Utopian Financial Infrastructure

Dual Citizenship

This chapter has two main objectives. First, it outlines the process of acquiring dual citizenship. Second, it clarifies dual citizenship by exploring the rights and responsibilities of dual citizens and their societies. Before a person can become a dual citizen, they must first be a citizen of a society. In this context, we will discuss birthright citizenship.

Overview

The concept of dual and multiple citizenship exists in present-day societies and will continue to exist in Utopian societies.

Soon after birth, the individual's first citizenship is registered when an entity record is created for an individual in the society where the individual was born. The society where the child is born accepts responsibility for the child by declaring the child a citizen. The Utopian Financial Infrastructure (that is, the UFI) creates the entity record for the child. This record creation should be viewed as "registering the fact that a citizen already exists". This is the concept of birthright citizenship.

In Utopian societies, birthright citizenship is the norm. But why? Because it would not be ideal for a society to allow circumstances to progress eventually culminating in the birth of a child, and then the society refusing the responsibility for the newborn. It is wrong for a society to deny citizenship to individuals born within its boundaries.

To understand why it is wrong, consider that a society is immensely more capable than a newborn child. So, on one hand we have a newborn child and on the other hand we have the entire society. Going one step further, imagine the society saying this to a newborn child: "We have allowed circumstances to progress leading to your birth. Happy Birthday. But, you are not one of us." If the newborn could understand, what would the newborn feel? What would you feel if you find yourself in that situation? For a society to think of such a thought is far from ideal; it is definitely not Utopian.

How does an individual acquire dual citizenship?

There is a process for a citizen of one society to acquire citizenship in another society. There are three major steps. An overview of the three distinct steps and their relationship with one another is presented in the section "Overview of Becoming a Dual Citizen". The actual three distinct steps of becoming a dual citizen are discussed in the following three sections: "Request to Create Invitation to Become Citizen", "Inviting to Become Citizen" and "Accepting Dual Citizenship".

After an individual becomes a citizen of another society, they still remain a citizen of the previous society or societies.

What does it mean to become a dual citizen? This question can be answered by considering the following kinds of questions:

  • What can dual citizens do in their parent societies?
  • What must dual citizens do for their parent societies?
  • How does the society's role change towards their citizens who are also citizens of another society?

These questions explore the mutual rights and responsibilities of the dual citizen and their parent societies.

The section "Regarding Rights and Responsibilities" discusses the generalities related to high-level categories of rights and responsibilities. Each high-level category is discussed in a separate section. These sections explore topics like voting rights, receiving wealth through wealth distribution, taxes, the ability to use the Utopian Payment Model, use of social credit and collective credit, employment, transferring assets between parent societies, etc.

Together, these sections elaborate the core meaning of dual citizenship.

Overview of Becoming a Dual Citizen

Normally, for someone to become a citizen of another society, they need to be invited by someone or some organization from the other society. Thus, an inviter from one society formally invites an invitee to become a citizen, and the society must also approve the invitation.

In the above paragraph, we said "normally" to acknowledge that there can exist not-so-normal situations in which a citizen of some society lays a claim to become a citizen of some other society. We will not discuss these situations in this book.

An inviter must request their society to extend an invitation to the invitee to become a citizen of the inviting society. If the invitee also agrees, then the society will officially accept the request to create an invite. This is discussed in the section "Request to Create Invitation to Become Citizen".

In due time, the inviting society will consider and may approve the request by issuing an invitation. Issuing an invitation based on the request means the society indicates approval of the invitee's citizenship. This is discussed in the section "Inviting to Become Citizen".

The invitee, upon receiving such an invitation, must choose to officially accept or reject the invitation within a specified amount of time. Acceptance implies applying to obtain citizenship. An acceptance of the invitation initiates the creation of an entity record and associated database for the invitee as a citizen of the inviting society. This is discussed in the section "Accepting Dual Citizenship".

Request to Create Invitation to Become Citizen

What does it mean to be a citizen of some society? It really means that one lives in that society, becomes a member of the society, enjoys the freedoms and rights in that society, and fulfills the responsibilities towards that society. There is nothing more than that.

When someone wants someone else to come and live in a society, that want should be interpreted as that someone wants that someone else to behave no differently than any other citizen in the society; that is actually be a citizen of the society.

