited to bring them back, and hopefully they'll be back for good.

00:01:16.940 | ♪

00:01:21.740 | My best of intentions are that each Friday I do a live Q&A.

00:01:25.180 | If you're new to the show, I limit these shows to patrons of the show,

00:01:29.380 | which are people who sign up to support the show on Patreon.

00:01:31.720 | You can do that at patreon.com/radicalpersonalfinance.

00:01:34.920 | Patreon.com/radicalpersonalfinance.

00:01:37.220 | That helps me to limit the number of people who call into the show, so I can give good attention.

00:01:41.660 | Sometimes we have a lot of callers, sometimes we have just a few.

00:01:43.860 | I also have a number of written questions lined up from listeners of the show who just can't call in on the live schedule.

00:01:49.440 | And so, if time allows, I will get to some of those.

00:01:51.940 | A couple of interesting international questions lined up for when we get done with the live callers in today's show.

00:01:58.440 | I have some questions on what life is like if an American citizen moves abroad,

00:02:03.120 | in terms of keeping their systems and their infrastructure in place in the United States.

00:02:08.580 | And then also some questions on what happens if...

00:02:13.420 | for birth tourism, for an American citizen who's thinking about doing birth tourism.

00:02:16.360 | But we begin with some of the live callers first. We go to James in Massachusetts.

00:02:19.900 | James, welcome to the show. How can I serve you today, sir?

00:02:23.100 | Joshua, I just want to say thank you for my wife and I and my son.

00:02:26.780 | And honestly, you helped us convert a bit of this existential dread around finances into hope and action.

00:02:35.020 | So, thanks for that.

00:02:37.720 | So, my first question is, we paid off about almost $200,000 worth of debt in the last three years.

00:02:48.300 | I would love to say it was through sort of just like using my income, but I made some investments, specifically cryptocurrency.

00:02:57.600 | I work in the space and I made some investments a few years ago that paid off.

00:03:02.340 | I took money out of the market and paid off about $125,000 worth of student loans and put down a down payment on a house.

00:03:13.900 | The market went down. I kind of forgot about what I was still holding. Long story short, the market is back up.

00:03:20.740 | We have about $50,000 worth of debt from still from actually the tax bill, which I didn't properly pay the first time I took money out.

00:03:31.700 | My question is, we'd like to get the last chunk of money that we owe to creditors paid off.

00:03:39.620 | And I don't know if I should take the remaining amount of cryptocurrency out of the market entirely at the risk of increasing my tax burden at the end of the year, or if I should use my income.

00:03:53.420 | What is your household income?

00:03:56.620 | It is $190,000.

00:03:59.380 | And household expenses?

00:04:02.660 | Household expenses are about $4,000 a month.

00:04:06.740 | So if you paid off the $50,000 out of income, how long would it take you simply to cash flow that?

00:04:16.740 | I was hoping to do it within a year.

00:04:18.860 | It should be $190,000 income take off expenses if you're spending somewhere in the range of $50,000 a year, then there should be enough wiggle room between $190,000 and $50,000 to pay it off in certainly less than a year unless I'm missing something or unless your estimates of income and expenses are woefully wrong.

00:04:36.860 | With regard to cryptos, do you want to still be in the market?

00:04:40.140 | Would you be selling everything just for this?

00:04:42.140 | Or is this just kind of a, "Hey, I've got some profits. Should I take them and pay off the debt?"

00:04:46.540 | This is, well, I think they're good, relatively good holdings.

00:04:53.820 | I have about $150,000 worth right now.

00:04:57.500 | And I think they'll go up, but I also don't, I mean, it's so volatile.

00:05:04.380 | I just really can't, I can't say for sure whether it's going to go up or not.

00:05:08.220 | It could go to zero as well.

00:05:10.060 | Of course.

00:05:10.860 | So I just don't know.

00:05:14.060 | I really want to be maxing out my 401k and doing other things.

00:05:19.100 | I just kind of have a lot of balls up in the air in terms of where I should be prioritizing

00:05:24.620 | the assets I do have versus the income I have to tackle this goal.

00:05:30.140 | Because we want to be out of debt.

00:05:31.660 | That's our first goal.

00:05:33.340 | And then we want to invest seriously starting from there.

00:05:37.580 | And is the full 50,000 that you owe, is that all tax debt to the IRS or is it to various

00:05:45.180 | creditors?

00:05:45.660 | $40,000 is to the IRS and actually 38,000 as of yesterday, after a check I sent them.

00:05:54.700 | And about 12,000 is a car loan.

00:05:58.620 | And so, yeah.

00:06:00.220 | Well, I mean, here's my thought.

00:06:03.900 | In reality, there's not a clear financial answer to the picture.

00:06:09.260 | The IRS debt is not charging you a high interest.

00:06:12.540 | I'm going to assume also that your car debt is kind of just a modest interest rate.

00:06:16.940 | So those things, those debts are not super dangerous, super expensive debts.

00:06:21.660 | If the IRS debt is on a payment plan and if the car debt is on a payment plan, they'll

00:06:27.260 | just naturally pay off over time.

00:06:29.900 | But if you and your wife feel like they're hanging over your head, then I would say it's

00:06:37.340 | good to clear them off, primarily for the emotional release of having them gone.

00:06:42.300 | Because of your income, if you have been earning $190,000, if it looks like you can continue

00:06:48.060 | to earn $190,000, because of your income, I think that it's a relatively short-term

00:06:54.540 | plan either way.

00:06:55.900 | If you kept these debts here and just simply lived on $4,000 a month and put everything

00:07:01.820 | extra against the debts, you would be debt-free in, you could do it in six months, right?

00:07:07.020 | Maybe a little more, a little less, but probably about six months.

00:07:09.500 | If you pay, if you take cash out some crypto and write a check to the IRS and write a check

00:07:14.700 | to pay off the car loan, you can reinvest another $50,000 into the crypto market in

00:07:20.940 | another six months.

00:07:22.220 | So it's not really, there's not a really compelling answer one way or the other.

00:07:26.300 | If you told me, "I'm absolutely committed that I'm just going to let these debts pay

00:07:29.100 | off over time, but I'm going to keep investing on the side and stacking up cash and we're

00:07:32.700 | going to keep our income, our expenses really low and save a lot of money," I'd say, "Okay."

00:07:36.940 | Or if you said, "I'm going to go ahead and pay off the debt and then do it," I'd say,

00:07:39.980 | "Okay, there's nothing really compelling here."

00:07:42.620 | As long as you keep the ratio there of $190,000 of income to $50,000 of annual expenses, you've

00:07:50.300 | got an excess $100,000 of cash flow, which means that at these, I just assumed 40,000

00:07:55.580 | of taxes and then 100,000 of excess cash flow for the 150.

00:08:02.300 | So as long as you keep that ratio, everything is good here.

00:08:06.300 | Here's what I do like though about your going ahead and paying it off.

00:08:09.660 | Three things.

00:08:10.700 | Number one, if you have gains in the crypto, you know as well as I know that that market

00:08:15.980 | can be extremely volatile.

00:08:18.300 | It may go up incredibly well, but it may also not go up.

00:08:22.940 | In general, due to our built-in fear of loss, I think we usually feel good when we take

00:08:28.220 | gains and do something meaningful with them.

00:08:30.620 | Doing something like cashing out some of your portfolio to pay off debt would probably be

00:08:38.060 | a worthwhile thing so that if the markets evaporate and if you're wrong in your bets

00:08:42.460 | and all of a sudden your particular basket of crypto falls apart, then I think you'll

00:08:49.660 | at least be able to say, "Hey, at least we got out of debt."

00:08:52.300 | And I'm okay with that because you're not getting totally out of the market.

00:08:55.260 | So if you've got $150,000 in your portfolio and you say, "I've still got $100,000,"

00:08:59.100 | there's still plenty of money in there for it to run if prices continue to increase.

00:09:03.980 | But taking some profits and doing something that's going to impact your life is generally

00:09:08.140 | pretty good.

00:09:08.940 | Number two, you've said in the conversation that paying off your debt is your number one

00:09:14.620 | goal.

00:09:15.180 | And the wonderful thing about paying off debt as a number one goal is that it's clear.

00:09:19.580 | And you've paid off so much debt in the last couple of years, regardless of how you got

00:09:23.820 | there, it doesn't matter.

00:09:24.780 | You've paid off a lot of debt and there's just this last little bit hanging on.

00:09:28.060 | So I say finish it off and enjoy the freedom of being debt-free.

00:09:32.300 | Which brings me to number three.

00:09:34.060 | If you are debt-free and you remain debt-free, I think that will open up your opportunities

00:09:39.820 | for investing and your career prospects.

00:09:42.620 | If you're working in the crypto space, which is what I understood you to say, you know

00:09:46.460 | that's a very volatile market.

00:09:48.220 | If I were in that situation, I would never want to be in a situation where I had to make

00:09:53.500 | monthly payments beyond a very basic level.

00:09:56.300 | I would always keep myself in the position where my goal is to make a million dollars

00:10:00.220 | a year, but I want to be able to live on the income of a bag boy at the grocery store if

00:10:04.860 | I had to.

00:10:05.580 | And the way to do that is to be debt-free.

00:10:07.660 | So because you're in such a volatile market, I think there's a lot of value in being debt-free.

00:10:13.100 | So for me, I say cash out the check, make sure you count enough to pay the taxes, do

00:10:19.340 | it in a tax-efficient way, but pay off the debt.

00:10:21.980 | And then in six months you can replace it.

00:10:23.660 | Stash the money in your 401ks.

00:10:25.020 | You can do all that still.

00:10:25.900 | There's plenty of time still this year to make those contributions.

00:10:29.180 | That's my answer, James.

00:10:30.060 | Thanks, Joshua.

00:10:32.620 | Any other follow-up questions before I go on to the next caller?

00:10:34.380 | I think I'll call in another time.

00:10:38.140 | I'll get past this challenge first.

00:10:40.060 | Congratulations on all the progress on paying off the debt.

00:10:45.340 | And I'm tempted to derail the rest of the Q&A show and just talk about crypto.

00:10:50.860 | My audience feels that I have ignored it and hopefully in the coming months I will stop

00:10:55.260 | ignoring it.

00:10:55.900 | We're going to Chuck.

00:10:56.700 | Chuck, welcome to the show.

00:10:57.420 | How can I serve you today, sir?

00:10:59.420 | Well, my question basically has to do with the money we have in 401k and IRS funds, IRA

00:11:07.100 | funds, and deciding where to keep that right now in the market with the major choices being

00:11:13.740 | between large cap equity stocks, bonds, and in their interest-earning cash equivalent

00:11:20.460 | within the plans we have available, given the market's kind of at a record high right

00:11:25.500 | now.

00:11:25.740 | I just want to get your thoughts on it.

00:11:28.540 | I know you don't have a crypto ball.

00:11:29.980 | So do you have a financial advisor that you work with or are you a DIY investor?

00:11:34.220 | We do a lot of it.

00:11:36.940 | Do you?

00:11:37.180 | I have financial advisors available through various plans that I'm in.

00:11:42.860 | One of them is a state retirement plan.

00:11:44.540 | I have three financial advisors I can talk to you through there.

00:11:47.340 | But I guess my worldview and my wife's kind of aligns with yours and that the nation's

00:11:54.700 | debt and things like that you've talked about on other shows.

00:11:57.740 | So I don't know that all the financial advisors necessarily take that into account.

00:12:04.700 | So let me real quick just say one thing there.

00:12:06.940 | I try to say this in any show I talk about with regard to things like national debt,

00:12:12.700 | et cetera, that I do not see a direct link between a discussion of something like national

00:12:20.060 | debt and the stock markets of a sovereign country.

00:12:24.140 | I don't see that as a direct causal relationship.

00:12:27.660 | In my thinking and in my research, I could see very well that the stock market measured

00:12:33.740 | in the whole could certainly continue to increase and do well even if a national government

00:12:41.180 | is not doing well.

00:12:42.140 | And in fact, I think that you could make a good argument that actually could be the case.

00:12:46.860 | Let me give you a simple example of a reasonable argument somebody could make.

00:12:51.740 | It could be argued, if you buy a certain economic theory, it could be argued that if a government

00:12:59.420 | keeps taxes low, that can stimulate the economy.

00:13:03.500 | That's a pretty decent argument.

00:13:05.180 | And in fact, what you see is most governments generally believe that.

00:13:08.620 | People in political parties will have certain theories that they will espouse.

00:13:12.700 | They'll say, hey, we believe in high taxation.

00:13:14.860 | But if you get into a situation where an economy is in recession and things are really

00:13:19.180 | struggling, you'll often see that various political parties will all vote either some

00:13:24.300 | loudly or some quietly for lower taxation.

00:13:27.420 | When you have an opportunity for lower taxation, generally, you'll see a jump in company and

00:13:33.100 | corporate activity and you'll see a corresponding increase in stock prices.

00:13:37.340 | Painting broadly, but that seems to be something that you can observe over time.

00:13:41.260 | But that lower taxation could mean if a government doesn't cut spending to correspond to the

00:13:48.620 | lower taxation, that lower taxation could mean that a government would increase its

00:13:53.660 | deficit, thus increasing its national debt, thus leading in a worse direction.

00:13:58.860 | So it's possible, I would say, it's possible for government finances to be heading in the

00:14:05.340 | wrong direction and it's possible for a stock market to be heading up.

00:14:08.940 | So there's not a direct kind of causal correlation where I could say, I'm pretty confident that

00:14:16.220 | the US government in coming decades is going to effectively pass through bankruptcy.

00:14:21.100 | I see that.

00:14:21.900 | I believe that.

00:14:22.540 | I don't see any way out of that.

00:14:24.220 | But that doesn't mean that I think the stock market is going to crash this year or that

00:14:28.380 | doesn't mean that necessarily I think that every person with retirement accounts has

00:14:31.900 | to pull all their money out of the stock market.

00:14:35.260 | So I see them as different.

00:14:37.020 | I see them as related.

00:14:38.540 | And I don't know exactly what will happen.

00:14:41.660 | But the stock market question conversation is in some ways a little bit separate from

00:14:46.540 | the question of national debt.

00:14:48.300 | I think you still have to rely at this point in time, I think you still have to rely on

00:14:54.060 | the basic practices of good financial management that are taught by the mainstream financial

00:15:01.420 | advice industry.

00:15:02.700 | I think that it's good in your personal life to be wary.

00:15:06.140 | So for example, I would have a, I would personally prefer to have a much higher level of cash

00:15:12.380 | available than probably many mainstream financial advisors would suggest.

00:15:17.100 | That fits my way of saying that the best way to solve for the unknowns is to protect yourself.

00:15:23.020 | Let me expand on that for a moment so it makes sense.

00:15:24.860 | I can't control what the stock market does and I can't control what a perfect portfolio

00:15:30.860 | can do.

00:15:31.660 | But I can look at my own life and I can assess my own needs.

00:15:35.020 | And I can assess the likelihood of certain events happening.

00:15:38.140 | So it's possible that if I'm a really great financial theorist, I could design an ideal

00:15:43.580 | portfolio that could, that's going to suit through any, basically anything that could

00:15:48.460 | happen.

00:15:49.340 | But for me, it seems more comfortable just to rely on the tools that I know, such as

00:15:53.340 | having instead of six months of cash in a bank account, to have a year or a couple years

00:15:57.740 | worth of cash in a bank account.

00:15:59.260 | Because if I've got a couple years worth of cash in a bank account, then I can just, that's

00:16:02.860 | stable, then I can look at an investment portfolio that is dropping due to market conditions

00:16:08.780 | and say, I know a couple years is going to make a big difference here.

00:16:12.220 | So I don't, I personally am uncomfortable with the extremist perspective of the dollar

00:16:17.180 | is going to zero, those markets are all going to crash, we should just put everything in

00:16:19.900 | cash or buy silver coins.

00:16:21.340 | That doesn't, that doesn't click with what I see or what I have experienced.

00:16:24.780 | But I'm probably more cautious than other financial advisors.

00:16:30.620 | But I don't see necessarily that the way to solve that is with some special portfolio

00:16:35.340 | approach, but rather with a better understanding of personal finance.

00:16:39.340 | So now let's talk about the most important question, which would be when you would do

00:16:43.740 | something with the money.

00:16:45.180 | The basic advice is you have to look at your time horizon.

00:16:48.380 | And I think that advice still holds true.

00:16:50.460 | So in your case, Chuck, these are retirement assets.

00:16:53.260 | When do you think you would start wanting to take money from these portfolios?

00:16:58.700 | We're both about 45 and we're wanting to retire around 55.

00:17:03.420 | We're probably actually already in a financial position where we could do that now if we

00:17:08.380 | chose to, but we're running a business and the business is doing well and we like our

00:17:12.220 | work.

00:17:12.720 | So we're going to continue for at least 10 more years.

00:17:17.180 | Okay.

00:17:17.680 | So your investments are, your assets are invested in retirement accounts that are in mutual

00:17:25.820 | funds, kind of mainstream mutual funds, and then in your business.

00:17:29.420 | Do you have any other investment classes outside of those two basic investment classes?

00:17:34.220 | Yeah, as far as total assets go, we probably have about 30% in real estate that we own.

00:17:40.860 | I'm talking outside of our house, investment properties, then office equity in our house.

00:17:47.580 | And then we have retirement accounts and then we have enough cash on hand to, we probably

00:17:53.420 | pay our bills for a year or two years with cash on hand.

00:17:56.940 | Yeah.

