# Oh goody. US becoming more like USSR **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 17, 2012, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214 "2012-05-17T15:36:38Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2012, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214/21 "2012-05-17T19:21:08Z")
> [@gamerunknown](#): > > To be fair, the USSR was anti-emigration and pro-immigration (to an extent). The U.S. would seem to be the reverse. We don’t much care if anyone not wanted by the law **leaves,** but . . . ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2012, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214/22 "2012-05-17T19:22:42Z")
> [@](#): > > I remember - when you emigrated from USSR in the 70s-80s (those that were allowed to do so) you had to leave all your possessions behind, and were barred from ever visiting again. How nice to see United States moving in the same direction. There are a few critical differences you seem to be missing. For one, you couldn’t just leave the USSR in those days, at least not if you were an ordinary citizen. So, a lot of time you were fleeing and seeking asylum in the US or the West, so your possessions were optional. Here, that’s only an issue if you are fleeing from justice (in the form of tax evasion wrt this thread). Seriously, I don’t see the issue here…nor do I see any sort of comparison between the US today and the old USSR, except that both have a ‘U’ and an ‘S’ in their name. -XT ---
**Author:** ![2sense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/2/e47774/32.png) [@2sense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/2sense)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2012, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214/23 "2012-05-17T19:31:12Z")
You wanna stop being American rather than pay your taxes and still come here? Why would we want your deadbeat ass around? Pass the law, I say. Then we wouldn’t have to wait for the AGs to step up and drum out the chiselers. (Which they haven’t been doing.) ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2012, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214/24 "2012-05-17T19:31:32Z")
> [@XT](#): > > There are a few critical differences you seem to be missing. For one, you couldn’t just leave the USSR in those days, at least not if you were an ordinary citizen. So, a lot of time you were fleeing and seeking asylum in the US or the West, so your possessions were optional. Hundreds of thousands of “ordinary citizens” did leave at the end of 70s. But you were required to leave all you owned behind. IIRC, you were allowed to take about $100 per person with you. ---
**Author:** ![Jack\_Batty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jack_batty/32/3201_2.png) [@Jack\_Batty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jack_Batty)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2012, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214/25 "2012-05-17T19:37:31Z")
Hey! Just like Saverin. Except, you know, instead of $100 it’s $4,000,000,000. The poor bastard. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2012, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214/26 "2012-05-17T19:56:05Z")
[QUOTE=Terr] Hundreds of thousands of “ordinary citizens” did leave at the end of 70s. But you were required to leave all you owned behind. IIRC, you were allowed to take about $100 per person with you. [/QUOTE] Which is merely another way to prevent or curtail people leaving, which was the whole point. Unlike this, which is simply about someone trying to have cake and eat too, tavorish (in USA cake eat you!). Again, why you seem unable to see the obvious differences is beyond me. It’s not even vaguely similar…which is why pretty much everyone in this thread is rolling their eyes here. -XT ---
**Author:** ![The\_Man\_With\_The\_Golden\_Gun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dc4da7/32.png) [@The\_Man\_With\_The\_Golden\_Gun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Man_With_The_Golden_Gun)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2012, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214/27 "2012-05-17T20:04:54Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > Hundreds of thousands of “ordinary citizens” did leave at the end of 70s. But you were required to leave all you owned behind. IIRC, you were allowed to take about $100 per person with you. I don’t really have a dog in this fight, but I’m curious what happened there. ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2012, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214/28 "2012-05-17T20:14:15Z")
> [@The\_Man\_With\_The\_Golden\_Gun](#): > > I don’t really have a dog in this fight, but I’m curious what happened there. > **[History of the Jews in Russia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_in_Russia#Emigration_to_Israel)** > > The history of the Jews in Russia and areas historically connected with it goes back at least 1,500 years. Jews in Russia have historically constituted a large religious and ethnic diaspora; the Russian Empire at one time hosted the largest population of Jews in the world. Within these territories, the primarily Ashkenazi Jewish communities of many different areas flourished and developed many of modern Judaism's most distinctive theological and cultural traditions, while also facing periods o... and > **[Jackson–Vanik amendment](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jackson%E2%80%93Vanik_amendment)** > > The Jackson–Vanik amendment to the Trade Act of 1974 is a 1974 provision in United States federal law intended to affect U.S. trade relations with countries with non-market economies (originally, countries of the Soviet Bloc) that restricted freedom of Jewish emigration and other human rights. The amendment is contained in the Trade Act of 1974 which passed both houses of the United States Congress unanimously, and was signed by President Gerald Ford into law, with the adopted amendment, on Janu... ---