Thus a citizen who desires that someone else from some other society should be a citizen of this society, must request the society (that is its administration) to invite the person. In requesting the society to invite someone else, the citizen must specify a reason. These reasons would not be any arbitrary reasons. In fact, these reasons would all be well anticipated and hence well categorized. Thus when we say "reason" we really are referring to a "reason category".

Based on the practices of current times, "inviting a life partner" and "inviting an immediate blood relative" are two commonly occurring reason categories. There are many others.

Here is the outline of the process to make the request to invite someone to be a citizen. There will be an inviter, an invitee, inviting society and the invitee's society.

The inviter has the desire to invite the invitee to be a citizen of their society. So, the inviter would know the invitee beforehand. The inviter discusses, with the invitee, their desire to invite the invitee. If the invitee informally agrees to such an invitation, the inviter can proceed with a formal "request to invite for citizenship", which the invitee would agree.

Here is an outline of the next few steps involving the inviter:

  • The inviter will obtain the invitee's ID as this is the only information required to initiate a request to invite.
  • The inviter will go to a "Request a Citizenship Invite" app hosted by the local UFI.
  • The inviter will press the "Request a Citizenship Invite" button on this page.
  • This will initiate the identification and authentication of the inviter. The inviter completes the authentication.
  • The inviter enters the ID of the invitee. Note that since an ID contains a society code, the inviting society can contact the invitee's society.
  • The inviter is presented with some minimal identification information about the invitee (like ID, name, date of birth, etc.) and is asked to confirm that information is as per the inviter's expectations. The inviter confirms.
  • The inviter is asked to confirm that the inviter wants to indeed "Request a Citizenship Invite for the Invitee". The inviter confirms.
  • In response to this confirmation, the inviter is sent a reference number (as a certificate) that references this "request for citizenship invitation". The reference number can be used to check on the status of the request.

This concludes the interaction of the inviter with their society's UFI.

Next, the inviting society contacts the invitee and confirms with the invitee that the invitee is indeed interested in receiving an invitation to be a citizen of the inviting society.

Once the invitee confirms, the invitee is also given the same reference number that references this "request for citizenship invitation". This enables both the inviter and invitee to check on the status of the request to invite.

This concludes the process to initiate a request to invite someone for being a citizen of the inviting society.

Inviting to Become Citizen

For most requests to "create invitation to become citizens", after a request is created, the request gets added to the end of a priority queue. Some categories of such requests can be added at the beginning of the priority queue (like a request to confer honorary citizenship on some person by the society itself).

As long as the request is in the priority queue, a decision about the request has not been taken.

Every society will have some limits (that is quotas) on the number of requests that it will process in a year. The quotas could be different for different invitation categories. Thus in the actual implementation, there will be a priority queue for each category. The amount of time that a request sits in the priority queue depends on the quota and on how many other requests are ahead of this particular request.

If the number of requests is smaller than the annual quota, the requests are picked out of the priority queue in the priority order.

If the number of requests is larger than the annual quota, then every day, the day's quota worth of requests are picked at random and processed. All other requests continue to stay in the queue till they expire after two years, that is 730 days after a request was created.

Note that the priority queue acts only like a true priority queue as long as the number of requests in this queue is less than the annual quota. Once the number of requests exceeds this quota, the queue no longer behaves like a priority queue; it becomes a random lottery. This is the intent because it is the only fair way to select requests when the demand for such requests far outstrips the quotas for such requests.

Eventually at some point in time, a request gets selected for processing. Now a decision has to be made about whether to accept or reject the request.

Every Utopian society will have a criteria for deciding whether to extend an "invitation to become citizen" to citizens of other societies. Most of this criteria would be objective, and an algorithm can take the decision. But there will also be human oversight to every decision taken by the algorithm.

In this chapter we are exploring the process of becoming a dual citizen and the nature of dual citizenship. Moreover, knowing the nature of dual citizenship would help us in choosing the criteria. So, we will not discuss the criteria in this version of this book.

The request contains both the inviter's ID and the invitee's ID. Since both the inviter and invitee have confirmed the creation of "request for invite", they both have also agreed to share their information for the purpose of processing the request. Societies would have already agreed to share this information with each other.

The request is processed by an algorithm within the inviter's society's UFI. The algorithm fetches all necessary information from the invitee's society; it already has access to the inviter's information. Based on just this information (and it will be extensive information), and the criteria, the algorithm makes a determination to accept or reject the request.