00:17:57.500 | So in that case, I don't see any reason why you should adjust your stock portfolio to

00:18:02.940 | try to account for an unpredictable future in, for an unpredictable future in things

00:18:10.780 | like sovereign debt, et cetera.

00:18:12.540 | If you're 45 years old and you think you might like to retire at 55, you have by definition

00:18:18.380 | the shortest time horizon you would have for these assets is going to be 10 years.

00:18:23.260 | More likely these assets you would be, you would leave alone for at least 15 years.

00:18:27.820 | So as not to trigger early, early distribution penalties on the money, since you have other

00:18:32.140 | cash, you have real estate and you have business.

00:18:34.540 | My guess is you certainly wouldn't touch this until 59 and a half.

00:18:37.900 | Although you could, as we've talked about in other shows, you could still use these

00:18:42.700 | as part of, as part of funding an early retirement.

00:18:45.260 | So you've basically got a time horizon or time perspective of 15 years going out to

00:18:51.820 | your expected lifespan and at 45 years old, your and your wife's expected lifespan pushes

00:18:57.740 | out into the eighties or nineties, the older you get, the longer your expected lifespan.

00:19:01.820 | So I would, my guess would be by the time you arrive at retirement age, your expected

00:19:06.300 | lifespan could very easily be 95.

00:19:08.940 | So you've got about a, in that case, you've got a 15 to 15 to my math is failing me 40.

00:19:17.820 | I'm not going to try it 15 to 45 year time horizon on these assets in these retirement

00:19:22.940 | accounts.

00:19:23.740 | So this, you've got a long-term time perspective.

00:19:27.260 | Now, the other magic words that you said was you have a business doing well, the business

00:19:31.260 | doing well means you're unlikely to have any need for cash unless the business goes down.

00:19:35.420 | You're unlikely to have any need for cash in the coming years.

00:19:38.060 | You have plenty of cash flow, so you're not going to be rating the investment assets.

00:19:41.660 | You also said what's music to my, to my ears, you have a significant amount of money in

00:19:45.660 | real estate.

00:19:46.540 | The thing I love about real estate is of course it has certain advantages, but one of the

00:19:50.540 | big advantages is it's close to you.

00:19:52.940 | You can touch it, you can change it, you can see it, which is more likely to make you,

00:19:56.700 | in my opinion, a better stock investor to have a balance of things working out.

00:20:01.020 | So from those facts, I wouldn't change anything about my investment portfolio just based upon

00:20:07.900 | the possibilities of, uh, of, you know, increasing government debt.

00:20:14.380 | What I would do is I would keep my investment portfolio invested in the asset classes that

00:20:19.820 | are likely in the long term to have the highest rate of return, which would be in a heavily

00:20:25.420 | stock portfolio.

00:20:26.540 | Unless you have a strategy where you're involved as an active manager and saying, I'm going

00:20:32.380 | to adjust my portfolio for the market conditions, I'm going to move in and out of investments,

00:20:36.060 | you're working with a financial advisor, something like that.

00:20:38.140 | I would stay tilted towards a heavy stock portfolio and I would stay tilted for maximum

00:20:45.020 | growth in those accounts.

00:20:46.220 | I wouldn't start to change and try to say, well, I'm going to try to predict this certain

00:20:51.420 | small change in the market.

00:20:52.620 | I don't think it's necessary for you.

00:20:54.220 | Okay.

00:20:56.460 | That makes a lot of sense.

00:20:57.500 | It makes me feel better hearing you say that.

00:20:58.860 | Good, good.

00:20:59.420 | I guess rereading the national news every day just gets you concerned, but I appreciate

00:21:04.220 | your words on that.

00:21:05.020 | Well, it's not that there's no reason to be concerned, but there is, and I'm trying to

00:21:09.980 | affirm there is reason for being concerned, but in your situation, I don't know what else

00:21:16.300 | you could do.

00:21:17.260 | If you would be devastated by your stock market investments declining by 50%, then I would

00:21:24.940 | be concerned, but I don't think you're going to.

00:21:26.940 | You have a successful business.

00:21:28.060 | If you have enough money that you could retire now, you're clearly wealthy.

00:21:32.140 | You have money in real estate.

00:21:33.740 | You have money in cash.

00:21:35.100 | You might, I'm not sure if you've taken my how to survive and thrive during the coming

00:21:39.740 | economic crisis course, but I would commend that to you because we talked there a lot

00:21:43.260 | about offshoring.

00:21:44.140 | I would make sure that I had a basket of currencies, that I had money offshore, that I had a plan

00:21:48.540 | to go offshore myself if necessary.

00:21:51.100 | If we wind up in a place of severe and intensive economic crisis in the United States, which

00:21:55.740 | is less likely than almost any other country in the world, so we got to acknowledge it's

00:21:59.500 | a low probability scenario, but if that were to happen, I think your best solution,

00:22:03.660 | um, is to have money and assets positioned offshore.

00:22:07.020 | You might adjust your portfolio a little bit.

00:22:08.860 | So if you're, if you are happy with the stocks that you are, um, that you're, that you own,

00:22:13.580 | maybe fund your 401ks, but adjust it in another direction where you see things being better.

00:22:17.820 | Maybe purchase some offshore real estate, maybe start another line of business.

00:22:21.420 | Um, you know, make sure you have a portfolio of precious metals, make sure you have a portfolio

00:22:26.140 | of basic, um, you know, personal preparedness items, you know, food, things like that.

00:22:30.620 | But in your case, a few checks and that's, that stuff is done and squared away.

00:22:34.060 | So I think you're on the right track.

00:22:35.820 | And at this point, I don't see any sense in the idea of just saying, oh, things could

00:22:41.020 | be bad for the next.

00:22:41.820 | Here's my opinion.

00:22:43.580 | I think fairly soon, I've been wrong on this so far, but I think fairly soon we'll go into,

00:22:48.860 | uh, recession.

00:22:50.220 | There are many good reasons to think that'll happen.

00:22:52.860 | Who knows how that works out with the timing of it.

00:22:55.420 | And I'm convinced personally, the next recession will be long, deep and difficult, but that's

00:22:59.580 | not going to affect your retirement assets because 15 years to start pulling money is

00:23:05.740 | more than enough time for you to adjust to whatever happens three or four years from

00:23:10.940 | now.

00:23:11.420 | If you were 65 years old saying, I'm going to quit working today, I would adjust in a

00:23:16.060 | different direction.

00:23:16.540 | But in your case, I don't see the sensibility of it.

00:23:18.940 | Make sense.

00:23:19.440 | Yeah.

00:23:21.580 | And thanks for the recommendation on the course.

00:23:23.340 | I think taking that course is a good idea and it's on my to-do list.

00:23:26.620 | Yeah, it'll solve for you.

00:23:28.220 | Listen, I wrote it myself and it's my answer to these questions.

00:23:33.660 | And it's basically that I can't bring myself to go all in on disaster.

00:23:38.300 | I think there's too much evidence that, uh, there's too much evidence that we should

00:23:43.340 | generally expect that things will in the long run get better.

00:23:47.740 | If you, if you look on all sides, there's too much evidence to think that to just say,

00:23:52.140 | well, everything's just going to get worse and the world's going to wind up in global

00:23:54.540 | catastrophe.

00:23:55.180 | I, that's hard to, that's hard to defend.

00:23:58.140 | That's a really hard position to defend.

00:24:00.060 | So I can't personally feel comfortable with this idea of I'm just going to go for the

00:24:05.020 | worst case scenario and take this uber pessimistic scenario situation that many people, um, take.

00:24:11.180 | But on the flip side, I am uncomfortable with the incoherence of the, it, things are always

00:24:17.260 | rosy position.

00:24:18.460 | You can't say that just because this has never happened in the past, it doesn't happen.

00:24:22.300 | It's not going to happen again.

00:24:23.580 | There are problems.

00:24:24.540 | We all have personal problems.

00:24:26.300 | There's a, you know, things can happen in our lives for all different reasons, just

00:24:29.660 | the mundane everyday problems.

00:24:31.340 | And then there are big, major societally wide problems, et cetera.

00:24:35.580 | I think that we are going to be living through in coming decades.

00:24:40.780 | I think we're living through a long excruciating collapse of an empire in the United States

00:24:45.820 | of America, but that can't be brought over.

00:24:48.460 | And as far as I can see, that can't be brought over to stock market advice.

00:24:52.620 | And so when I say decades, maybe it starts, you know, maybe I think we're starting to

00:24:56.860 | be in it, but maybe it starts 30 years from now.

00:24:58.860 | Maybe it starts 50 years from now.

00:24:59.980 | Who knows?

00:25:00.380 | How do we even know?

00:25:01.340 | Anybody who's put times on these things has generally proven themselves to be wrong.

00:25:05.340 | The game can continue far longer than any of us think.

00:25:07.820 | So I'm stuck right in the middle, trying to be a realist and recognize that on the whole

00:25:14.380 | I should be optimistic because history is on the side of the optimists, but there are

00:25:20.060 | plenty of good examples to show me that in local circumstances and in specific periods

00:25:24.940 | of times, collapse happens.

00:25:27.020 | Societies collapse, cultures collapse, money, currencies collapse, markets collapse, et

00:25:33.660 | cetera.

00:25:34.380 | And so I look at it and say, how can I buy some insurance for this situation?

00:25:39.260 | I don't mind making some insurance payments.

00:25:41.420 | If there's a way that I can make sure that the collapse would not be devastating to me

00:25:45.980 | without paying all of my wealth and the whole price to just move to a bunker in the woods,

00:25:50.700 | which I don't want to do.

00:25:52.460 | So that's why I wrote the course.

00:25:54.460 | It's basically a matter of how can you buy some insurance to protect yourself from economic

00:25:59.980 | crisis, be it personal or society-wide, and do that in a sensible way so that there's

00:26:06.300 | little downside to the whole plan if things just continue to be rosy, but there's a lot

00:26:11.500 | of upside if you wind up having a disaster scenario.

00:26:14.700 | And I sleep better with that insurance.

00:26:16.620 | Just like with any insurance policy, you basically sleep better and then you can stay focused

00:26:21.340 | on your business, your family, the things that you're building, and feel a little bit

00:26:26.220 | more insulated from any potential for catastrophe.

00:26:29.660 | So I would commend it to you.

00:26:31.180 | Any other questions, Chuck, before I move on?

00:26:32.540 | No, thank you.

00:26:34.940 | Thank you for calling in.

00:26:36.060 | We move on now to, looks like Lisa in Illinois.

00:26:38.940 | Lisa, welcome to the show.

00:26:39.740 | How can I serve you today?

00:26:40.620 | Hello, Joshua.

00:26:42.620 | I'm so pleased that I got through and I'm glad to be talking to you.

00:26:47.100 | I've listened to you for quite a long time.

00:26:48.780 | So my question is, I have been married for 16 years.

00:26:54.460 | I recently started my own business buying real estate and my husband and I are separated.

00:27:01.100 | And so I took all of my money, which was about $10,000, and put it into this new real estate

00:27:08.140 | venture and we are separated, but I had to quit my job because I was sick for a long

00:27:14.220 | time.

00:27:14.720 | I was working with disabled adults and the warehouse was making me sick, bottom line.

00:27:21.500 | So I don't have a position right now, a job.

00:27:28.300 | I was a certified retirement plan advisor and administrator.

00:27:36.380 | So I could go back to that, but I think my land business will do okay.

00:27:40.380 | I don't have much debt.

00:27:43.340 | My question is, he has quite a bit of debt, probably over $60,000.

00:27:46.780 | He does, his gross income is over $14,000 and mine was about $2,000 when I went into

00:27:54.940 | the non-for-profit sector.

00:27:56.700 | So I'd like your thoughts on everything because I was very much into the investing,

00:28:06.140 | not necessarily a day trader.

00:28:07.660 | I'm really risk adverse.

00:28:10.060 | So everything I do is pretty much, I don't like credit cards.

00:28:16.300 | I like to buy everything with cash, which is now a downside seeing that I have a business.

00:28:21.020 | I use things like, I'm into privacy, so I use my pseudo for mail and everything, which

00:28:27.180 | is also difficult.

00:28:28.380 | I'm staying with my daughter.

00:28:30.860 | What would you recommend in my situation?

00:28:33.420 | When you say that your husband's income is $14,000, did you mean per month or per year?

00:28:38.300 | Per month.

00:28:40.380 | Okay.

00:28:40.880 | You mentioned your daughter, how old are your children?

00:28:44.860 | So I have three kids.

00:28:48.460 | I have a 35, 32 and a 30 year old.

00:28:52.780 | They're all on their own.

00:28:53.740 | They're doing fine.

00:28:54.860 | However, my middle child did take her life a few years ago.

00:29:01.420 | Since then I've helped out quite a bit because she did come back.

00:29:04.060 | And so she's not the same.

00:29:05.900 | She's got a farm.

00:29:06.540 | So I help out whenever I can over there.

00:29:08.460 | So that was difficult.

00:29:10.540 | And that's one of the reasons that I went into my own business so I could create passive

00:29:15.580 | income and take care of those grandchildren.

00:29:17.580 | What do you think will happen at this point in your marital relationship?

00:29:22.620 | And what do you want to happen?

00:29:23.980 | He's on the spectrum.

00:29:27.900 | He's a genius, but he doesn't understand what a relationship is.

00:29:31.260 | I hope that when he goes through butox and he becomes a different person, we can get

00:29:37.500 | back together.

00:29:38.140 | I don't think he sees that.

00:29:39.340 | And so right now he's wanting to only stay separated and not do a legal separation or

00:29:46.940 | legal divorce because of financial.

00:29:49.740 | His brain only works the numbers.

00:29:51.180 | He doesn't understand the personal side of it or the emotional side of it.

00:29:55.820 | He's, it's hard to explain, but if you watch the imitation game, he's likened to

00:30:01.180 | that.

00:30:01.680 | And so I could never explain to him about finances.

00:30:07.100 | He thinks what I'm doing is being taken advantage of this business and everything.

00:30:11.340 | So I'm not, he hasn't filed anything and I haven't filed anything.

00:30:18.860 | We've lived apart now for a couple of months, but I would say the last three years we were

00:30:24.940 | emotionally apart.

00:30:26.620 | Sadly.

00:30:28.140 | How old are you and how old is your husband?

00:30:30.780 | Um, I'm 56.

00:30:32.060 | He's 57.

00:30:33.660 | And is your husband, the father of your children?

00:30:36.380 | Um, he is not, and he has his own son who lived with us and lives with him.

00:30:42.940 | Who's also on the spectrum.

00:30:44.220 | So in terms of the answer to your question, what are you, what, what, what specific

00:30:54.380 | questions do you have for me?

00:30:56.220 | Specifically?

00:30:58.140 | I mean, he's got a good pension.

00:30:59.580 | I don't really know about, I mean, he, right now he pays for my insurance, my health insurance,

00:31:03.660 | which obviously is important right now.

00:31:05.660 | And that was his, he said, you ran the numbers and it's better if he, we don't get legally

00:31:11.100 | separated or divorce because it'll benefit him later on because he's again, thinking

00:31:16.620 | of the numbers.

00:31:17.580 | My question is, I did start a business.

00:31:19.900 | I'm very private, but I'm trying to keep it as private as I can.

00:31:22.860 | He said, by the way, when you do make a million, I will come after you.

00:31:26.140 | I don't know if I'll ever make a million, but, um, I do own now, um, some properties

00:31:33.420 | and I'm buying and selling, um, to create the passive income so I can be around my grandchildren.

00:31:38.140 | I'm not sure how much longer my daughter will be able to sustain a life without some assistance,

00:31:46.060 | but do I push for the divorce and get part of the pension and put, get rid of the debt

00:31:52.460 | that I do have and then, um, take care of the family or do I, because any debt he incurs

00:32:00.460 | now I will incur is that that's correct.

00:32:03.020 | Even if we're living separately, if it's not legally separated and I, since I don't have

00:32:07.180 | credit cards and I don't like to incur debt, um, that's one of my worries as well, because

00:32:13.580 | he doesn't understand that he's not a bad person.

00:32:16.540 | Right.

00:32:17.180 | Right.

00:32:17.680 | So let me give you some thoughts, a couple of ways to think about.

00:32:21.580 | So I think first you have to separate the question of financial advice from the question

00:32:30.540 | of moral advice.

00:32:32.780 | When you're dealing with divorce, separation, marriage, et cetera, you are in a territory

00:32:38.460 | where you have to start not by thinking about what's in my financial best interest, but

00:32:43.900 | you have to start by thinking about what is morally right.

00:32:48.140 | What is the right thing for me to do?

00:32:50.620 | Now, with this, we go into the most difficult and touchy area of advice that anybody can

00:32:57.980 | get.

00:32:58.460 | So here are some things that you need to watch out for.

00:33:01.020 | The first thing that you need to think about is your, I'll just go, I'll take them in order,

00:33:07.020 | not necessarily in order of importance.

00:33:08.940 | The first thing you need to be aware of is what your life will look like if you continue

00:33:15.420 | to be married to him versus if you separate and divorce from him.

00:33:20.220 | Very likely, the data would indicate, in my understanding of the data, if you divorce

00:33:26.620 | this man, you will likely never marry again.

00:33:29.340 | So you need to consider if that is something that you are okay with or something that you

00:33:34.220 | are not okay with.

00:33:35.660 | For women, as you grow older, if you divorce, it is very hard for an older woman to effectively

00:33:42.460 | and happily remarry.

