Posted on 12/31/2016 12:27:51 PM PST by WilliamIII
“The taxes, definitely. Russia has inflicted the dreaded 13% Flat Tax on its hapless citizens. Such repression is simply inhuman!”
For some reason you fail to mention that while the Russian government imposes a low tax rate, the government owns the major industry.
That’s Communism.
That’s their problem.
You can drive a Lada.
They are only 25% owned by the Russian government.
Yet, another example of Putin-Russian Communism.
Russia has the same Life Expectancy as Gabon. It is a failed system.
And one of the highest abortion rates in the world.
Yes and I remember communism ending in Russia. The cold war is over. Well, it might live in in minds like yours.
FRiend, you might want to get that word to the KGB filth running Russia who famously said and I quote: “the collapse of the Soviet Union was a major geopolitical disaster of the century”.
Forbes is not accurate.
The world’s most wealthy do not disclose their wealth to anyone.
There are Chinese families in special mountain ranges and there are temples in India with gatekeepers, both having assets in the trillions. However, monetizing the assets is most difficult.
Russia also has the world’s largest inventory of diamonds, and they are very good ones. They could easily put De Beers out of business., and themselves in the process. The problem is that dumping diamonds on the market would tank the market. Because De Beers and Russia control the market and the market is built on psychology, Russia has agreed to sell their diamonds to De Beers and no one else except for small black market activity which gets away from them.
Monetizing wealth is subject to market psychology and supply magnitude. Forbes not only is inaccurate with respect who to holds or controls the most liquidity, they are also in the dark about who holds or controls the most valuable assets.
Saudi Prince Alwaleed for example, owns and controls many times more than a few trillion in oil and gold. Saudi Arabs are obsessed with gold and they do not disclose how much they hold or where it’s held. Forbes may attach a wealth number to this Prince but they don’t know what is real.
Forbes publishes ‘the world’s richest persons’ because it sells. People are curious. So people learn about Gates, Slim, Buffett, Cuban, Zuckerberg and a few foreigners. People want to look at their pictures and read about where they are, how they live, etc. because it feeds people’s curiosity about how the wealthy live. It matters not if the list is accurate. To keep it interesting they will add a new billioinaire here and there.
Prince Charles’s crown office is known to have a special license through an esoteric system in Luxembourg that opens more than 1800 financial credit accounts worldwide and the credit is based on assets, both liquid and illiquid. The value of all those accounts is said to be in the trillions.
Like Prince Charles, the Bush family is said to have the special Luxembourg credit accounts in the trillions with the trading arm centered in the Evergreen Trading firm.
I know all this from contacts in Switzerland and a few other places, contacts that own their own 757s, have homes all around the world, and more businesses than they can keep up with. No one will ever know how wealthy they are except their accountants and they have many of those and they don’t communicate to each other. So no one person or firm knows the full magnitude of the wealth.
Actually they do. But what's worse, their own citizens are illegals. That's right! Because for a Russian to travel around Russia they need an INTERNAL passport - and special permission from the government to live in desirable places like Moscow. As a result, millions of Russians live secretly as illegals - in their own country! Vladimir Putin is not our friend.
Your view is not held by several Russians who became US citizens, Army officers, etc. One became an O-6. Yes, Moscow has been and probably still is highly controlled by KGB. What about the Pentagon, and all the military bases and Forts around DC. Russia damn sure does not have all the Muslims we have now, add Hispanics from Mexico, central America, and south America who have just walked into the USA. Try walking into Russia. No I am no fan of commies. I damn sure want this country’s citizenry back to what it looked like in 66 and earlier.
Your view is not held by several Russians who became US citizens, Army officers, etc. One became an O-6. Yes, Moscow has been and probably still is highly controlled by KGB. What about the Pentagon, and all the military bases and Forts around DC. Russia damn sure does not have all the Muslims we have now, add Hispanics from Mexico, central America, and south America who have just walked into the USA. Try walking into Russia. No I am no fan of commies. I damn sure want this country’s citizenry back to what it looked like in 66 and earlier.
“Russia damn sure does not have all the Muslims we have now...”
Let’s see.
In Russia 6.5% of the population is Muslim.
In the United States 1% of the population is Muslim.
I thought that most were the old Genghis Khan type Muslim and consider them different then the regular Arabs. Maybe not. Obama is importing a Muslim every 33 seconds according to the news here. Perhaps they (Genghis Khan) types are like the others. I seem to recall Russia had a problem in a school with Muslims taking over the school full of kids. I have not heard of anymore problems. We damn sure cannot say that.
Yes. I am on FR here. LinkedIn, however, has been blocked.
I would say that in gereral the women are attractive. Most of the women I’ve seen in Eastern Europe (Russia, Ukraine and Hungary) are very attractive.
“I seem to recall Russia had a problem in a school with Muslims taking over the school full of kids. I have not heard of anymore problems. We damn sure cannot say that.”
How about the bombing Metrojet Flight 9268?
Life Expectancy in Russia
www.worldlifeexpectancy.com/russia-life-expectancy
According to the latest WHO data published in 2015 life expectancy in Russia is: Male 64.7, female 76.3.
Well maybe if the men would put down the vodka bottle they would be around longer.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jan/31/russian-men-losing-years-to-vodka
Russian men who down large amounts of vodka have an “extraordinarily” high risk of an early death, a new study says.
Researchers tracked about 151,000 adult men ...from 1999 to 2010. They interviewed them about their drinking habits and, when about 8,000 later died, followed up to monitor their causes of death.
The risk of dying before age 55 for those who said they drank three or more half-litre bottles of vodka a week was a shocking 35%.
Overall, a quarter of Russian men die before reaching 55, compared with 7% of men in the UK and about 10% in the United States. The life expectancy for men in Russia is 64 years, placing it among the lowest 50 countries in the world in that category.
And there lies your answer- and let it be a warning to us all.
http://www.worldlifeexpectancy.com/usa/life-expectancy-by-county
A cool map of life expectancy by gender, race, diseases, other cause, etc.
Very revealing.
Russia doesn’t have all the Muslims that the US has? No, they have a lot more. Large parts of Russia are predominately Muslim. Have you ever heard of Chechnya? I don’t get this pro Russia fetish- it’s toolish.
Their economy is tied to oil. So year to year trends are not as important as longer periods that include a a full cycle in oil prices.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.