Then the application is processed by multiple but an odd number of officers specializing in this particular kind of application. Note that the minimum number of officers processing each application is three; because one is not enough. Each one of these officers independently evaluates the information, applies the criteria, and compares their decision with the algorithm's decision. For each officer, their evaluation culminates in either accepting or rejecting the algorithm's decision. The majority decision of these officers is the final decision of this process.

The decision will either be an acceptance of the request or rejection of the request. The outcome is packaged as a certificate and communicated to both the inviter and the invitee.

If the decision results in the acceptance of the request, then it generates an invitation to the invitee. This act of "extending an invitation" is as good as granting citizenship; the only thing that remains is the acceptance of the invitation.

If the majority results in the rejection of the request, both the inviter and invitee would get a status update (as a certificate) about the original request. Either one of them can request a "reevaluation" and there would be a process to do such a reevaluation and that process would again involve independent evaluation from multiple officers specializing in this kind of evaluation. We will leave the details of that process to your imagination.

If the majority decision was acceptance of the request, the invitee would have gotten an invitation (in the form of a certificate) and the invitee can go ahead and accept the invite as described in the next section. The inviter is also informed of this fact.

Accepting Dual Citizenship

When a citizen receives an invitation to become a citizen of some other society, that invitation is just a certificate. The certificate can be opened and the information within it can be accessed. One such piece of information is a link to an "Accept Citizenship Invitation" app hosted by the inviting society. This app provides a button that needs to be clicked to indicate acceptance. This button is specific to the invitation and hence contains the ID of the invitee.

When the invitee clicks this button, it takes the invitee to an app that initiates identification and authentication of the ID associated with the button and its invitation. When that completes successfully, then the app shows all details pertaining to the invitation like the invitee, reason category of the invitation, etc. and asks the citizen to review all the information. Then the app asks for a confirmation for "Accept Citizenship Invitation". This confirmation goes through the normal method for such confirmation. This confirmation is the actual acceptance by the invitee to become a citizen of the inviting society.

This confirmation is also the authorization by the invitee to their current society to share the physical identification information (that is biometrics, etc.) with the inviting society. When this information is shared, the inviting society has the means to identify the individual and hence can proceed with the creation of the entity record signifying a new citizen in their society. This sharing of identification information and creation of the entity record happens immediately.

We could call the creation of an entity record as "granting of citizenship" to the invitee. Once the record is created, the invitee is a citizen of the inviting society.

Societies communicate such "granting of citizenship" events to all known parent societies of the individual. Thus, for a person who is a citizen of more than one society, each such society knows about every other parent society of that person.

Regarding Rights and Responsibilities

Utopian societies implement ideas like wealth redistribution and Utopian Payment Model. Both these imply that a society has responsibilities towards its citizens and it fulfills these responsibilities using money. Similarly, citizens have responsibilities towards their society and a citizen fulfills them by paying taxes.

If an individual could be a citizen of multiple societies, then what would be the nature of the individual's and the societies' responsibilities? Imagine for a moment that there is a person who is a citizen of two societies. This gives rise to many questions:

Would this person pay wealth-based taxes in both societies?

Would this person get wealth redistribution from both societies?

If this person is poor and if this person needs to use the Utopian Payment Model to pay for the essentials, then would both societies share the burden? Will this burden be shared equally or unequally?

If unequally, then on what criteria? Would such an arrangement give some advantage to such individuals who possess citizenship of multiple societies?

Would any such arrangement put all other citizens, who are citizens of only one society, at a disadvantage?

In the normal course of conversation and discussion, when we say "citizen", we are referring to an individual who is a citizen of only one society. Such a citizen has all the rights of being a citizen of a society and has all the responsibilities of being a citizen of the society. On the flip side, the society also has expectations from such a citizen and the society also has responsibilities towards the citizen.

We will refer to such a citizen with the term "complete citizen". We coined the term "complete citizen" to distinguish such a citizen from a "dual citizen". This is because for an individual with more than one citizenship, the rights and responsibilities between citizen and the citizen's societies will be different from the case of a citizen of a single society.

We will introduce two more terms: "parent society" and "primary parent society". Here are their descriptions:

At birth, a person is a citizen of the society in which they are born. This society is the "primary parent society" for this person, even though the person is a citizen of only one society.