00:33:43.980 | It is much easier for an older man to remarry when he is older because he can more easily

00:33:50.220 | attract and be attractive to a younger woman.

00:33:53.260 | But it is much more difficult for a 56-year-old woman who divorces to be able to remarry.

00:33:59.740 | In my opinion, women in your situation are often sold a false hope, a false dream.

00:34:07.100 | The idea that, well, you are just going to be happier on your own.

00:34:09.500 | That may be.

00:34:11.340 | I have known a number of women who divorced in their 50s and they felt that they were

00:34:15.980 | happier.

00:34:16.860 | But in general, there is this basic conceit that is sold to many divorced women that you

00:34:23.020 | will just be happier on your own when you can do it and you will find a better man.

00:34:27.020 | The data does not bear that out.

00:34:28.700 | That is not to say there cannot be exceptions to it, but the data in general does not bear

00:34:32.940 | that out.

00:34:33.660 | So before you go and file for divorce, before you accept this separation and for this divorce,

00:34:39.580 | you should be very, very cautious to make sure that you are having a clear, unemotional

00:34:46.060 | understanding of the situation.

00:34:48.780 | You also need to have a clear and unemotional analysis of the numbers involved.

00:34:54.780 | Have you spoken to a divorce attorney or gotten any legal advice as to what would happen

00:35:02.940 | potentially for you in a divorce settlement?

00:35:09.100 | I do not have that information.

00:35:11.900 | I did talk to somebody once.

00:35:13.420 | There is some verbal abuse because he is on the spectrum, but that is not really what

00:35:19.180 | I wanted.

00:35:19.740 | They basically said he would be paying you quite a bit per month and then you would get

00:35:24.780 | part of his pension.

00:35:25.580 | But that is not necessarily what I am looking for.

00:35:29.100 | I am looking for more of, you know, he does not understand debt or investments.

00:35:35.580 | And so I could not get him to stop just understanding that you cannot just go out and spend money.

00:35:42.140 | And so I was worried about that aspect of it.

00:35:44.860 | But I really have not done a lot of digging for that and I do not really, I do not think

00:35:50.460 | either him or I at this point are going to be doing that.

00:35:53.500 | So just to clarify, when you talk about his debt, you say that he owes $60,000 of debt.

00:35:59.980 | Do you just mean like credit card debt, car debt or is that, tell me a little bit more

00:36:04.140 | about the financial situation.

00:36:06.060 | That is pretty much credit card debt.

00:36:07.660 | That is not including vehicles or phones.

00:36:10.940 | And like I said, because he does not understand debt, if he needs something, he goes and gets

00:36:16.380 | it.

00:36:16.700 | It is hard to explain when you are, he is so smart but yet, but he does not understand

00:36:24.620 | the principles of, for instance, I asked him once what he was invested if it was self-directed

00:36:29.900 | or if he, because it is a school, where the money, the platform was.

00:36:35.420 | He said, I do not know.

00:36:36.140 | And it took me about five minutes to look it up and I showed him and he goes, how did

00:36:39.180 | you find that?

00:36:39.740 | And I said, well, it is public knowledge.

00:36:43.020 | And so, but he, that is how much he does not understand.

00:36:47.740 | But so debt wise, if he, for instance, if you have eight mustards and you need one or

00:36:52.140 | if you need a new phone, you go get one, even if you could just fix the old one.

00:36:55.660 | He does not understand it.

00:36:57.420 | So, there is probably a lot more than 60, 60 is just the credit cards.

00:37:02.300 | >> Okay.

00:37:02.860 | But you said that he makes $14,000 a month, right?

00:37:06.300 | >> Correct.

00:37:07.580 | >> Okay.

00:37:08.140 | So, for somebody who is making $14,000 a month, which is $170,000 a year, $60,000 of credit

00:37:15.340 | card debt is not an unmanageable number.

00:37:18.460 | I have seen, I have worked with people who make $30,000 a year of $60,000 of credit card

00:37:23.980 | debt.

00:37:24.460 | So, I am not denying, hey, I would love it if nobody ever borrowed money.

00:37:27.420 | I would love it if every single person, if every single person thought about every money

00:37:36.300 | they spent and went for the most frugal.

00:37:37.660 | So, I would love that, but that is not reality.

00:37:39.740 | Other than his having $60,000 of credit card debt, are there other serious financial problems?

00:37:48.220 | Are you or he behind on your bills?

00:37:50.220 | Are you in foreclosure, going into bankruptcy?

00:37:52.940 | Are there, is there a real serious tone to things or is it just the fact that he has

00:37:56.700 | $60,000 of credit card debt?

00:37:58.140 | >> No, and actually the finances, because, I mean, he does not have any savings.

00:38:08.940 | I have more cash available than he does, but our problem was, are you asking about why

00:38:16.540 | we divorced or why we separated or are you asking about why he is very popular?

00:38:18.540 | >> Sure, tell me about it.

00:38:19.660 | Tell me why you are separated from him.

00:38:21.580 | >> So, he, because if you think about the imitation game, you know, someone that is

00:38:28.940 | that smart, there was a lot of verbal abuse and, you know, I did, I lived on my own basically

00:38:35.740 | in the same house and because he had his son there and they ate separately, everything

00:38:40.860 | was separate.

00:38:41.420 | So, I was really on my own for pretty much our whole marriage.

00:38:46.620 | And I mean, I am a Christian and I got him to go to church and he became a Christian

00:38:50.060 | and, but it was constantly, for instance, when my dad died, he went to work.

00:38:56.620 | When my daughter died, he wanted to go home to get a sweater.

00:38:59.020 | He does not understand those simple things and he would, if he did not take his medicine,

00:39:04.140 | I would be thrown out.

00:39:05.100 | I mean, it was very difficult.

00:39:06.700 | I went through a lot.

00:39:07.500 | >> Why did you marry?

00:39:11.420 | Why did you marry him?

00:39:12.940 | >> I loved him and I was with him and I said, you know, I am, I said, I am not going to

00:39:19.740 | move in with you unless we get married.

00:39:21.340 | I am a Christian.

00:39:22.380 | And at that time he said, we met on a blind date.

00:39:25.740 | I had been through a really bad divorce with a very abusive husband and he was very kind

00:39:33.260 | and I did not realize that he was somebody different initially.

00:39:36.860 | And like I said, I met him on a blind date.

00:39:38.460 | He was really kind.

00:39:40.140 | I had my own garden business and I was a day trader and I just gone through a really, I

00:39:46.540 | was stocked for a year and finally I met him at a blind date and it was almost instantly.

00:39:52.060 | He was very, very kind.

00:39:53.900 | He was, he went and bought a bicycle cause he knew I went on bike rides.

00:39:56.860 | I mean, he was just everything I needed him to be.

00:39:58.860 | And then it was pretty much right away after we got married, his son moved in who was like

00:40:05.820 | Rain Man.

00:40:06.300 | >> Has he committed adultery against you?

00:40:14.060 | >> I thought so.

00:40:16.380 | I don't have any proof of that, but he was talking to people online, but I don't think

00:40:21.900 | he has.

00:40:22.380 | He said he hasn't, but I don't know.

00:40:25.980 | >> All right.

00:40:26.540 | So here are some things that I think you should consider.

00:40:29.500 | And I'm going to run through basically a list of things.

00:40:32.700 | And I just encourage you to consider these.

00:40:36.460 | You don't need to do anything with what I said other than consider it.

00:40:40.300 | And probably the best thing would be for you to listen back after we finish the phone call.

00:40:44.700 | Just listen to these things and consider them separately on your knees before the Lord and

00:40:50.060 | ask for discernment in a number of different things.

00:40:53.900 | So first, let's talk about finances.

00:40:55.900 | In what you've told me, I don't see anything that would indicate a reason for you to separate

00:41:07.100 | or to be really all that concerned about financial goings on in what you have described.

00:41:14.460 | Almost nobody in the US American culture, aside from, I don't know the percentage, I

00:41:20.700 | would say it's got to be less than 20, maybe 10%, maybe 5%.

00:41:24.060 | But almost nobody in the US American culture would be able to explain what a self-directed

00:41:29.820 | IRA is.

00:41:31.020 | Almost nobody understands what a 401(k) means or what the differences between a 401(k) and

00:41:37.580 | a Roth IRA means.

00:41:39.180 | Now you are interested in investing and you're interested in money.

00:41:47.420 | And so for you, you're listening to a podcast like mine, which I commend you for and I love

00:41:52.060 | you for.

00:41:52.780 | But a podcast like mine appeals to a tiny, tiny percentage of the population.

00:41:57.500 | Most people don't care about money.

00:42:00.540 | They're uninterested in the subject.

00:42:01.980 | They don't care about being rich.

00:42:03.820 | Most people want to simply enjoy today.

00:42:06.620 | And from your husband's perspective, he's clearly very good at something to be earning

00:42:11.900 | $168,000 per year.

00:42:14.380 | And he's very comfortable with the fact that he can earn all this money per month and he

00:42:18.300 | can have what he needs to have.

00:42:19.740 | And by definition, if your husband wanted to pay off his credit card debt, he could

00:42:23.900 | pay it off in a year just out of his earned income.

00:42:27.020 | He's not in bankruptcy.

00:42:28.460 | He's not in severe financial problems.

00:42:31.020 | He probably doesn't know how much money he even owes and he doesn't pay much attention

00:42:34.780 | to it.

00:42:35.500 | Many people just simply don't care.

00:42:37.580 | Now, if he's a little bit autistic or has some kind of mental just lack of connection

00:42:43.980 | or comfort with numbers, it's not at all surprising that he would just not be interested

00:42:48.700 | in it.

00:42:49.180 | And many people just say, "Ignore it.

00:42:50.940 | And as long as things can go okay, as long as I have enough money to pay the minimum

00:42:54.220 | payments, then things will go okay."

00:42:56.460 | I'm not denying that I would love it if he would be debt-free.

00:42:59.420 | What I am denying is that what you've described to me is a financial emergency or catastrophe.

00:43:05.100 | Is it ideal?

00:43:06.780 | No.

00:43:07.420 | But is it a catastrophe or an emergency or is it in and of itself worth separating over

00:43:13.260 | or worth divorcing over?

00:43:15.020 | My answer is clearly no, it's not.

00:43:17.660 | From what you've described to me, it's normal behavior for a huge percentage of the population.

00:43:23.500 | It's not ideal, it's not going to lead to wealth, but it's normal behavior for a huge

00:43:27.420 | percentage of the population.

00:43:29.820 | That's an important thing to recognize and to consider, is the financial questions.

00:43:39.420 | Let's continue on the financial theme before we go to the moral theme.

00:43:42.140 | So financially, you should think very carefully and probably solicit some good advice about

00:43:50.700 | the financial ramifications of divorce.

00:43:53.820 | In your situation, I don't know that you have a very strong claim that would entitle you

00:44:01.180 | to a tremendous amount of money, tremendous alimony payments, etc.

00:44:05.580 | Your children are grown adults and he is not their biological father.

00:44:11.660 | So you and he married at a later age, which means that even with regard to his income,

00:44:19.420 | even with regard to his pension, it's not like you and he married when you were 16

00:44:24.700 | years old and now you're 55 years old and the judge would just automatically say, "Oh,

00:44:28.700 | well, you get 50% of his pension."

00:44:30.300 | It's not like that.

00:44:31.340 | Which, by the way, the fact that he has a pension, using the word pension, is even another

00:44:35.900 | argument in favor of the fact that he's figured out how to get himself in a place where he

00:44:40.300 | can pretty much just live comfortably, not worry too much about money, and he's got

00:44:43.980 | retirement taken care of with his pension, so he probably doesn't think too much about

00:44:46.780 | it.

00:44:47.340 | But I don't know that you, if you and he divorced, that you would walk away with $7,000

00:44:52.460 | a month of alimony payments and half of his pension.

00:44:54.620 | In fact, I would not think that that would be the case.

00:44:58.540 | I don't think that would be the case.

00:45:00.220 | I think that in your particular situation, divorce would very much mean that financially

00:45:08.540 | that you are building largely with what you have and what you can build in and of yourself.

00:45:14.940 | Now, you're a competent investor, you could learn more skills, you can develop things,

00:45:19.580 | and you can make tons of money.

00:45:20.780 | But I wouldn't look, in your situation, of my understanding of the law, I would not

00:45:25.100 | look at divorce as some kind of golden check, that this would just solve all the financial

00:45:31.020 | problems.

00:45:31.340 | And by the way, let me be clear and affirm, you have not said that or indicated that in

00:45:36.620 | any way.

00:45:37.340 | But it's certainly one of those things that has to be considered.

00:45:39.740 | But you haven't said that or indicated that in any way.

00:45:44.140 | So I'm not accusing you of trying to pursue a divorce because you just want money.

00:45:48.460 | That's not at all my accusation.

00:45:50.060 | But I am trying to encourage you to take a good, hard, rational look at the facts and

00:45:54.380 | consider what they actually are.

00:45:55.820 | So financially, in many ways, the best solution would probably be for you and he to stay married

00:46:05.500 | and then for you and he to come up with an agreement about handling the finances.

00:46:11.500 | If you are more well suited for these things like making investment decisions, if you're

00:46:16.460 | more well suited for managing the budget, for doing things like paying off debt, you

00:46:20.940 | could come up with some kind of arrangement that would leave you in a position of managing

00:46:26.220 | those details so that together, as a couple, together, you wind up together winning with

00:46:32.220 | money.

00:46:32.940 | It's not that hard between your skills and his skills to pay off $60,000 of debt.

00:46:37.660 | It's just not.

00:46:39.180 | A couple years of work, sure, but it's not that hard.

00:46:41.740 | But what would be required is the ability to communicate about it, the ability to work

00:46:45.340 | on a plan, the ability to find some kind of common goal, common purpose to where you're

00:46:50.380 | committed to it and you're willing to work at the difficult things, the difficult changes

00:46:55.340 | that would need to happen.

00:46:56.780 | I would say that there are possibilities there.

00:47:01.020 | From what you've said, it sounds to me like he's just more disinterested and he probably

00:47:05.980 | feels nagged and frustrated by your trying to help because it's not important to him.

00:47:11.740 | He hasn't said, "Here's a clear goal that I have."

00:47:13.420 | He was probably pretty happy with how things were beforehand.

00:47:16.140 | So financially, I would be very slow to encourage you to divorce.

00:47:21.100 | Let me switch to what I think is more important than financially, and that is the moral decision.

00:47:27.980 | I believe that in life, we often have to ask questions and understand what is right regardless

00:47:35.820 | of whether it is financially the better solution.

00:47:39.020 | I could become a multimillionaire by becoming a criminal, but that would be the wrong thing

00:47:43.260 | to do.

00:47:43.740 | We would all agree on that.

00:47:45.260 | So in your situation, when you're dealing with something like moving from one job to

00:47:49.580 | another job, as long as the job in and of itself is not immoral, there's few moral considerations.

00:47:54.540 | But when you're dealing with something like divorce, filing for divorce, that is an incredibly

00:48:00.060 | important thing to discuss.

00:48:02.380 | You said that you are a Christian and that your husband is also some form of Christian,

00:48:07.340 | going to church, et cetera.

00:48:08.860 | The Bible very clearly says, "God hates divorce."

00:48:12.140 | It's from the book of Malachi.

00:48:13.580 | So we're dealing with something that is more momentous than almost anything else and more

00:48:19.420 | morally weighty.

00:48:20.780 | And so you need to start your thinking and consideration, not with finances, not with

00:48:26.060 | budgeting, et cetera, but specifically what is morally right in your situation about divorce.

00:48:33.580 | So I would hear it refer you primarily to your Bible.

00:48:37.180 | Your Bible contains enough instruction that if you look at it and wait on your knees before

00:48:41.980 | the Lord and ask the Holy Spirit to show you clearly what the Bible says, you can see everything

00:48:48.860 | that you need to say there.

00:48:50.620 | Now, I'm going to give you two things to consider, three positions basically to consider.

00:48:56.540 | So here are the three positions that you can consider.

00:48:59.900 | The first position is what you will hear in much of modern mainstream Christianity, which

00:49:08.380 | basically looks exactly like the world around that says, "If you're unhappy in your relationship

00:49:13.420 | with your husband, if you are unhappy, then you can divorce him."

00:49:18.140 | That is profoundly unbiblical and unchristian.

00:49:21.820 | It's absolutely wrong.

00:49:23.340 | And the people who would preach that, the people who teach that, they will suffer the

00:49:28.140 | consequences both now and in eternity for preaching that doctrine.

00:49:33.020 | You see it already in many Christian churches, the erosive and corrosive effects of this.

00:49:37.660 | But as a 56-year-old woman, when you're talking with your girlfriends, you need to understand

00:49:42.780 | that most of them, whether they self-identify as Christians or whether they self-identify

00:49:47.980 | as secular or whatever, most of them are going to ask you the question, they're going to

00:49:51.740 | say, "Lisa, what makes you happy?

00:49:53.820 | Do you think you'll be happier if you are together with your husband or do you think

00:49:57.820 | that you're happier if you're not together with him?"

00:50:00.380 | They'll say, "What makes you happy?"

00:50:01.820 | That thinking, if you are not very careful, that thinking will invade your thinking.

00:50:08.140 | And I want to caution you that first, it's a very unstable way to make any kind of life

00:50:13.900 | decisions thinking about what would make you happy.

00:50:16.940 | And second, I want to caution you that if you study the literature, notwithstanding

00:50:22.380 | the people who would say that, you will find that you will be in a very difficult position

00:50:26.220 | being a newly divorced 56-year-old woman trying to figure out how to form a new life.

