h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Think he means you'd have to pay SA taxes. probably in addition to UK taxes.

The situation here is smilar if you spend more than 13 weeks in one tax year in the UK you have to pay UK taxes. Even if it means that you end up paying taxes in 2 countries that year.

In my line of work where we get posted overseas we try to beat that by selecting what time we fly out. typically in the early part of the year.

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I'm trying to understand if "paying taxes to" was to be equated to "being a citizen or resident of" as the discussion was about migrants and borders.

If you live in one country for 11 months and go to another for a month that's what many people in the UK do nowadays. It's called holidays abroad. They may be two, two week breaks but many people do it.

I think what he's trying to say is that many Zimbabweans live 11 months of the year and work in SA. Yet the migration figures in the CIA report shows Zimbabwe with very low migration rates.

So he's saying the migration figures are a bit suspect.

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Ok, I follow now. Thanks.
The countries with the highest rates of refugees (as opposed to migrants) are often among the poorest as they are next to the poor countries where conflict is going on.

How's this for economic opportunism:
Zimbabwe has no petrol worth talking about - except goverment vehicles. Enterprising empoverished entrepreneur in Zim borrows a car and just enough petrol to get over the border into SA (where we have enough petrol) and parks it in a secure place to sleep in. He works for five days on a farm or construction site or roadside stall until he makes enough money to fill the tank and drive home over the border to Zim. Back home he sells the petrol in the tank for twice what he paid for it and pockets the difference.

He doesn't pay income tax in SA or in Zim!

I'm not sure about you but sleeping in a car for 5 days to earn the price of a tank of petrol is not that attractive to me.

Sadly I am not greatly educated in the areas of economics, politics, or indeed many of the specific academic areas you may care to mention associated with this topic. So I apologise if I say something uninformed and I hope not to fall into the merciless jaws of "Mr. X, Honorary Member of the Campaign for a Hitchhiker Smiley". Yikes.
Sorry in fact I'll come back when I'm a little more informed. Just rearing my ugly head for no appearent reason, it seems.

You don't know what a tank of petrol (if you can get it) will cost you in Zim - more than a month's wages for a labourer at the official price. The grey-market petrol price is four times that much, so effectively he is earning four months Zim-wages for one week's work in SA..!

I find it difficult to judge the actions of poor people who try to reduce their poverty without resorting to crime.

I could afford to fill my car's petrol tank any day of the week. My weekly salary (based on your estimates) could be more than a year's pay for the Zimbabwean.

I abhor Mugabe's regime and I think that the land reform should have taken place at the beginning of his "reign" rather than doing it now, brutally and as a cynical political game.

As I said before the poor people will go to where the resources are, if they can get there.

Gettind rid of boundaries is not a bad idea..why try and translate it into terms of house and home..simple example..i am a pakistani...if i want to go to india..i have to go through a lot of beurecratic crap before i can get a visa...if there were no boundaries i could just walk over to the other side....!!! life would be soooo simple! may be too simple!

What if all the Indians decided to walk over to Pakistan - wouldn't you be swamped in humanity??

Except they would never ALL go. A large number might go to Pakistan but a proportionate number of Pakistani (sorry if I spelled that wrong) would in turn move to India. So it balances out.

I thought that was supposed to have happened at the time of the separation fo India and Pakistan - seem as though it is still happening...

Ah, but this is a different generation we're talking about, and thus would logically have different opinions. So there.

Besides I don't study history enough to know about it.

India and Pakistan and Bangladesh were once without borders. They were all India. Then following a lot of bloodshed it was East and West Pakistan with India in the middle and then East and West Pakistan fought and East Pakistan became Bangladesh. (Sorry to cram such a painful time into a couple of lines but it seemed relevant).