When a person is a citizen of multiple societies, each society that the citizen is a member of is called a "parent society".

After becoming a citizen of more than one society, a person can change what they regard as their primary parent society.

Most citizens will designate the society in which they normally reside as their primary parent society. Moreover, they will hold most of their wealth in this society. Both these points will be clarified in the following sections.

In Utopian societies, for a person to be a citizen of two or more parent societies, we need to do the following:

  • we need to specify the rights and responsibilities of the person in each of the parent societies.
  • we need to specify the rights and responsibilities of the parent societies in relation to the person.

That is we need to stipulate the expectations about the functioning of the following aspects in relation to the individual and the individual's parent societies:

  • Voting Rights.
  • Identification and Authentication.
  • Taxes.
  • Wealth Redistribution. Both receipts and payments.
  • Payments due to monetary policy.
  • Assistance from the Utopian Payment Model.
  • Regular and Social Employment.
  • Social Credit and Collective Credit.
  • Utopian Mortgage.
  • Transferring citizen's assets from one parent society to another parent society.

The next several sections deal with the specification of these aspects and associated rights and responsibilities.

Can a citizen of multiple societies vote in all of them? The short answer is no; they can vote in only one society.

In answering this question, we are specifying the extent of the person's decision-making authority within those societies; we are specifying the voting rights of this person.

The intuitive logic behind the answer given above is as follows: If a person is a citizen of a single society, they have just one vote in any social decision in which they participate. If the entire Earth was one single society, even then this person has a single vote. So, just because Earth has multiple societies and some of these societies are willing to confer citizenship on this person does not mean the citizen gets more than one vote.

Thus, when a citizen of a single society becomes a citizen of a second society, that event does not change their voting power. The person continues to have voting power in the original society and does not get voting power in the second society. At this point in time, it is as though the person is a primary citizen of the original society and an honorary citizen of the other society.

Utopian societies grant voting right to citizens only in their primary parent society. This is consistent with the principle of "one person one vote".

Setting policy parameters is a form of participating in the decisions of the society. Therefore, a citizen of multiple societies can only specify the policy parameters in the primary parent society.

How can a citizen of multiple societies choose where they should have the right to vote? Let's discuss.

Utopian societies allow citizens to change their minds about their primary citizenship, but not too frequently. Once a citizen changes their primary parent society, that change needs to stay put for some amount of time. What is this amount of time? It is one year.

The above choice of "one year" may seem arbitrary. Should citizens have the ability to decide this amount of time by using a policy parameter? This is a reasonable question, as we have discussed many policy parameters. But, the short answer is "No". Here are the reasons:

Since there are at least two societies, it cannot be a policy parameter within any of these societies. If it were, then the value of the policy parameter of the primary society has control over when the person can change their primary citizenship. It does not consider a different value of the policy parameter in the other society, even when the person is a citizen of that society. It is as though one society forces its will on the individual even when the individual is simultaneously a citizen of multiple societies.

We could think about using some sort of calculation (for example minimum, maximum or average) based on the value of such a policy parameter, but that just introduces an additional choice of calculation, which itself could be a policy parameter.

Attempting to make this number a policy parameter complicates implementation, and we derive no obvious benefit other than "because we can". This is a situation in which we should prefer simplicity over complexity.

We do many things at an annual frequency. Consistent with that theme, the minimum amount of time is chosen to be 1 year.

The one year limit mentioned above is from the time a previous such choice was made. That is, after every change in the primary citizenship, the person has to wait for one year before they can change it.

When a person becomes a citizen of a second society, the prior such decision was at the person's birth.

Usually, individuals obtain their second citizenship much later in life. Such individuals can choose to call the second society their primary parent society immediately after becoming its citizen.

In the chapter Logins and Transactions we mentioned that the ID of an individual is stored on their devices and they can use that ID to login. For citizens of multiple societies, when any parent society initializes that citizen's device, it stores on that device all the citizen's IDs associated with all the parent societies of the citizen.

The citizen can choose one of these IDs as their primary ID. This chosen ID is used in all interactions. This ID contains embedded information that indicates the society to which the ID belongs. Choosing an ID implies choosing the society that coordinates the citizens interactions and transactions. The chosen society's UFI is involved in identifying and authenticating that individual, and obtaining authorizations and confirmation from the individual. All subsequent transactions are paid by using the funds in the citizen's account within the chosen society.