00:50:31.900 | So I completely disregard and I would encourage you to disregard that position, that kind

00:50:36.780 | of modern, general, liberal position that says, "Well, you should just decide what

00:50:41.660 | would make you happy."

00:50:42.860 | So let's go to what are biblical grounds for divorce.

00:50:46.060 | Well, here there are basically two options.

00:50:48.300 | I'm in a minority of this, so I'm going to begin with the majority position and then

00:50:52.300 | I'll get to my position and you will have to read your Bible and come to your own conviction

00:50:58.060 | about what is actually correct.

00:51:00.300 | So the majority position among people who are serious Orthodox Christians is that there

00:51:07.580 | are either one or two reasons why a Christian can become divorced.

00:51:13.420 | And those one or two reasons would be in the case of, number one, would be adultery, or

00:51:20.300 | number two would be abandonment.

00:51:23.020 | So the idea of abandonment is very, very hard, so I'm going to ignore it here, because it

00:51:29.420 | doesn't apply to your situation, and focus on just simply adultery.

00:51:33.900 | If you take the mainstream Orthodox Christian perspective that is most common, the mainstream

00:51:41.100 | Orthodox Christian perspective would say that the only reason why you would be biblically

00:51:47.100 | permitted to divorce your husband would be if he has committed adultery against you.

00:51:52.140 | In what you said, you said, "I don't think so," or "I don't have any evidence that he

00:51:56.380 | has."

00:51:57.020 | And so on that basis, you have no biblical grounds to file for divorce.

00:52:02.140 | I understand that I don't, and I don't think we should discuss such things publicly here,

00:52:06.940 | it's best in a private setting.

00:52:09.180 | I understand that something like what you term to be "verbal abuse" can be very painful.

00:52:17.260 | I understand that being in a house where your husband has a child by another woman, and

00:52:26.060 | you feel unloved and uncared for, I understand that those things are intensely difficult

00:52:31.980 | and emotionally draining and painful.

00:52:35.020 | But they are not biblical qualifications for divorce.

00:52:39.180 | The biblical qualification that many people believe exists for divorce is only adultery.

00:52:45.500 | So in that case, you cannot, if you take that position, you cannot divorce your husband

00:52:52.060 | because he has not, you don't have any grounds for divorce.

00:52:55.180 | Now you could legally do it in the United States today, you can divorce for any reason

00:52:59.260 | whatsoever, you don't have to give any reason.

00:53:01.580 | But morally, when you stand before God, you have no moral basis for divorce.

00:53:06.940 | And you need to take that seriously.

00:53:08.700 | I don't know anything about the makeup of your church or what advice you're getting

00:53:13.740 | from pastors or preachers, but it's extremely important for you to recognize because you

00:53:18.860 | can't stand before God on the basis of what anybody else tells you.

00:53:23.020 | You can't stand on the basis and say, "Well, my preacher told me such and such."

00:53:26.060 | You have to stand before God based upon the conviction of the Holy Spirit and the clear

00:53:30.460 | teaching of scripture.

00:53:31.900 | Now, the reason I said that that's the majority position, let me go on now to my personal

00:53:37.340 | position.

00:53:38.380 | I do not believe that there is any legal or moral justification for divorce, and I would

00:53:44.140 | say that based upon the clear teachings of Jesus.

00:53:47.820 | If you believe that Jesus taught a standard that superseded the Mosaic standard, which

00:53:54.780 | is what I believe, then I would say there is no basis for divorce, for any person to

00:54:00.380 | divorce.

00:54:01.340 | And any concession for divorce that occurred in the Old Testament was a concession for

00:54:07.420 | the sin of the Jews, and that was the reason why there was a Mosaic concession for divorce.

00:54:13.260 | But if you go and you read the teaching of Jesus, you will find that he clearly says,

00:54:17.820 | when asked by the Pharisees if it was permissible for a man to divorce his wife for any reason,

00:54:24.540 | you will clearly find that he says, "Moses allowed it, but I say to you that from the

00:54:29.580 | beginning it was not so."

00:54:30.940 | So I believe that man has no influence over marriage.

00:54:35.820 | Man can create laws about marriage.

00:54:38.620 | Man can say that you can marry this certain person or you can divorce under these circumstances,

00:54:43.500 | just like the US government can say.

00:54:45.260 | The US government can say that black people and white people can't marry each other,

00:54:51.420 | but that doesn't mean that God says black people and white people can't marry each

00:54:54.380 | other.

00:54:54.860 | The US government can say that you can only divorce in case of adultery, or then the

00:54:58.540 | US government can change its law and say, "Well, you can divorce for any reason."

00:55:01.820 | The US government can say that a man and a man can marry each other.

00:55:04.540 | The US government can say a man and a woman and a woman can marry each other.

00:55:07.260 | None of those things mean anything other than individual people trying to exert power and

00:55:12.460 | coercion over other people.

00:55:14.140 | That doesn't mean that it is morally right.

00:55:16.620 | So in the teachings of Jesus, what I would encourage you, this is my opinion, I'm trying

00:55:20.540 | to acknowledge that it's a minority opinion, but I believe it's the opinion that's true

00:55:23.980 | to Scripture.

00:55:25.740 | I believe that men and women are married based upon what they do.

00:55:29.340 | God said, "Let a man leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife."

00:55:32.860 | And what man joins together, what God joins together, let not man separate.

00:55:38.220 | So I don't see any place for divorce whatsoever.

00:55:41.420 | So you have to, you need to go back to the Bible, you need to think very, very carefully.

00:55:46.700 | Now, I want to point out for the sake of clarity that this is complicated because you are already

00:55:53.260 | married again when you were already married once.

00:55:57.180 | And so that's even more difficult, which brings me to the next thing.

00:56:00.700 | Biblically, if you are going to be faithful, whether to the clear teachings of the Scripture,

00:56:05.900 | whether or not you take the majority opinion or whether you take my opinion, if you do

00:56:11.900 | divorce this man, you can't biblically remarry.

00:56:15.420 | The Scripture very clearly teaches that remarriage is adultery.

00:56:19.980 | So I would say that when you married your current husband, you committed adultery against

00:56:25.900 | your first husband.

00:56:27.260 | And that was the major error.

00:56:29.100 | And what you've seen in the relationships with your children, the relationships with

00:56:33.900 | his children, you've seen the devastating impacts of that and are experiencing the pain

00:56:38.380 | of it.

00:56:39.180 | But pain is, you're not in a hopeless situation, but what you need is not financial advice,

00:56:46.300 | you need to find somebody locally who can sit with you, who can encourage you, and who

00:56:51.180 | can be straight with you and sit and study the Scripture and get a clear direction from

00:56:56.460 | the Lord based upon Scripture as to what is the right thing to do.

00:57:01.020 | And I'm not in a position, of course, here in this situation to do that.

00:57:05.660 | But if I were you, obviously I'm encouraging you and I care for you greatly, I would simply

00:57:12.700 | say there isn't a financial answer to your question.

00:57:17.260 | Because even if it costs you everything to do what is morally right, you should still

00:57:23.260 | do it.

00:57:23.900 | You cannot serve God and money.

00:57:27.340 | One of them will have to be higher over the other.

00:57:29.820 | So even if it costs you everything to do what is right, you should still do what is right.

00:57:35.020 | But you shouldn't think about money at this point in time.

00:57:38.220 | You should be on your knees and think about what is right, what is the right thing to

00:57:42.380 | do.

00:57:42.940 | And when you come to a place of clear conviction where the Holy Spirit speaks to you and you

00:57:47.740 | see very clearly written in the Scripture the confirmation of that, when you see very

00:57:52.460 | clearly that, then I would say set your course to do what is morally right, no matter the

00:57:58.300 | cost, and then we can figure out the finances as they come along.

00:58:01.260 | So, I can't give you any other answer than that.

00:58:04.700 | I understand that may or may not be what you were looking for, but that's my answer,

00:58:08.460 | Lisa, of some things for you to consider in this situation.

00:58:11.340 | Lisa: I would say that's the best advice I've heard yet.

00:58:15.420 | Pete: [Laughter] Good.

00:58:17.020 | I'm gonna, I'll end the call with you here, but I would encourage you, feel free, obviously

00:58:23.820 | I'm not close there.

00:58:24.780 | These things I think are too sensitive and too important to be talked about publicly.

00:58:29.260 | So, I would first, I would encourage you to people in your community to, if you're part

00:58:35.020 | of a church, I would encourage you to speak to the pastors in your church, the elders

00:58:40.540 | in your church, open yourself up to them.

00:58:42.620 | Look in your friends, try to find a community if you have friends, family members, things

00:58:48.140 | like that, people who are serious.

00:58:50.060 | I would warn you, I wish I didn't have to make this warning, but I would warn you, you

00:58:54.220 | will not find very many people who are willing to actually be straight with you and who are

00:59:00.700 | willing to actually be straight with what the scripture says.

00:59:03.980 | The scripture in and of itself is crystal clear, but you very rarely will hear it preached.

00:59:11.420 | And so, if you're in a, you know, just a good question would be, if you are in a church

00:59:16.460 | community and there's a man or a woman who is in that church community who divorced their

00:59:21.580 | spouse for any reason except adultery and/or abandonment, and they weren't excommunicated

00:59:26.940 | by that church community, you should tread very carefully.

00:59:31.340 | So, there are plenty of people available, but they are going to be challenging for you

00:59:34.860 | to find.

00:59:35.180 | It's going to be fine for, doing what I'm doing, speaking to you straight is very difficult

00:59:38.860 | for most of us in the modern world.

00:59:40.540 | So, feel free to write to me by email and I'd be happy to encourage you as I can, but

00:59:46.860 | I'm just going to send you to somebody in your local community who can pray with you,

00:59:50.860 | who can search the scriptures with you, and I encourage you, do the bare minimum to survive

00:59:55.580 | financially.

00:59:56.220 | Just, you know, make enough money to survive.

00:59:59.020 | Go live with your daughter if you need to encourage her, but do the bare minimum that

01:00:02.540 | you need to do to survive and focus on understanding what's right and then just make the finances

01:00:08.700 | fit that.

01:00:09.340 | But I think that's as far as we should go with any kind of public conversation here.

01:00:14.140 | - Thank you.

01:00:14.640 | - My pleasure.

01:00:15.500 | - Thank you.

01:00:16.140 | - That was the last of our live callers for today, but I have two more questions that

01:00:20.380 | were written in by patrons that are both interesting and international in scope.

01:00:25.740 | The first one is going to be the simpler one and then the second one will be interesting.

01:00:29.740 | I think you'll enjoy it.

01:00:30.460 | The second one's on birth tourism.

01:00:31.580 | So, we begin, Muhammad writes in and asks this question.

01:00:34.540 | It says, "What are the logistics of having my investments in the United States if I am

01:00:39.820 | no longer a US resident, but still a US citizen?

01:00:44.780 | I want to live in Spain for the next few years and I would become a resident of Spain.

01:00:50.220 | Would I still be allowed to have bank accounts and investments in the US?

01:00:53.980 | Gracias."

01:00:55.100 | Well, Muhammad, in this case, in some ways, you are in luck as a US citizen because the

01:01:01.580 | requirements for US citizens are much simpler than they are for the majority of residents.

01:01:08.300 | And I'm assuming that we're going to talk about taxes.

01:01:10.620 | So, I guess I shouldn't make that assumption.

01:01:12.460 | So, let me clarify first.

01:01:13.420 | And I'll use Canada and the United States because they're geographically close and yet

01:01:19.900 | they give me the distinctions that I want to make.

01:01:21.900 | So, if you were a Canadian citizen living in Canada who desired to move to Spain, but

01:01:27.660 | if all of your investment life were in Canada, you would be in a situation where you could

01:01:33.740 | just simply move to Spain and keep all of your situation in Canada.

01:01:38.380 | You wouldn't have to make any changes.

01:01:39.740 | And this is the same for any person from any nation.

01:01:43.420 | You can leave a nation and keep everything in place.

01:01:47.580 | Now, if you were a Canadian citizen and resident who was looking to move to Spain and become

01:01:53.020 | a resident of Spain, and if you were trying to disentangle yourself from the Canadian

01:01:59.900 | tax system, from owing the Canadian government money on your taxes, on your worldwide income,

01:02:06.140 | from paying for the various Canadian social programs, insurance programs, et cetera, in

01:02:12.860 | that situation, in order for you to successfully extricate yourself from Canada, you would

01:02:18.060 | have to do two basic things.

01:02:19.820 | You would have to move to a new place, in your case, obviously, Spain, and you would

01:02:26.380 | have to sever all of your ties with Canada, which would mean you would have to move your

01:02:32.380 | investments, you would have to close your credit cards, close your bank accounts, you

01:02:36.940 | would probably need to sell any property that you own in Canada.

01:02:40.380 | You would need to, in order to fully extricate yourself from Canada and to prove that so

01:02:45.180 | you could stop dealing with the Canadian government, you would need to sever all of

01:02:48.780 | your ties with Canada.

01:02:50.620 | Now, in some ways, this is an advantage and a disadvantage between US Americans and Canadians,

01:02:56.060 | because you could ultimately and fully sever your relationship with Canada by doing those

01:03:03.180 | things.

01:03:03.500 | And frankly, as a US American, I get a little bit envious of that situation, because there

01:03:08.860 | are many times where I'd like to sever all of my relationships with the United States

01:03:12.620 | of America, I'd like to extricate myself from the tax net, from the other duties and

01:03:19.100 | obligations that are imposed upon US Americans no matter where they live, I'd like to sever

01:03:22.940 | myself from those things, but I'd still like to keep the option to be able to go back to

01:03:26.540 | the United States to keep my US passport, etc.

01:03:29.260 | Well, you could do that if you were Canadian, but you would have to fully cut yourself off

01:03:33.660 | when moving to Spain if you were trying to get out of that.

01:03:36.060 | Now, as a US citizen, things are far simpler for what you're describing.

01:03:40.380 | And they are simpler because you cannot extricate yourself from the US government unless you

01:03:47.900 | formally renounce your citizenship, and you're not going to do that.

01:03:50.540 | You didn't say you're going to do that, and in fact, we'll touch on even if you did

01:03:53.980 | choose to do that in just a moment.

01:03:55.580 | So as a US citizen, there is only basically one benefit that you can get by physically

01:04:03.340 | moving yourself outside of the United States, and that is the foreign earned income exclusion

01:04:08.620 | and its neighbor or friend, accompanying friend, the foreign housing deduction or exclusion.

01:04:17.660 | So that's it, the foreign earned income exclusion.

01:04:20.140 | And the only thing that that can do is that can qualify you to avoid the federal income

01:04:25.580 | taxes on the first about $105,000 of your earned income.

01:04:31.020 | With everything else, your relationship with the US government is going to be about the

01:04:36.460 | same whether you're living in Kansas City, Kansas, or whether you're living in Madrid,

01:04:42.540 | Spain.

01:04:42.940 | You're going to have to file a tax return every year.

01:04:46.140 | You're going to have to file a couple extra forms.

01:04:48.860 | In fact, your life will be a little bit more complicated if you do foreign banking, foreign

01:04:52.380 | investments, et cetera.

01:04:53.500 | But your relationship isn't going to change.

01:04:55.740 | The US government is going to see you as having the full obligations to them no matter where

01:05:01.740 | in the world you live.

01:05:02.940 | So what this means, however, is it's purely based upon your physical location and whether

01:05:09.020 | or not you qualify for the foreign earned income exclusion.

01:05:12.380 | Now, there are two ways to qualify for the foreign earned income exclusion.

01:05:15.100 | You can qualify based upon the strict days test, which means that you spend at least

01:05:19.260 | 330 days outside of the borders of the United States and inside the borders of another place.

01:05:24.140 | And if you do that, you qualify for the foreign earned income exclusion.

01:05:27.820 | Or if you're trying to qualify for it based upon the substantial presence test, then that's

01:05:35.500 | a little more complex and you might have to rent out your house in the United States,

01:05:38.780 | buy a house in Spain, et cetera.

01:05:39.820 | So let me just keep things really simple.

01:05:41.180 | If you want to qualify for the foreign earned income exclusion by living in Spain, you just

01:05:46.620 | need to make sure that you spend 330 days in some country other than the United States.

01:05:51.100 | And if you do that, you'll be in a situation where you can avoid the income taxation on

01:05:57.180 | your first $105,000 of income.

01:05:59.340 | But everything else in your life can stay exactly the same as a US American.

01:06:04.540 | All of your investment accounts stays the same.

01:06:06.780 | Nothing changes.

01:06:07.820 | All of your bank accounts stay the same.

01:06:09.340 | Nothing changes.

01:06:10.140 | All your credit card accounts, everything is the same.

01:06:13.660 | Nothing is different with the United States because you are abroad other than that foreign

01:06:21.820 | earned income exclusion.

01:06:23.020 | You may or may not care about that depending on whether you're working in Spain.

01:06:25.660 | If you're not working in Spain, just come and go as much as you want.

01:06:27.580 | It doesn't really matter.

01:06:28.940 | Now, you will still have then the consideration of your obligations and your relationship

01:06:33.260 | with the Spanish government, which you will need to think about.

01:06:36.060 | How much time you're going to be in Spain?

01:06:37.500 | Are you going to get a residency, which can expose you to taxation?

01:06:40.620 | Are you going to go that path or are you going to do some other plan?

01:06:42.860 | That's up to you.

01:06:43.820 | But with regard to the United States, nothing has to change.