**Author:** ![grude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47774/32.png) [@grude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/grude)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2012, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214/29 "2012-05-17T20:18:58Z")
Is it too much to ask they make sure this legislation only targets wealthy tax evaders? The last time they changed the law it took nearly a decade to get it cleared up that no they weren’t trying to prevent Billy $30K a year from emigrating. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Man\_With\_The\_Golden\_Gun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dc4da7/32.png) [@The\_Man\_With\_The\_Golden\_Gun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Man_With_The_Golden_Gun)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2012, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214/30 "2012-05-17T20:20:59Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > [History of the Jews in Russia - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_in_Russia#Emigration_to_Israel) > > and > > [Jackson–Vanik amendment - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jackson%E2%80%93Vanik_amendment) Pretty interesting reads. I didn’t know any of that, but I don’t know a lot about Soviet history beyond “In Soviet Russia…” jokes. 😛 Thank you, BTW. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2012, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214/31 "2012-05-17T20:24:36Z")
> [@XT](#): > > Seriously, I don’t see the issue here…nor do I see any sort of comparison between the US today and the old USSR, except that both have a ‘U’ and an ‘S’ in their name. There’s also the “of”. But you know who else had taxes? Nazi Germany. And Nazi Germany killed millions of Jews. So by the Theory of Pointing At Two Things and Claiming They’re Identical, I now proclaim that income tax is the same as genocide. ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2012, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214/32 "2012-05-17T20:28:31Z")
You know who _else_ drank water, don’t you? [del] Jesus[/del] [del]Hitler[/del] Stalin. Commies, the lot of ya! ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2012, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214/33 "2012-05-17T20:32:17Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > Hundreds of thousands of “ordinary citizens” did leave at the end of 70s. But you were required to leave all you owned behind. IIRC, you were allowed to take about $100 per person with you. IIRC, when my parents immigrated in the 1970’s, they were allowed to bring $200 and a couple of suitcases of clothing. I didn’t get the sense that this was a rare condition imposed on emigrants at the time. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2012, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214/34 "2012-05-18T01:49:20Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > Hundreds of thousands of “ordinary citizens” did leave at the end of 70s. But you were required to leave all you owned behind. IIRC, you were allowed to take about $100 per person with you. > [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > IIRC, when my parents immigrated in the 1970’s, they were allowed to bring $200 and a couple of suitcases of clothing. I didn’t get the sense that this was a rare condition imposed on emigrants at the time. Heck, by that point in the Soviet Union in the 1970s, unless one was an _aparatchik_, oneself, that was probably all most of them owned, to begin with. ---
**Author:** ![Svejk\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ea666f/32.png) [@Svejk\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Svejk_1)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2012, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214/35 "2012-05-18T03:39:28Z")
Emigrating =! renouncing citizenship. ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2012, 4:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214/36 "2012-05-18T04:06:18Z")
> [@Svejk\_1](#): > > Emigrating =! renouncing citizenship. In order to leave USSR in the 70s you had to renounce citizenship. ---
**Author:** ![Svejk\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ea666f/32.png) [@Svejk\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Svejk_1)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2012, 4:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214/37 "2012-05-18T04:15:34Z")
Sure, unless you moved somewhere within the Soviet block or were on diplomatic duty or something. Regardless, this is not the case in the US today. Plenty of Americans leave the country and build up a life somewhere else, and none of them have to renounce their citizenship. This is where the analogy fails to hold I think. ---
**Author:** ![Gleena](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/b3f665/32.png) [@Gleena](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gleena)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2012, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214/38 "2012-05-18T04:43:50Z")
> [@Svejk\_1](#): > > Sure, unless you moved somewhere within the Soviet block or were on diplomatic duty or something. Regardless, this is not the case in the US today. Plenty of Americans leave the country and build up a life somewhere else, and none of them have to renounce their citizenship. This is where the analogy fails to hold I think. Sure, and I have done so. And yet I’m required to file and pay taxes in a country I no longer live in, have no ties to and take no benefits from. Granted I have not yet hit the exemption threshold, but I could in the next few years. They even require me to list my husband’s income and he is not an American citizen at all. Soon they will even require me to list where I bank, and how much money is in the bank. I have in moments of pique considered ditching my own citizenship just so I can stop filing the damn forms. What Saverin is doing is different entirely, but I can totally see why some expats give up their citizenship for tax reasons. The comparison to the USSR is just silly, though. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2012, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214/39 "2012-05-18T04:50:41Z")
He doesn’t want to pay dues, yet he still wants to stay in the club house. No, I don’t think so. If you don’t want to be a member, why should we allow you to stay? “Hey, you renounced your citizenship, but you want to stay here? Too fucking bad.” ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2012, 5:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214/40 "2012-05-18T05:17:18Z")
In Soviet America, false equivalence creates **you!** [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-goody-us-becoming-more-like-ussr/622214.md?page=3)