01:06:47.180 | And here's what's interesting.

01:06:48.700 | You could do this for decades.

01:06:50.620 | You can bank in the United States.

01:06:52.220 | You can invest in the United States.

01:06:53.580 | You can not nothing needs to change.

01:06:55.660 | Let's go to that ultimate thing.

01:06:56.700 | What if you ever renounced your citizenship?

01:06:58.780 | What's remarkable is even if you renounce your citizenship with the United States, you

01:07:03.180 | can actually continue most of those things.

01:07:05.420 | Nothing actually has to change with your investments, your banking, etc.

01:07:09.260 | Even if you ultimately renounce your citizenship, you would keep your social

01:07:12.460 | security number.

01:07:13.020 | You're still eligible for Social Security benefits.

01:07:14.860 | The cost of renouncing your citizenship is, of course, possibly exit taxes, the cost of

01:07:20.940 | the actual renunciation and the fact that you can never get it back and you can't come

01:07:24.380 | to the United States as a citizen.

01:07:25.980 | You would have to come on a visa or something elsewhere.

01:07:28.700 | But on this basis, it's actually quite interesting that Americans, US Americans have it easier

01:07:33.820 | than most other places.

01:07:36.220 | Australians, Germans, Brits, Canadians, Mexicans.

01:07:41.420 | You've got to sever your ties with your home country.

01:07:44.380 | And every country has a different process.

01:07:45.980 | And then you can never actually quite know if you are fully gone.

01:07:50.780 | And that's what's so dangerous is it's possible that you could say, let's say you're

01:07:55.980 | from the UK and you lived in London for years, then you decided to move away from London.

01:08:00.700 | Well, you could go through all the steps recommended by the British government.

01:08:08.940 | But if they came back five years later and did an audit of you and found out that in

01:08:13.180 | some way you were still you still had some ties to Britain, it's possible they could

01:08:19.580 | actually impose taxes for all those years.

01:08:22.860 | So it can be not quite as clear for someone else to separate themselves.

01:08:27.340 | And so the safest thing that most of those people have to do is they have to fully sever

01:08:31.740 | all of their connections.

01:08:32.940 | As I said, move investments, close accounts, close credit cards, et cetera.

01:08:37.740 | For US Americans, it's far simpler.

01:08:39.740 | You can keep everything in the United States.

01:08:41.660 | And there are only two things that you need to consider.

01:08:43.900 | Number one, physically, where is your physical body located for the majority of the year?

01:08:48.940 | And for simplicity's sake, are you physically outside of the United States for at least

01:08:53.340 | 330 days per year?

01:08:55.180 | Number two, the question then is citizenship renunciation.

01:08:58.540 | And you can't renounce accidentally.

01:09:00.860 | It's a formal process with a formal oath.

01:09:02.860 | And so you have a paper that says you've renounced.

01:09:05.260 | If you've renounced, you file your final tax return and you're done with the US government

01:09:08.860 | in that regard.

01:09:09.740 | So it's much simpler for Americans.

01:09:13.260 | So I hope you enjoy your time in Spain.

01:09:15.020 | But thankfully, you don't have to change anything.

01:09:17.500 | You can keep everything exactly as it is.

01:09:20.140 | Which now brings me to the last question of today submitted by a patron of the show who

01:09:26.540 | basically writes in and says, "Joshua, time zones are going to prevent my attendance on

01:09:30.620 | the Q&A show, but I'd love to hear your advice on how to research birth tourism that can

01:09:35.100 | lead to second passports, not only for our upcoming baby, but also for my wife and for

01:09:41.660 | me.

01:09:42.220 | My wife is pregnant and our insurance encourages an expat birth because it's usually cheaper.

01:09:48.460 | So we have the financial angle covered, but we are unsure how to research the legal or

01:09:53.740 | immigration angle.

01:09:54.780 | Birthright citizenship countries are easy enough to find, but of those 30-ish options,

01:10:00.300 | I'm having a hard time tracking down whether I can get citizenship myself via the child

01:10:05.660 | who gets it via birthright.

01:10:07.420 | I'd love any help or advice or pointers."

01:10:10.140 | And I responded, because this was in writing, I responded with a clarifying question and

01:10:14.700 | I asked the listener whether he was in a position where he was just looking to go abroad for

01:10:19.260 | the birth and then come back home quickly or whether he's willing to move to another

01:10:22.940 | country as well.

01:10:25.100 | And he responded, he says, "Our thought is that we'd more like to take something like

01:10:28.380 | a month-long trip for the birth itself, but we could probably swing another month if it

01:10:33.180 | enabled a second passport.

01:10:34.780 | We could probably swing renting a place to establish residency and maybe one visit a

01:10:39.340 | year, but we aren't in a financial position where buying property would make sense.

01:10:42.700 | We are US citizens currently living in Asia, but not in a country that offers birthright

01:10:49.100 | citizenship.

01:10:49.740 | Of course, if we were in the Asia region, then it would be simpler for us to visit more

01:10:55.340 | frequently, but even then we can't move to a new place, even semi-permanently."

01:11:00.460 | So I'm going to do my best to give a useful, abbreviated answer to this question.

01:11:06.780 | I'm going to target 20 to 30 minutes and you can laugh if I go to an hour or not.

01:11:11.980 | I actually have quite an extensive outline to this question prepared in all of my outlines.

01:11:16.380 | I could do a whole show on it.

01:11:17.660 | I thought about actually creating a course on this, because it's something of interest

01:11:21.180 | to me.

01:11:21.820 | It's something that I have done.

01:11:23.340 | It's something that I have put a lot of time and thought into.

01:11:27.020 | And so I have a lot to say on it, but I'm going to try to keep it abbreviated here for

01:11:32.460 | the benefit of this listener who is a patron of mine.

01:11:35.580 | So quick background for all listeners and then background for listeners who are considering

01:11:41.740 | doing this.

01:11:42.300 | What this listener is talking about is the concept of birthright citizenship.

01:11:48.300 | The technical theory, the legal theory here is called jus soli, which is basically the

01:11:56.060 | right of the soil.

01:11:57.100 | And the idea is that if you are born in a certain geographic location, the sovereign

01:12:02.700 | government that claims sovereignty over that geographic location is willing to confer upon

01:12:09.340 | you citizenship of that nation because of the location of your birth.

01:12:14.540 | This is contrasted against the doctrine of what's called, was it just sanguinis, or

01:12:19.740 | basically the right of the blood, which means that if you are born to a parent who is a

01:12:24.060 | citizen of a certain country, then you can be eligible for the citizenship of that country

01:12:29.900 | of your parents' citizenship because you come from that bloodline.

01:12:33.900 | Now, there's a marked distinction in the world between these two different legal theories.

01:12:38.540 | Much of the old world, including Europe, much of Africa and Asia, much of the old world

01:12:46.540 | goes by the theory of the blood.

01:12:48.700 | So if you are British, born to British parents, the British government looks to see are your

01:12:53.980 | parents British, not exclusively were you born in Britain.

01:12:58.300 | If you can, in this situation, or in Asia as well.

01:13:01.420 | So if this, let's pretend this listener is living in China, but yet they're American

01:13:06.140 | citizens.

01:13:06.620 | So two American citizens can be living in China and can have a baby in China, and they'll

01:13:11.580 | be able to have the baby, but the baby will not be a Chinese citizen just because it is

01:13:16.780 | born in China.

01:13:18.300 | Whereas two Chinese parents could be living in the United States, not being citizens of

01:13:23.500 | the United States, but if the baby is born in the United States, the baby will automatically

01:13:27.900 | be considered a US citizen because it's born in the United States.

01:13:32.860 | So there are 30-ish countries in the world that without regard to the parent's citizenship,

01:13:38.860 | they will confer citizenship upon the child that's born in their national territory.

01:13:44.220 | And most of those 30-ish countries are in the Americas and in the Caribbean, the so-called

01:13:50.140 | New World.

01:13:50.700 | So the idea here is where should you have your baby?

01:13:55.340 | What's an intelligent place to have your baby?

01:13:57.260 | And if you can give your child a second citizenship by birth, then why should you not do that?

01:14:03.020 | If you can go and have your baby in Canada as an American, and your baby is automatically

01:14:09.180 | then a dual citizen of Canada and the United States, well, then you can move right back

01:14:13.420 | to the United States.

01:14:14.220 | And as I just said, your baby will actually really have very little relationship with

01:14:17.980 | the Canadian government.

01:14:18.780 | They're not going to be subject to taxation, et cetera, just because they were born there.

01:14:24.220 | They can have a Canadian passport though and be a Canadian citizen, and they can always

01:14:28.220 | enjoy those benefits even if they never live in Canada.

01:14:31.100 | And there's a list that goes around on the internet of about 29 countries.

01:14:35.260 | I think, I'm not sure who started this list.

01:14:37.020 | I think it was probably Andrew Henderson at Nomad Capitalist, but there's basically the

01:14:41.740 | same list.

01:14:42.220 | You see it repeated on every site.

01:14:47.100 | Where I would send you would be to start with a Wikipedia article at wikipedia.org/wiki/jus_solide.

01:14:53.980 | J-U-S underscore Soli, S-O-L-I-D, where it talks about the different kinds of just solely

01:14:59.820 | which are unrestricted just solely and gives a bunch of countries and restricted just solely.

01:15:04.700 | Now, I don't know if every one of these countries exactly is correct.

01:15:08.940 | It's probably, the Wikipedia article is probably pretty good, but when you're dealing with

01:15:13.340 | what, almost 200 sovereign states or whatever, it's a little challenging to keep on track

01:15:19.260 | of all those laws.

01:15:20.700 | But let's talk about what you would do first, and then I'll give you some ideas on different

01:15:24.780 | countries.

01:15:25.340 | What are the benefits of having a baby abroad?

01:15:28.780 | Well, I think the benefits come into basically two categories, possibly three if you have

01:15:33.660 | other children.

01:15:34.780 | So the first is, what are the benefits for the baby?

01:15:38.060 | If you go to a country that will confer citizenship on a child that's born within its geographic

01:15:44.140 | borders, that baby will have certain benefits.

01:15:47.420 | That baby will have the benefits of citizenship of that country.

01:15:51.580 | So what are those benefits that are the most important?

01:15:54.460 | In my mind, the first obvious benefit is the ability to live in that country and to work

01:16:02.220 | there as a person who's in that country.

01:16:05.420 | If you think about the concept of citizenship, about the only ultimate right that citizenship

01:16:12.060 | confers is the legal right to live within certain geographic boundaries of a sovereign

01:16:18.620 | government.

01:16:19.180 | That's about it.

01:16:20.220 | That's the basic right.

01:16:21.820 | Now, depending on the government, there may be other benefits, but that's the basic right,

01:16:28.620 | the ability to live and work in a certain place.

01:16:32.380 | And so if you're going to get that, you have to think about what's going to be in the best

01:16:36.620 | interest of this baby.

01:16:37.980 | Give an example.

01:16:39.100 | One of the countries that has a citizenship of the soil, just Sali, is the country of

01:16:45.580 | Tuvalu.

01:16:46.220 | Now, I don't know how familiar you are with the country of Tuvalu, but it is a tiny little

01:16:53.180 | island nation down in the Pacific, and its total landmass is about 10 square miles.

01:16:59.340 | It's just a long, thin strip, not that long, but about 10 square miles.

01:17:05.020 | And there are, I think, how many people live there?

01:17:08.620 | 11,000, about 11,000 people who live on the island of Tuvalu, and they have a GDP of just

01:17:18.380 | under $40 million, basically, of total GDP for the country, or about $3,500 of GDP per

01:17:26.780 | capita, per person.

01:17:27.820 | So if you go to Tuvalu and have your baby in Tuvalu, your baby is going to be legitimately

01:17:33.980 | proven by the constitution of Tuvalu.

01:17:36.300 | Your baby is going to be, what do you call it, Tuvaluan, I think?

01:17:40.300 | Tuvaluan?

01:17:40.940 | But the question is, how big of a benefit is that going to be to your baby?

01:17:47.740 | Well, if the benefit is a place to live, it's probably not a great benefit.

01:17:52.460 | I'm sure Tuvalu is very nice, but it's not exactly a big place.

01:17:56.380 | And if the benefit is economic opportunity, it's probably not that big of a place where

01:18:02.620 | there's a lot of economic opportunity.

01:18:04.300 | So that might not be really a huge benefit for your child.

01:18:10.300 | Now, if you were to compare that with a country like Canada or the United States, of course,

01:18:17.420 | you're already American, so we can skip the United States largely, or Mexico, or maybe

01:18:23.340 | Panama, or Chile, or Colombia, or Brazil, all of these countries offer birthright citizenship.

01:18:32.140 | But compared to Tuvalu, they are huge countries, which provide massive geographic area in which

01:18:38.300 | your baby can live, and a massive economy in which your baby can participate.

01:18:43.420 | If you have a baby in Mexico, there are many, many more economic opportunities available

01:18:48.380 | to your child than if you have your baby in Tuvalu.

01:18:51.020 | So you need to think about, what are the benefits that I'm trying to get for my baby?

01:18:53.980 | And think about, well, I'm trying to give my baby a place that they can legally live

01:18:58.220 | and a place that they can legally work.

01:19:00.300 | Now, the obvious solution here, of course, is the United States.

01:19:02.300 | But since you're US Americans, you already have that you can already confer upon your

01:19:07.340 | child US citizenship, because you are US American parents, no matter where they're born.

01:19:12.780 | And so what else, what other place would be in the benefit or the interest of that child?

01:19:18.860 | Now, when you're thinking about access to live and work in a place, you should consider

01:19:22.780 | if there are opportunities even beyond a certain country into a certain region.

01:19:28.620 | So some countries are big enough in and of themselves that they can provide benefits,

01:19:33.260 | but then some countries are also part of larger blocks.

01:19:36.860 | So the most well-known block would be something like the European Union.

01:19:40.940 | Now, I'm not aware of any countries in the European Union who will provide birthright

01:19:46.220 | citizenship exclusively for a child who's born there, regardless of the citizenship

01:19:51.100 | of their parent.

01:19:52.220 | But what you should consider is if you have some claim on citizenship yourself, can you

01:19:57.180 | help your child to have that citizenship by being born in that country?

01:20:00.220 | One of the short sight things that I see people look at is they look just to the 30-ish countries

01:20:08.380 | where the child can be automatically a citizen because it's born there.

01:20:11.420 | But you need to consider if you're having your child in a certain place can help them

01:20:15.980 | to receive a citizenship that you have, because there are actually a whole set of countries

01:20:20.860 | in addition to those 30-ish countries that you read on the internet that have some sort

01:20:29.020 | of more restricted right of birth.

01:20:33.340 | So for example, one example would be a country like South Africa.

01:20:43.580 | If a child is born in South Africa, of course, a child born in South Africa to South African

01:20:50.300 | citizens would be a citizen.

01:20:51.580 | But if a child is born in South Africa to permanent residents of South Africa, that

01:20:55.740 | child can be granted South African citizenship.

01:20:58.380 | Or the United Kingdom has a law that at least if one parent is either a British citizen

01:21:03.980 | or legally settled in the country at birth or upon the 10th birthday of the child, regardless

01:21:09.740 | of their citizenship status, that child can be a British citizen.

01:21:13.740 | So could you do want to be legally settled in Great Britain under those terms?

01:21:18.700 | There are actually more options than just the 30 countries.

01:21:22.380 | But in terms of in that one, depending on what happens with Brexit, that one would be

01:21:26.860 | the kind of thing that could potentially give you access to the EU.

01:21:30.620 | There are other regions though.

01:21:32.300 | For example, in South America, there's a large region called Mercosur, which includes, let's

01:21:37.420 | see, Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay, Argentina, and as primary members and associate members

01:21:47.340 | would include Chile and a couple of the South American countries.

01:21:49.980 | The point is residents or citizens of any of those Mercosur countries have fairly unrestricted

01:21:56.700 | ability to move and to work in those other countries.

01:21:59.740 | It's not quite as seamless as the EU is, but it is fairly easy.

01:22:05.100 | So if you are the parent of an Argentine citizen, you can move to Brazil.

01:22:09.900 | If you're a Brazilian citizen, you can move to Paraguay and you can live and work there

01:22:13.820 | with an expedited system.

01:22:16.380 | In the Caribbean, there is an alliance called CARICOM, which can have certain benefits as

01:22:21.580 | well in the Caribbean islands.

01:22:23.420 | So think about those benefits to the baby and try to think about what will give the

01:22:28.380 | best benefit for the baby.

01:22:30.860 | One, I guess another interesting thing for you to consider would be often there are aspects

01:22:37.660 | of this that George has talked about in the blog post that you read about, such as other

01:22:42.540 | benefits with relationships that certain countries might have with a place that the child can

01:22:48.780 | be born.

01:22:49.260 | And one example would be it doesn't have to be just necessarily outside of the country.

01:22:53.980 | So let me give an example.

01:22:54.940 | If I were a Mexican, if I were a Canadian, a Canadian couple wanting to have a baby,

01:23:07.500 | and if I wanted my baby to be an American by birth, on the basis of birthright citizenship,

01:23:14.060 | I wouldn't necessarily just automatically go to New York and have the baby in New York.

01:23:18.540 | Now, that would be good because that would automatically confer dual citizenship upon

01:23:22.060 | the baby with, of course, the obligations to the US government, which can be, you know,

01:23:27.660 | it's probably helpful.

01:23:28.380 | I mean, the US is such a massive financial powerhouse.

01:23:31.980 | It's a valuable thing to have a US citizenship financially.

01:23:35.100 | But I would consider going and having the baby in a place like Puerto Rico because now

01:23:39.980 | I can get multiple benefits for my baby.

01:23:42.780 | Children who are born in Puerto Rico are automatically citizens of Puerto Rico by birth

01:23:49.660 | and also citizens of the United States.

01:23:52.860 | So by the basis of being born in Puerto Rico, my child will automatically be an American

01:23:58.540 | citizen, can get an American passport, et cetera.

01:24:01.420 | But as a native-born Puerto Rican, that child has additional benefits with Spain.

01:24:07.100 | Because Puerto Rico was formerly a Spanish possession, then a Puerto Rican who was native-born

01:24:13.180 | in Puerto Rico has the opportunity to have the expedited path to citizenship that Spain

01:24:19.500 | offers, which is as little as two years of residence.

01:24:22.940 | So now, if you're thinking about, let's pretend you're a Canadian, and you're saying,

01:24:26.780 | "Where can I have my baby so that it has multiple benefits?"

01:24:29.900 | Going and having the baby in Puerto Rico gives it automatically US citizenship by birth.

01:24:34.700 | Then you can move to Spain, spend two years in Spain, and now there's an expedited path

01:24:39.740 | to citizenship for that child to have now an EU passport.

01:24:43.820 | So what have you done with something like that?

01:24:45.260 | Well, now you've opened up the European Union and Canada and the United States to that child,

01:24:50.620 | where they can legally live anywhere in those three regions.

01:24:53.580 | They can work anywhere in those three regions.

01:24:55.740 | They can travel.

01:24:56.700 | And if they follow that path through, they can have major benefits.

01:25:02.220 | There are a lot of these little countries, whether it's a place like Barbados or possibly

01:25:07.740 | Jamaica.

01:25:08.460 | But Barbados, being a former British possession, people who are born in Barbados automatically

01:25:14.300 | are citizens of Barbados by birth.

01:25:16.780 | You say, "Well, what benefit is that?"

01:25:19.100 | Well, it's maybe not bad.

01:25:20.220 | There are certain benefits to it, although it may not be a huge region.

01:25:23.340 | It does provide access to the Caribbean under the CARICOM agreements, etc.

01:25:27.500 | But then you have the opportunity to have possibly an expedited path to British citizenship

01:25:33.260 | and possibly a British passport.

01:25:35.820 | So you can look into things like that for yourself.

01:25:38.380 | There are opportunities there with the French government, with some of the European governments

01:25:44.620 | through being born in their island communities.

01:25:47.420 | Now, other benefits for the baby.

01:25:49.180 | I'm not sure that necessarily being born in the biggest place is always necessarily the

01:25:55.260 | best thing.

01:25:56.220 | And this is where I think a little bit about the value of smaller countries.

01:26:00.220 | Now, being Americans and assuming you're going to pass on American citizenship to your baby,

01:26:05.180 | you're already now doing business with a very large country.

01:26:10.300 | But what opportunities would there be for your child if they were a citizen of a smaller

01:26:14.940 | country?

01:26:15.740 | One of the dangerous trends is that most of the large countries, the United States, the

01:26:22.540 | Canada, many of the big Brazils, the Mexicans, as they have financial resources, these countries

01:26:31.100 | are pursuing the path of engaging in much more global spying.

01:26:37.020 | They're imposing more and more obligations onto their citizens.

01:26:44.700 | So I think if you care about freedom, there's actually a really good argument in favor of

01:26:49.820 | your child being a citizen of a much smaller country.

01:26:54.140 | I mean, imagine if your child were born in Nicaragua and were a native-born Nicaraguan

01:26:59.260 | citizen.

01:26:59.660 | On that, you can have a baby in Nicaragua, automatically citizen by birth.

01:27:05.260 | Now, Nicaragua is a pretty poor place.

01:27:08.620 | And even worse, in the last couple of years, it had a major turn towards heavy leftism

01:27:13.420 | and socialism, which is at this point kind of in the DNA of the Nicaraguans.

01:27:16.940 | But there's no possibility that the Nicaraguan government, at least in our foreseeable lifetime,

01:27:22.620 | is ever going to have the money to be able to spy on the world.

01:27:26.380 | And so if you're a Nicaraguan citizen traveling on a Nicaraguan passport, you can be pretty

01:27:30.460 | free to float around the world and not have to deal with them kind of tracking you down.

01:27:34.300 | So there's kind of a freedom argument in favor of for an individual that goes against

01:27:40.300 | big country.

01:27:41.100 | Now, I think it's more compelling to give the child access to live and work in other

01:27:45.100 | places, but you can consider that for yourself.

01:27:48.700 | Now, let's quickly talk about benefits for the siblings.

01:27:51.500 | If you already have children, there may be certain benefits for the baby, but then also

01:27:56.380 | benefits for the siblings.

01:27:58.140 | For example, the siblings might be able to qualify for a residency visa and/or to qualify

01:28:03.900 | for an expedited path to citizenship, especially when they are minor children.

01:28:09.340 | For example, I'll talk in a moment about a country like Brazil.

01:28:12.460 | Brazil has an interesting law where if a child is born in Brazil, then they are automatically

01:28:20.380 | Brazilian by birth, and then the siblings, the minor siblings of a child born in Brazil

01:28:26.300 | can have an extremely expedited path to citizenship once after really, in many ways, as little

01:28:33.100 | as six months or eight months of residency.

01:28:35.100 | Then the siblings of a child born to a Brazilian baby by birth can have an expedited path to

01:28:45.500 | citizenship.

01:28:46.220 | So there are some things for siblings.

01:28:47.580 | Consider that.

01:28:48.300 | But then let's talk about parents.

01:28:49.660 | What about the benefits for parents?

01:28:51.420 | There may or may not be any benefits that you would like to have as the parent of a

01:28:57.500 | child, and they're much harder to come by than the benefits for the child.

01:29:02.220 | So you might choose something that's in the best interest of the child, but actually won't

01:29:05.900 | benefit the parents in any way, or you might not.

01:29:08.460 | So let me give an example.

01:29:09.420 | It's my understanding of the Canadian immigration system that any child born in Canada is

01:29:14.300 | automatically a Canadian citizen.

01:29:16.060 | But Canada doesn't have any possibility or any recognition for immigration for the parents

01:29:24.300 | simply based upon the fact that they're parents of a Canadian citizen.

01:29:27.260 | If you want to move to Canada, you have to qualify for a residency visa based upon the

01:29:34.620 | Canadian system of law, based upon their point system in their case.

01:29:37.820 | Are you a valuable worker?

01:29:38.860 | Can you get enough points?

01:29:39.820 | And can your application be approved?

01:29:41.900 | So you don't get any benefits as the parent of a Canadian child.

01:29:45.900 | Now, that's different than a country like Mexico.

01:29:49.100 | So Mexico has the ability, if you have a baby in Mexico, the baby is automatically Mexican.

01:29:54.860 | And then you can apply for a residency visa as the parent of a Mexican baby.

01:30:00.300 | And under their doctrine of family reunification, that residency visa will be issued to you

01:30:05.900 | so that you can now live in Mexico.

01:30:08.140 | A country like the United States is kind of interesting.

01:30:11.020 | It's not really one or the other.

01:30:13.500 | There is no automatic rights to stay, no automatic residency for parents who go and have their

01:30:20.220 | baby in the United States.

01:30:21.820 | But there is the possibility once the child is older and working to sponsor their relatives.

01:30:27.180 | But it's a much harder process.

01:30:28.860 | I find that particular debate so ironic in the political space, where in reality, people

01:30:35.740 | who often rail against birthright citizenship, there was a big scuffle in the United States

01:30:39.580 | a couple of years ago about ending birthright citizenship, et cetera, and somehow changing

01:30:44.140 | it.

01:30:44.300 | You need to have a constitutional amendment to change it.

01:30:46.460 | But in reality, based upon the way the US taxes its worldwide citizens, no matter where

01:30:51.020 | they live, people should be clamoring for everybody to come to the United States and

01:30:54.220 | then leave again and go somewhere else.

01:30:55.980 | Because a baby who's born in the United States is saddled with a lifetime tax obligation,

01:31:00.620 | even if they never again set foot in the United States.

01:31:03.900 | So it's pretty amazing.

01:31:05.500 | The major benefits for the parents would primarily be a right to get a residency visa.

01:31:10.860 | And on this basis, it can be a big benefit.

01:31:17.820 | To your question, there is no country in the world that will automatically confer some

01:31:28.220 | form of citizenship on the parent because they're the parent of a child born in that

01:31:33.100 | country.

01:31:33.740 | So there's no country in the world that you can go there, have a baby, the child's

01:31:36.940 | automatically a citizen, and then a week later, you're a citizen.

01:31:39.260 | Doesn't exist.

01:31:40.460 | The fastest in the world, when you start reading the articles around this, the fastest in the

01:31:44.060 | world that you'll read about again and again is Brazil.

01:31:46.700 | And the idea is if you go to Brazil and have a baby in Brazil, Brazilian law allows you

01:31:51.820 | to apply for citizenship as the parent of a Brazilian child after one year of residency.

01:31:59.580 | So the way it works is you go to Brazil, you have your baby in Brazil, you apply, the baby

01:32:04.460 | is a citizen by birth, you apply now for your residency visa.

01:32:08.220 | Once your residency visa is issued, then you wait one year and then you apply for citizenship.

01:32:13.580 | So the idea is it could be as fast as one year.

01:32:16.060 | Now, what the law says and what the practice is are night and day different things.

01:32:20.460 | So what it actually is in Brazil, it's not one year of residency to apply for the visa.

01:32:26.060 | It needs to be more like two because you're dealing with the local officials and they

01:32:30.220 | want to see if they're going to take the application, they want to see that you're

01:32:33.260 | legit a resident of Brazil.

01:32:35.900 | And so that means that you can't just go there and show up every now and then.

01:32:39.660 | You've got to go and you've got to build a life there.

01:32:41.500 | You've got to buy a house or rent a house.

01:32:43.500 | You've got to get a job or start a business in Brazil using your Brazilian residency visa.

01:32:49.020 | You have to go and you need to pay taxes to Brazil under their tax rates on your worldwide

01:32:56.460 | income.

01:32:56.780 | You need to become a legit Brazilian person who's integrated in the local society.

01:33:02.220 | Then you go and you apply after usually about two years.

01:33:05.020 | They want to see at least two years.

01:33:06.300 | And then the process itself is of issuing the paperwork on the ground right now is about

01:33:11.340 | two more years.

01:33:12.460 | And so in reality, if you're going to go and have a Brazilian baby, it's going to be

01:33:16.540 | for the path to citizenship for you is going to be closer to about four years at the very

01:33:22.940 | fastest.

01:33:23.420 | Maybe I mean, sorry, I shouldn't say the very fastest, but the normal thing to expect

01:33:27.500 | would be about four years.

01:33:28.860 | So if you're going to get that Brazilian passport, you need to be there for about four

01:33:32.140 | years.

01:33:32.300 | And by the way, then you have, there's also the language test.

01:33:34.540 | You have to be able to pass a Portuguese fluency exam in order to become a Brazilian

01:33:40.380 | citizen.

01:33:41.260 | So you need to think about it.

01:33:43.260 | The biggest benefit for the parent is going to be the ability to either now or in the

01:33:48.300 | future apply for a residency visa.

01:33:51.420 | So the reason I asked about the time, you don't necessarily have to do this all at once.

01:33:55.420 | Let's use Brazil as an example, because that's the one you always, always read touted in

01:33:59.420 | this series of articles that you can find online.

01:34:01.660 | If you think about Brazil, you could go to Brazil.

01:34:05.420 | You could be there for a month is probably a little fast with Brazil, maybe a little

01:34:10.220 | longer, but a month, a month or two, you go there, you have the baby.

01:34:14.060 | The baby becomes a Brazilian citizen.

01:34:15.820 | You finish up the paperwork for the baby, get their citizenship, and then you can leave

01:34:19.020 | and you take the baby back to Asia.

01:34:21.020 | Now, six years from now or 10 years from now, you can now go back to Brazil.

01:34:25.180 | Of course, you go on a tourist visa in that case, but you go back to Brazil.

01:34:28.620 | And then once you're in Brazil, you apply for your residency as the parent of a Brazilian

01:34:32.860 | child, unless something happens with the law in terms of a constitutional change, which

01:34:38.140 | is pretty unusual.

01:34:39.580 | Unless something happens with the law, you could exercise that right of residency 10

01:34:43.340 | years from now.

01:34:44.300 | And so this is the same thing that happens with Canadians and with or people who, you

01:34:50.380 | know, say you're Chinese, you come to the United States, have your baby in the United

01:34:52.940 | States, the baby is a US citizen, you go back to China, you live there.

01:34:55.900 | But then when your baby is an adult, then they can move to the United States and then

01:34:59.100 | potentially sponsor the parents to come to the United States as well.

01:35:02.220 | So your biggest benefit to think about is going to be a residency visa.

01:35:07.340 | So I ask you the question, is there a place that you'd like to have residency where you

01:35:11.900 | can get benefits for the baby and benefits for you?

01:35:14.940 | Now, as we move into this a little deeper, then you would want to consider, is it a place

01:35:19.580 | that's fairly easy for me to get residency, even if I'm not the parent of a Brazilian

01:35:24.380 | child?

01:35:24.780 | Give me an example.

01:35:25.420 | Let's say you want to Panama, right?

01:35:29.660 | Panama would be a really great place to live, to work.

01:35:33.980 | Panama has, it's a bustling economy, booming economy in Central America.

01:35:38.220 | It's a financial hub for, in many ways, the world, but definitely of the Americas.

01:35:43.820 | It's a financial hub.

01:35:45.020 | It's in a wonderful, it's in the same time zone as the Eastern time zone.

01:35:48.300 | And so it's very connected and very easy to live there and work and do business in the

01:35:51.260 | East Coast of the United States.

01:35:52.380 | What else about Panama?

01:35:55.180 | It is easy to get to.

01:35:58.380 | They have a wonderful tax system, a territorial tax system.

01:36:01.020 | So you can live there and have a very efficient tax life.

01:36:03.500 | But the thing is, do you need to go and have a baby there that's a natural born Panamanian?

01:36:08.380 | It's not hard right now.

01:36:10.780 | If you're from one of the friendly nations, it's not hard to apply for a Panamanian friendly

01:36:15.500 | nations visa and for you to go and live in Panama under the friendly friendly nations

01:36:19.580 | visa to cost you some few thousands of dollars of lawyer fees, make a deposit in a bank.

01:36:24.060 | But it's not that hard for you to get that visa.

01:36:26.380 | So if you're going to go to the hard work of going to Panama and doing that, do you

01:36:32.220 | really want to have the baby there or do you want to just get the friendly nations visa,

01:36:35.500 | which you can do with a few thousand dollars of legal fees?

01:36:37.660 | Similarly, many countries have various visa options that you can get.

01:36:42.700 | It's not that difficult for an American to go and get residence in Mexico.

01:36:46.780 | You can get residence in Brazil.

01:36:48.140 | You become an investor and apply under their investor program, or you can go to Colombia,

01:36:51.900 | or you can apply for pension auto visas throughout Central and South America.

01:36:56.540 | So there are a lot of these.

01:36:57.500 | So you're going to think, is this really where I want to have it?

01:36:59.580 | It's not easy.

01:37:00.220 | Then we go to other considerations.

01:37:03.260 | So you want to consider what obligations would I be signing my child up for by having them

01:37:11.980 | in this country?

01:37:13.420 | And so let's use the United States as an example.

01:37:16.460 | It's a major obligation to have a child in the United States because you're signing your

01:37:21.740 | child up with the burden and the possibility of US citizenship by having your child in

01:37:28.300 | the United States.

01:37:29.500 | But that's a burden that will flow with them throughout their entire lifetime.

01:37:33.180 | Now, in many cases, I think the economic argument would say it's still worth considering,

01:37:38.300 | but that's the kind of thing that you have to consider.

01:37:40.460 | One obligation for you to be very careful of would be something like military registration.

01:37:44.940 | Some countries mandate military service for their citizens.

01:37:49.900 | So let's see, having Israeli citizenship.

01:37:53.500 | In Israel, all young men and all young women are obligated to serve in the Israeli Defense

01:37:58.620 | Force.

01:37:59.420 | So your child will have to serve.

01:38:01.740 | Now, some places may have a military obligation, but it's a little bit less likely.

01:38:06.220 | So for example, Brazil.

01:38:07.660 | If you have a baby in Brazil, that baby will be obligated to Brazilian military service

01:38:11.900 | in the Brazilian Army once they're a, I think it's just for men is my understanding there,

01:38:16.620 | but at 18 years old.

01:38:17.660 | So they require to report that.

01:38:19.500 | And even if they're a Brazilian living abroad, they still have to go and request exemptions

01:38:24.380 | to that.

01:38:25.340 | Now, it's not that I don't think it's that big of a risk in that in their case, who is

01:38:30.140 | Brazil necessarily going to go and fight?

01:38:31.980 | They're not that inclined to military conflict.

01:38:36.380 | There's fairly easy to get out of.

01:38:38.060 | So I don't think it's a huge risk, but you want to consider something like military registration.

01:38:43.340 | You also want to consider other obligations of the that you're potentially exposing your

01:38:48.940 | child to.

01:38:49.820 | For example, some places you would have to pay into the national health system.

01:38:53.420 | And so are you obligating your child to some system of taxation, especially if that obligation

01:38:59.340 | would be on an ongoing basis, and especially if it's not funding things that you think

01:39:07.980 | should be funded.

01:39:09.180 | Some countries impose an obligation to vote where you're legally required to vote in

01:39:13.660 | that country's elections.

01:39:14.620 | Do you want to impose that obligation on them?

01:39:17.580 | Residency in some places can bring other challenges that especially Americans are not used to

01:39:25.900 | thinking about.

01:39:26.860 | Things that are important to me, for example, would be things like the ability to homeschool,

01:39:32.780 | homeschooling versus government schooling.

01:39:34.860 | In the United States, homeschooling fought all the big battles back in the 1970s.

01:39:39.260 | And so now it's fairly easy for you to homeschool.

01:39:42.780 | And in most states, it's pretty easy to do.

01:39:44.700 | It's not the same in the rest of the world.

01:39:46.940 | You may find yourself, if you're trying to live and work in another country, you find

01:39:50.860 | yourself and your child, especially as a citizen of that child, with significant challenges

01:39:55.980 | dealing with the government if you want to do something like homeschool.

01:40:01.020 | And then I would say one of the big challenges is even the process itself of giving birth.

01:40:07.820 | The entire process of birth in and of itself can be very, very challenging.

01:40:12.300 | It's a very vulnerable time in a woman's life.

01:40:14.700 | It's a very challenging time in a couple's life as you learn new things, especially if

01:40:20.460 | this is your first baby.

01:40:21.500 | I remember when my wife and I had our first baby.

01:40:24.060 | And just the challenge of birth itself was difficult to think about.

01:40:29.100 | What kind of birth do we want to have?

01:40:30.940 | Where do we want to give birth?

01:40:33.260 | And there are all these big questions that have to be solved with the whole birth process.

01:40:38.380 | Are we going to give birth in a hospital?

01:40:40.220 | Are we going to give birth out of a hospital?

01:40:42.460 | What kind of care are we going to have?

01:40:44.060 | Who are the people that we're going to have involved?

01:40:45.900 | What classes, what birthing methodology are we going to follow?

01:40:49.820 | What convictions are we going to have?

01:40:51.100 | Are we going to have a higher or a doula?

01:40:52.860 | Are we going to vaccinate?

01:40:53.900 | Are we going to circumcise?

01:40:54.940 | Are we going to like all these big questions that new parents that face.

01:41:00.220 | And it's really challenging to give birth even in a culture that you're totally comfortable

01:41:05.180 | with.

01:41:05.680 | And this in and of itself can be challenging.

01:41:09.580 | Now to take it out of a culture that you're comfortable with and move it into another

01:41:12.940 | place where now you're navigating the birthing system in an unfamiliar place and you're

01:41:17.580 | navigating unfamiliar laws.

01:41:19.420 | For example, my wife and I have never had a baby in a hospital.

01:41:23.260 | Now thankfully we've had smooth low-risk pregnancies, but we've never had a baby in

01:41:27.420 | a hospital.

01:41:27.920 | I've received all my babies when they were born.

01:41:30.620 | But that's easy and legal in the United States, but it's not necessarily easy nor is it

01:41:36.700 | necessarily legal in other countries.

01:41:39.420 | And so navigating the birthing system can be a challenge.

01:41:43.100 | Things like understanding what your rights are in that process.

01:41:46.860 | I'm fairly comfortable throwing my weight around if I'm in an American hospital because

01:41:53.660 | I understand what my rights are, I understand what my wife's rights are, I understand

01:41:57.740 | who's in charge.

01:41:58.460 | I'm a little less comfortable in other places where the laws are not on the side of the

01:42:04.380 | individual, but the laws are much more in line with what the government says should

01:42:08.140 | be done.

01:42:09.260 | And then navigating these things in a language you don't speak can be challenging.

01:42:14.540 | So now you've got to bring in an interpreter and figure out how to get your wishes done

01:42:19.500 | in an interpreter.

01:42:21.100 | And then in some cases you just simply don't have the legal rights that you do in other

01:42:27.100 | places.

01:42:27.900 | For example, in the United States, one of the challenges that parents have to face is

01:42:33.180 | if they're going to vaccinate their children or not.

01:42:35.980 | And it's not as simple as just saying, "Yeah, I'm in favor of vaccination."

01:42:38.620 | You have to decide, "Am I going to vaccinate my baby?

01:42:40.460 | Am I going to do it right away?

01:42:43.420 | Am I going to do it at some point?

01:42:44.540 | Am I going to do the standard CDC schedule?

01:42:46.700 | Am I going to not vaccinate at all?

01:42:47.740 | Am I going to vaccinate according to a modified schedule?"

01:42:49.580 | Really, really tough.

01:42:50.780 | And it's one of the most contentious, difficult issues that you see it on the news every day,

01:42:55.340 | measles outbreak and all this stuff.

01:42:57.020 | But in the United States, if you don't wish to vaccinate, you can do it entirely fine.

01:43:00.940 | And the only time you face is a handful of states if the child goes to a government school

01:43:05.180 | or a private school.

01:43:06.540 | But it's not the same in many other places in the world.

01:43:09.740 | So if you're going to...

01:43:10.860 | Well, let's leave it at that.

01:43:13.260 | It's not the same.

01:43:14.220 | It's not legal.

01:43:15.340 | You don't have the legal right to opt out.

01:43:18.860 | Now, whether you have the practical right or not, that depends on who's going to help

01:43:22.300 | you with the birth.

01:43:22.860 | What are you going to do?

01:43:24.380 | And so it's a tough...

01:43:25.660 | There are a whole bunch of things that are often not thought of.

01:43:28.140 | And then the documents, the process of getting the documents can be really, really challenging.

01:43:32.620 | So what documents do you bring from home?

01:43:35.100 | What documents does the baby need?

01:43:36.780 | How do you, in many ways, get the baby out of the country?

01:43:39.660 | You go to a place and have the baby, the baby is going to be trapped in that country until

01:43:45.740 | the baby gets a passport issued and the permission of the government to leave.

01:43:49.980 | Some countries, they don't care.

01:43:51.020 | They don't track anything.

01:43:52.300 | Other countries, you've got to have all kinds of permission slips and etc. filled off.

01:43:57.020 | So this is the stuff that the articles don't tell you.

01:43:59.740 | This is the stuff that we learned by doing it.

01:44:02.860 | So that's why I like to write a course, because at this point, I can now write a course on

01:44:07.820 | all the stuff that I wish the articles had said, but that they didn't.

01:44:15.100 | And it's not as easy as you think it will be.

01:44:17.980 | So I would give you kind of a couple of summary things for you to consider.

01:44:22.380 | This is not at all an exhaustive list, but just some things for you to think of.

01:44:27.980 | First, expand your thinking beyond just the 30 country list that you read online.

01:44:33.420 | Think about your ancestry and your heritage and consider if there's anything unique to

01:44:37.740 | your situation.

01:44:38.540 | Do you have, do you already have another citizenship?

01:44:41.580 | Because you might actually want to give birth in a country where one of you has a connection

01:44:45.820 | or a tie because of the benefits there, even if it's not one of those 30 countries that

01:44:50.780 | automatically confers unrestricted birthright citizenship on the child.

01:44:54.940 | Consider that.

01:44:56.780 | Consider how much time you actually have available and consider, I would be remiss, I didn't

01:45:03.260 | mean to make this, but you have to also then consider the medical, the quality of the medical

01:45:07.340 | system.

01:45:07.740 | Sounds silly, but I guess I shouldn't have kind of breezed over that.

01:45:11.980 | I'm sure Tuvalu is a lovely place.

01:45:15.580 | I haven't been there.

01:45:16.300 | I've seen pictures and videos of it, but it looks like a beautiful place.

01:45:18.940 | But you cannot say that the, that Tuvalu is going to have the same medical resources that

01:45:25.100 | are available in Mexico City.

01:45:26.860 | Mexico City, and any city in Mexico, is going to have top tier, class A, excellent medical

01:45:33.340 | care.

01:45:33.900 | And that's super important because you're dealing with the lives of your wife and the

01:45:37.980 | lives of your baby.

01:45:39.100 | And so you, especially as a father, you don't want to be careless or cavalier about that

01:45:44.380 | in any way.

01:45:45.340 | It's too important to be careless or cavalier.

01:45:47.020 | So you need to think about medical care as well, which is going to probably point you

01:45:50.220 | to a handful of countries.

01:45:52.780 | You know, Chad offers, the country of Chad in Africa offers Chadian citizenship to a

01:46:01.260 | child who's born in Chad, according to the Wikipedia article.

01:46:03.900 | I'm not confident in the medical situation in Chad.

01:46:09.260 | Canada, on the other hand, I have no questions.

01:46:11.660 | Mexico, got no questions.

01:46:12.860 | The United States, no questions.

01:46:14.060 | Brazil, no questions.

01:46:15.420 | Easy.

01:46:16.060 | You know, Chile, no questions.

01:46:17.980 | There's top tier medical care available.

01:46:21.980 | So consider that.

01:46:23.980 | And consider if you and your wife want a certain benefit for yourselves and/or if it's just

01:46:29.980 | for the child.

01:46:31.100 | It's not wrong for you to want benefits yourself.

01:46:35.100 | The ability to apply for a residency visa is an extremely valuable thing.

01:46:38.700 | And if I were, in one case, it's so different for you being a US American and your wife

01:46:44.540 | being US American than it is for, say, somebody from Pakistan.

01:46:48.460 | I mean, if I were from Pakistan, there's no question that I would be working like crazy

01:46:53.420 | to make sure that we had a baby in some other place that conferred birthright citizenship.

01:46:59.180 | And I'd be doing that for the baby and then also for us as a parent, because it's pretty

01:47:03.980 | hard for me to really make it really excellent for my family in Pakistan.

01:47:10.380 | And earlier, I kind of skipped over even the travel benefits of the passport of that country.

01:47:16.940 | One of the big things that Americans are not used to thinking about and most Westerners

01:47:20.700 | not used to thinking about is the quality of a passport from a certain country.

01:47:24.620 | But a Pakistani passport makes it almost impossible for a person to move without constant

01:47:29.980 | visa applications all around the world.

01:47:32.220 | Or if you're from Afghanistan or from Iraq or from Iran or one of these countries, citizens

01:47:38.060 | of those countries, especially citizens who want to travel, who want to live and work

01:47:41.660 | abroad, do business, are often desperate to have a second passport.

01:47:46.300 | So there's a very compelling case for them to go and have their baby abroad and get the

01:47:53.820 | benefit of a residency visa in a new place where they can, over time, naturalize as citizens

01:47:58.860 | in time.

01:47:59.420 | So think about, is it just for the baby or are you also going to consider benefits for

01:48:04.620 | you and your wife?

01:48:06.540 | It's not a right or a wrong, necessarily.

01:48:09.260 | I think that you'll have to think about the overall benefits.

01:48:12.540 | So a few highlights, and I'm going to run, just run down the list of countries in alphabetical

01:48:17.420 | order from the Wikipedia article, and then I will wrap up here.

01:48:21.260 | So here are the countries that, according to Wikipedia, are available for unrestricted

01:48:25.100 | birthright citizenship.

01:48:26.380 | Antigua and Barbuda.

01:48:28.220 | Possibilities, small Caribbean countries.

01:48:32.060 | I'm going to lump all the Caribbean countries together.

01:48:34.300 | Antigua, Barbuda, Barbados, etc.

01:48:37.180 | With the exceptions of the ones that possibly provide citizenship by investment programs,

01:48:41.340 | you should consider those because if you actually want to live there and naturalize, you may

01:48:44.700 | be able to get basically a pretty decent travel document that gives you benefits without necessarily

01:48:51.740 | having to pay the however many hundreds of thousands of dollars.

01:48:54.780 | So Antigua and Barbuda, don't have any comments.

01:48:58.140 | Argentina.

01:48:59.340 | Argentina is an interesting choice for you for a number of reasons.

01:49:03.180 | First, Argentina has one of the fastest paths to citizenship of really two years of residency.

01:49:10.140 | Now, I don't know what the actual time on the ground is with dealing with the bureaucracy,

01:49:14.220 | but the law is two years of residency and you're eligible to apply for Argentinian citizenship.

01:49:18.460 | And Argentinian citizenship is actually a pretty decent citizenship to have, in addition

01:49:25.660 | to the fact that Argentina itself is a huge country.

01:49:29.820 | And so back to that place to legally live, huge country and part of Mercosur.

01:49:34.700 | Problem with Argentina is figuring out how to deal with the current economic system can

01:49:40.300 | make certain things very cheap.

01:49:41.820 | I mean, if you go down to southern Argentina, I think you'd probably find a safe place

01:49:45.420 | to live.

01:49:46.060 | And yet it's incredibly low priced.

01:49:48.300 | And so it'd be a great place to go for to live worldwide taxation for residents.

01:49:54.940 | So Barbados consider the is guaranteed.

01:49:59.900 | Consider the path into the UK if that's important to you.

01:50:02.700 | According to Wikipedia, there's some arguments that they're proposing ending birthright

01:50:06.220 | citizenship.

01:50:07.180 | Belize.

01:50:07.740 | I don't know what to say about Belize.

01:50:11.820 | It's kind of a wacky Central American country, largely English English speaking, primarily

01:50:16.940 | black Afro Caribbean place.

01:50:20.620 | Interesting place, interesting, but not exactly the nicest of places that you might want to

01:50:25.340 | live.

01:50:25.580 | Not hard to get residency yourself in Belize.

01:50:29.340 | It's not.

01:50:29.900 | I don't think it's what I would pick.

01:50:31.660 | Bolivia comes next.

01:50:33.020 | Interesting socialist country, South America.

01:50:34.940 | I don't serve any significant benefits to choose Bolivia over some of the other options.

01:50:41.020 | Brazil is a really interesting choice.

01:50:44.940 | First class medical care, really diverse country, which is a real benefit.

01:50:50.140 | If you're black, if you're white, if you're brown, if you're red, if you're yellow, doesn't

01:50:52.940 | matter.

01:50:53.580 | There are some people of your color in Brazil.

01:50:55.820 | Huge economy.

01:50:58.460 | 200 something million people there in South America, part of Mercosur.

01:51:01.820 | Not really any negative baggage associated with the passport.

01:51:05.980 | I mean, who hates the Brazilians?

01:51:07.500 | I don't know of anybody that hates the Brazilians.

01:51:09.420 | So there are a lot of good solutions in Brazil.

01:51:12.860 | Brazil will be touted as being one of the fastest paths to citizenship for the parents.

01:51:17.340 | I warn you, it's not true.

01:51:19.020 | I researched it.

01:51:19.900 | I know what I'm talking about.

01:51:21.020 | It's not true.

01:51:22.300 | It's four years of residency, basically plan on a four year pathway.

01:51:27.740 | Heavy taxation for residents and taxation on your worldwide income.

01:51:31.900 | Very kind of socialist police state, which can be hard to take if you're more freedom

01:51:37.500 | oriented.

01:51:38.140 | They're famous for having just elected President Bolsonaro, who's supposedly right wing, but

01:51:43.500 | you're kind of got this long history of socialist police state, which is a little bit hard to

01:51:48.700 | deal with.

01:51:49.420 | But Brazil, I think, should be very high on your list for consideration.

01:51:53.100 | Just don't expect what you read about online to be true about the one year path to citizenship.

01:51:58.060 | Canada.

01:51:58.860 | Canada, I think, is a really excellent option, but it may be superfluous for an American,

01:52:05.820 | for a US American, especially if you don't think you or your children would ever renounce

01:52:10.140 | citizenship.

01:52:10.700 | For people who might renounce citizenship, I think Canada is a really great option because

01:52:15.740 | you have a powerful, powerful passport, good economy, kind of first world, very easy English

01:52:24.700 | speaking in the majority of it.

01:52:26.380 | And one of the most important things, you have very easy access to the United States.

01:52:30.380 | Canadians have a special relationship with the United States, more special than any other

01:52:33.500 | country in the world.

01:52:34.540 | Six months, fairly automatic entry into the United States.

01:52:37.580 | They don't even have to complete ESTA to pass US immigration.

01:52:41.260 | So I think Canada is a...

01:52:42.620 | Canada, that's what I always call it with a Canadian buddy of mine.

01:52:46.860 | Canada, I think, is a really strong option, but in many ways it kind of ebbs and flows

01:52:52.060 | with the United States.

01:52:53.660 | So you don't...

01:52:54.620 | I think there's more benefit if you're thinking about your child, think about South America,

01:52:58.140 | think about some economies that might grow rather than Canada.

01:53:01.740 | Chad is an option.

01:53:04.460 | I have never been to Chad, but you could consider it.

01:53:07.900 | Chile is, I think, a very powerful option for you to consider.

01:53:11.740 | Chile, the biggest...

01:53:12.940 | One of the biggest and most modern economies in South America, very much on the right path.

01:53:18.620 | Really compelling place to consider living, working, etc.

01:53:25.020 | Very much growing, unique in many, many ways.

01:53:28.300 | Beautiful.

01:53:28.940 | The cities are not inexpensive, but they're just really neat option would be Chile.

01:53:34.380 | Downside of two reasons not to consider arguments against Chile would be number one, worldwide

01:53:38.940 | taxation on residents if you trigger the residency and you'll have to if you wind up moving there.

01:53:44.620 | But Chile and passport, very good passport for your child and really, really compelling

01:53:52.380 | option.

01:53:52.700 | Another argument against Chile, however, would be that Chile right now, at least, is a fairly

01:53:58.380 | easy place for you to get a visa to live even without having a baby there.

01:54:05.260 | So it might make sense if you're interested in a residency visa for yourself, it might

01:54:09.660 | make more sense for you to consider a place where it's harder to get a residency visa.

01:54:15.900 | But you're living in Asia, so you're probably not going to go there anyway.

01:54:18.300 | Costa Rica is next.

01:54:19.980 | Costa Rica is a really interesting option.

01:54:22.300 | One of the major benefits of Costa Rica would be it's...

01:54:26.460 | No military, so you don't have to worry about your child getting drafted in some dumb war

01:54:33.580 | or something like that.

01:54:34.620 | Costa Rica has a very peaceful reputation, one of the strongest, kind of safest places

01:54:40.700 | in Central America.

01:54:41.500 | It's very convenient to the United States.

01:54:43.340 | Costa Rica is a very beautiful place.

01:54:46.780 | It makes most of its living on tourism, especially ecotourism.

01:54:50.300 | Economy is not that strong, not nearly as strong as a place like Panama, but it's not

01:54:55.900 | bad.

01:54:56.220 | And one of the great things, Costa Rica would be good if you're looking for that kind of

01:55:01.260 | small country option for your child where, "Hey, I want to be a citizen of a smaller

01:55:07.180 | country."

01:55:07.900 | Very easy to get to, first-class medical care in San Jose.

01:55:11.260 | Costa Rica is the benefit of a territorial tax system, can save you money if you wind

01:55:17.100 | up living there and give you a residency visa.

01:55:20.140 | So I think Costa Rica is an interesting option.

01:55:21.820 | It's not going to give your child access to a big market or to a big job market or a big

01:55:29.020 | place to live.

01:55:31.100 | It's a small country.

01:55:32.380 | Dominica, island down in the Caribbean, interesting.

01:55:36.220 | Dominica is interesting because it also provides an economic citizenship, citizenship by

01:55:40.860 | investment program, but I'm not too familiar on the details of that.

01:55:45.260 | Ecuador, don't have anything to say.

01:55:47.340 | El Salvador, don't have much to say other than murder capital of Central America right

01:55:52.860 | now.

01:55:53.260 | Doesn't mean everywhere is dangerous, but be careful.

01:55:55.660 | Now you're in Asia, so the next option I think is interesting, Fiji.

01:55:58.860 | Fiji confers citizenship on children who are born there, and I think it's worth considering

01:56:06.060 | because it might be easier for you to get to Fiji than it would be for you to get to

01:56:10.140 | El Salvador.

01:56:11.340 | The way that most of these countries work is if you apply for a residency visa after

01:56:16.860 | you have a child in that country is in order for you to maintain that residency visa, you

01:56:21.580 | need to show up semi-regularly.

01:56:23.500 | Some countries every year, with some countries every few years, depends on the country.

01:56:27.740 | Some countries every year, every few years, and then doesn't really matter.

01:56:31.260 | But a place like Fiji might have certain values and benefits, and especially if you are in

01:56:35.660 | Asia, it could be worth considering.

01:56:38.300 | I don't know much about the Fijian passport, but could be worth considering.

01:56:41.980 | Granada, don't have much to say.

01:56:44.220 | Guatemala, interesting place in Central America.

01:56:46.620 | I always think of Guatemala, it doesn't participate in CRS, which doesn't really matter for

01:56:51.900 | Americans, but for Europeans, it's kind of an interesting thing about Guatemala.

01:56:56.780 | But beautiful, mountainous country, really lovely, don't know much about the passport.

01:57:01.820 | Guyana, Honduras, Jamaica, Lesotho, don't have much to say.

01:57:07.580 | Big one next would be Mexico.

01:57:09.340 | I think Mexico is a really interesting and compelling option for you to consider.

01:57:15.660 | It's easy to get to, well not in your case from Asia, but for other American listeners,

01:57:19.420 | it's easy to get to.

01:57:20.380 | You can basically automatically get the six-month visa when you pass in.

01:57:26.300 | First-rate medical care, easy to get to in a car, really wonderful place, massive, great

01:57:32.300 | economy in many ways, depending on, of course, where you are and what you're doing.

01:57:37.420 | One of the most interesting things about Mexico, I think, is the university system.

01:57:41.820 | Mexico has government-run university systems, including even things like government-run

01:57:47.580 | medical schools.

01:57:50.780 | I spoke one time to an optometrist who did all of her advanced education, went through

01:57:58.220 | medical school, went through advanced specialty, etc., in the Mexican government schools for

01:58:03.900 | medicine and only ever paid $50 per semester for her own fees.

01:58:09.980 | It was all government-paid.

01:58:11.100 | Interesting things like that for the access to medical school.

01:58:14.780 | One of the challenges of financial planner I've always wrestled with is how do you help

01:58:19.740 | a somebody avoid the potential for $200,000 of student loan debt?

01:58:24.300 | One of the interesting solutions is go to a place, go through medical school where it's

01:58:30.060 | cheaper, and then test your way in.

01:58:31.980 | Most countries, if they have a doctor who comes from another country that doesn't have

01:58:36.860 | the accredited school system of that country or residents don't have a medical test that

01:58:40.300 | they can have.

01:58:41.100 | I'd assume, rather, if I were doing that, I'd rather go to Mexico, go through the Mexican

01:58:45.020 | government school system, build the knowledge, then test my way into somewhere else versus

01:58:49.500 | having the risk of $200,000 of medical school debt, things like that.

01:58:53.260 | But Mexico is an interesting option.

01:58:55.180 | You could do that, of course, if you're an American in and of itself.

01:58:57.260 | Nicaragua, I don't really have anything good to say about Nicaragua.

01:59:00.860 | Your mileage may vary.

01:59:02.700 | Pakistan, I don't see any benefit of having a baby in Pakistan.

01:59:06.940 | Panama, I see benefit of having a baby there, but I would say, why bother when there are

01:59:11.900 | better places?

01:59:13.340 | Paraguay, I think, is really interesting.

01:59:15.420 | Paraguay is a place that you can have a baby and the baby is automatically Paraguayan.

01:59:20.780 | Paraguay is part of Mercosur, so that gives you relatively easy access to other countries

01:59:27.260 | in the Mercosur agreement, including Brazil, Argentina, etc.

01:59:31.740 | And Paraguay has kind of a reputation for having fairly lax residency requirements for

01:59:38.140 | people who get a Paraguayan residency visa.

01:59:41.260 | And so having a baby in Paraguay could be interesting, and then getting a Paraguayan

01:59:46.060 | residency visa could also be interesting.

01:59:48.940 | The trick here is I don't know of a benefit of having the baby in Paraguay that couldn't

01:59:53.260 | be had by simply taking the one month old there and applying for the Paraguayan residency

01:59:58.460 | visa.

01:59:58.780 | So why not have the baby in Brazil or Argentina or Uruguay and then go to Paraguay and get

02:00:04.540 | your residency stuff in order?

02:00:06.220 | Peru is, I think, really interesting.

02:00:09.180 | In my opinion, the most interesting thing about Peru is the visa-free access to Russia.

02:00:14.780 | Russia is an interesting and difficult place to get into, but if you're interested in doing

02:00:19.820 | business in Russia, you can, of course, apply for visas.

02:00:22.860 | But Peru has some more unique relationships that you don't get with other places.

02:00:29.500 | So consider Peru.

02:00:31.500 | I don't love it, but it's worth your consideration if Russia is something interesting to you.

02:00:38.460 | St. Kitts and Nevis, another Caribbean program, research that.

02:00:43.580 | You can get citizenship by investment.

02:00:45.260 | St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Tanzania.

02:00:48.700 | Tanzania is worth considering.

02:00:51.820 | I don't know much about it.

02:00:52.620 | Trinidad and Tobago, Tuvalu, already discussed.

02:00:55.660 | The United States, already discussed.

02:00:57.820 | Uruguay.

02:00:58.700 | Uruguay is a really fascinating little country there in South America with a very European

02:01:07.340 | kind of cosmopolitan flair, which is different than other places.

02:01:10.540 | Uruguay is not a hard place to get visas to, though, in and of yourself.

02:01:14.060 | So I'm not sure it'd be number one.

02:01:15.580 | And Venezuela, don't go to Venezuela right now.

02:01:18.780 | It's not worth the risk.

02:01:20.220 | Do consider the list of restricted, just solely countries to see if any of those pique your

02:01:25.260 | interest.

02:01:25.500 | But I'll give you just a few ones for you to consider.

02:01:28.220 | I think number one would be Mexico, Canada, Brazil, Chile,

02:01:36.700 | and Argentina.

02:01:40.300 | Those, I think, would be five that, if I were in your shoes, would be at the top of my list.

02:01:45.980 | Different benefits of each one, but I think those five would be at the top of my list.

02:01:51.180 | Given what you've said about your situation, I think that since you're already living in

02:01:56.380 | Asia, most likely just choose a place where you'll go, you'll have the baby, and then

02:02:02.380 | you'll plan to leave again.

02:02:04.220 | And you probably won't bother with applying for residency yourself, unless I'm wrong.

02:02:09.420 | Consider, do some research on those options that are available closer to you, especially

02:02:14.140 | in places like Fiji.

02:02:15.340 | And I would just say, do some research and see if you can find anything that, if you

02:02:20.620 | did get something like residency in a different place, having a baby there that would help

02:02:25.580 | you.

02:02:25.900 | I don't know about that with the Asian countries, but just do some thinking to see if there's

02:02:30.860 | a way of having the baby there as a resident.

02:02:35.180 | I was just reviewing the list here of restricted countries, just solely countries, thinking

02:02:41.580 | about if I were living in Asia.

02:02:43.660 | A couple things stand out to me.

02:02:44.860 | Malaysia, according to Wikipedia, Malaysia indicates a person born in Malaysia with at

02:02:50.860 | least one parent being a Malaysian citizen or permanent resident is automatically a Malaysian

02:02:56.460 | citizen.

02:02:56.940 | So that could be interesting.

02:02:58.220 | It might be possible for you to get your Malaysian permanent residency in some number of months.

02:03:04.380 | I don't know.

02:03:04.780 | You would have to dig into that.

02:03:06.300 | And possibly having the baby in Malaysia could result in the baby being a Malaysian citizen.

02:03:10.700 | Another option might be New Zealand.

02:03:14.780 | A little, New Zealand's not close to anything.

02:03:16.780 | A person born in New Zealand acquires New Zealand citizenship by birth only if one parent

02:03:23.980 | was a New Zealand citizen or permanent resident.

02:03:26.620 | So, and that includes Australian citizens and permanent residents.

02:03:30.380 | So maybe there might be an opportunity that you could get New Zealand or Australian residency

02:03:36.620 | quick enough to do something in New Zealand.

02:03:40.220 | Other than that, I'm just not sure any specific solution.

02:03:45.820 | Cambodia, in 1996, Cambodia changed the law to grant citizenship to children born to foreign

02:03:51.500 | parents living legally in the Kingdom of Cambodia.

02:03:54.380 | Might be a solution depending on where you are in Asia.

02:03:57.500 | Bahrain, I think is interesting.

02:04:00.140 | The Gulf States, a lot of possibilities.

02:04:04.780 | Children born to a foreign father with valid residency permits who himself was born in

02:04:08.780 | Bahrain have right to citizenship.

02:04:10.060 | So that won't work with you unless you happen to have been born in Bahrain.

02:04:15.100 | So perhaps a strategy is in order.

02:04:17.500 | If this is your first baby and you don't have a residency, go to one of those countries

02:04:22.220 | and then make sure that you're a permanent resident of Australia or New Zealand or something

02:04:26.300 | like that before your next baby.

02:04:27.820 | All right, that's it.

02:04:28.460 | I obviously didn't do it in 20 minutes.

02:04:31.580 | It took me more like 45, but I hope it was useful to you.

02:04:33.980 | I love this topic.

02:04:35.820 | I have, again, wanted to do a whole course on it.

02:04:38.620 | We've just scratched the tip of the iceberg of some of what my notes are.

02:04:41.260 | I've kept a few things private and of course I've not shared with you what I've done.

02:04:44.300 | I'll just say this.

02:04:44.940 | I've done it.

02:04:45.580 | It's very doable.

02:04:46.540 | You know, our newest, my son has a passport from the country that we're living in now.

02:04:53.020 | So, you know, right here on my desk, it's possible.

02:04:56.940 | He's got two passports.

02:04:57.820 | I could go.

02:04:58.620 | The process with the United States is fairly simple.

02:05:00.860 | You'll go and register.

02:05:01.660 | If you're going to give him US citizenship, which is an interesting question whether you

02:05:04.940 | should or not, you're going to give him US citizenship.

02:05:09.100 | You go and file a consular report of birth abroad, follow the systems with your local

02:05:13.100 | embassy.

02:05:13.660 | You can get an American passport and an American.

02:05:16.060 | So your child will have a birth certificate from the country of their birth and also a

02:05:22.380 | consular report of birth abroad designating that child and American citizen.

02:05:26.140 | One interesting thing.

02:05:27.180 | Let me, I said, I love this stuff.

02:05:29.660 | So here's one more interesting thing to consider.

02:05:32.140 | I think there is a real benefit for internationally minded Americans to have their baby outside

02:05:40.940 | of the United States.

02:05:42.140 | One of the benefits, which is minor, I admit it's minor, but it's not insignificant.

02:05:47.420 | One of the benefits is that the United States is not listed as a place of birth on their

02:05:52.540 | passports with almost any passport from almost any place in the world, at least that I'm

02:05:57.260 | aware of your place of birth is going to be listed on that passport.

02:06:01.740 | So even if you're, you're Australian, but the Australian is born in the United States,

02:06:06.300 | it's going to say USA.

02:06:07.820 | And what happens is that can make your financial life very difficult due to the coercion that

02:06:14.220 | the United States foists upon the rest of the world financially with especially the

02:06:18.940 | FATCA legislation in the last decade.

02:06:20.780 | If your child goes to a bank and presents a passport, even if the passport is Australian

02:06:27.180 | and Australian's back because they're big government too, but let's say your child is

02:06:30.220 | Cambodian and you go to Hong Kong and you want to open a bank account.

02:06:33.180 | If your child has a Cambodian passport, but it says place of birth, Florida, USA, they're

02:06:39.420 | automatically going to be understood to be a US citizen subject to FATCA.

02:06:43.820 | Because, and that's considered to be an indicia, an indication of US citizenship.

02:06:48.940 | And so in order to, if the bank doesn't do business with US Americans in a situation

02:06:52.700 | like that, your child will have to produce a document industry indicating that they've

02:06:58.540 | renounced US citizenship to be able to bank with that, with that place.

02:07:02.860 | So there's an actually an interesting debate among expats about whether they should even

02:07:08.300 | register their children as US citizens at the time of their birth or not.

02:07:13.900 | If you go and you have your baby in Chile, right?

02:07:19.340 | You go to Chile, you have your baby in Chile, your baby have a Chilean birth certificate

02:07:26.220 | and you get your baby, a Chilean passport right away.

02:07:29.100 | And then you can travel the world with that baby as a Chilean, and you never actually

02:07:33.100 | have to register that baby as a US citizen.

02:07:37.260 | And then your child could decide later if they wanted to register as a US citizen or

02:07:42.300 | not.

02:07:43.020 | So you can keep the option open to your child to be a US citizen.

02:07:46.780 | So they go to school in the United States or, or easily travel to the United States

02:07:50.540 | without a visa or work in the United States, take advantage of the economy, things like

02:07:54.540 | that.

02:07:55.100 | But you don't have to subject them to the burden of US citizenship right away.

02:07:58.540 | They could wait for many, many years.

02:08:00.540 | Now, most Americans would just kind of automatically register their child, but you should

02:08:05.020 | know that there's actually a really interesting argument against that.

02:08:07.820 | And I've thought a lot about that, that there's a decent argument to be said for not even

02:08:11.740 | registering your child.

02:08:12.940 | It's an option if they want to move to the United States in the future, you have to keep

02:08:15.900 | all the documentation to prove citizenship because your, your, your, your child will

02:08:19.820 | automatically inherit American citizenship based upon having two American parents.

02:08:24.300 | And there are some laws about one American parent and the amount of time in the United

02:08:28.060 | States, but it's fairly simple.

02:08:28.940 | You can look it up on the consulate website.

02:08:30.860 | So consider that.

02:08:32.140 | But I think that's all I have to say on that subject.

02:08:34.060 | Hope you enjoyed the Q&A show.

02:08:35.820 | That is the kind of Q&A show that I like doing.

02:08:37.980 | It's the kind of diversity of questions that I find to be really fun.

02:08:41.500 | And so I hope that you have enjoyed it as well.

02:08:43.900 | I'm always careful with making forward-looking statements on the show, but ideally I should

02:08:49.900 | be able to be able to do these Q&A shows fairly regularly going forward.

02:08:56.140 | So I would encourage you come on by patreon.com/radicalpersonalfinance, sign up as a patron so that you can join me

02:09:02.140 | on the next Q&A show.

02:09:03.180 | And I'll do my best to help you live a rich and meaningful life now while building a plan

02:09:07.980 | for financial freedom in 10 years or less.

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02:09:39.180 | (upbeat music)

RPF0648-Friday_QA-Sell_Crypto_to_Pay_Debt_Adjust_Investments_for_Economic_Uncertainty_Adjusting_Finances_for_Divorce_Birth_Tourism_Living_Abroad_Etc