Choosing one of the many IDs as the primary ID is not the same as choosing one of many parent societies as the primary parent society.

Since we are considering a person who is a citizen of more than one society, this person will have an identity record and an account book in each one of these societies. Thus this person can have wealth in all these societies.

Every society knows the local current wealth and local typical wealth of this citizen. Every society also knows all other societies that this citizen is a member of. Hence they know the citizen's typical wealth in each of these societies in their respective currencies. Each society can convert the value of the typical wealth of this citizen in some other society into the local currency using the currency exchange rate. Thus, every parent society knows the citizen's total typical wealth across all societies that the citizen is a member of.

We will use the concepts of local typical wealth and total typical wealth.

As a citizen of a society, the person ought to receive their share of the wealth redistribution.

If a citizen is a citizen of multiple societies, then the citizen gets a fraction of their share of wealth redistribution from each of the parent societies. We will call this fraction the claim fraction, and it is determined as follows:

claim fraction = local typical wealth / total typical wealth

Thus, if a citizen holds 100% of their wealth in a specific parent society, then the citizen's claim fraction in that society is 1. Such a citizen would get 100% of their share of wealth redistribution from that parent society.

Thus, if a citizen holds 10% of their wealth in a specific parent society, then the citizen's claim fraction in that society is 0.1. Such a citizen would get 10% of their share of wealth redistribution from that parent society.

A citizen, who is a citizen of multiple parent societies, gets a fraction of their share from each one of the parent societies. That share is deposited in the citizen's account book within that society.

When all these fractions are considered together, it is clear that the citizen receives their full share.

For citizens who are members of multiple parent societies, in each parent society, receipts from the implementation of the monetary policy will be based on the concept of claim fraction as described above.

In general, taxes are charged based on the current wealth - not the typical wealth.

As a citizen of a society, a person ought to pay their share towards wealth redistribution. This payment is solely based on the current local wealth.

As a citizen of a society, a person ought to pay their share towards wealth-based taxes. This payment is solely based on the current local wealth.

As a citizen of a society, a person ought to pay their share towards taxes associated with the implementation of the monetary policy. These taxes are also computed based on the current local wealth and are automatically included in the wealth-based taxes.

Thus, in principle and in practice, this payment is solely based on the current local wealth.

For a citizen with multiple parent societies, which parent society is responsible for assisting such a citizen with the Utopian Payment Model?

We want to ensure that a person who is a citizen of multiple societies does not get more help than a citizen of a single society would get. Here are the rules consistent with this intention:

  1. A citizen of multiple parent societies can receive assistance from the Utopian Payment Model only from their primary parent society.
  2. A citizen of multiple parent societies can receive assistance from the Utopian Payment Model only within that primary parent society.
  3. If a citizen of multiple parent societies is in a parent society other than the primary parent society, then the person is treated as a visitor to that society and hence ineligible for assistance from the Utopian Payment Model of that parent society.
  4. A citizen of multiple parent societies must use the identity of their primary parent society when seeking assistance from the Utopian Payment Model.

How much assistance can a citizen of multiple societies expect from the Utopian Payment Model in their primary parent society?

Normally, for the Utopian Payment Model, the amount of assistance is based on the person's typical wealth. In the case of a citizen who is a citizen of multiple societies, the person's total typical wealth is used as the basis for computing the monetary help that the Utopian Payment Model would consider providing.

Specifically, this computation is not based on the citizen's local typical wealth. This computation determines the assistance the individual would have received if they had all their wealth in a single society.

The actual help that such citizens receive from the Utopian Payment Model is proportional to their claim fraction within their primary parent society. Note that the claim fraction was discussed in the "Receiving Wealth Related" section.

Thus, if a citizen holds 100% of their wealth in the primary parent society, then the citizen's claim fraction in that society is 1, and hence they would get 100% of the assistance that the Utopian Payment Model would have provided.

Thus, if a citizen holds 10% of their wealth in the primary parent society, then the citizen's claim fraction in that society is 0.1, and hence they would get 10% of the assistance that the Utopian Payment Model would have provided.

Note that social credit is given only when a citizen has no money in their money account and the specific transaction is eligible for social credit.

Dual citizenship has no impact on getting social credit. If a citizen is eligible for social credit, they will receive it regardless of the other societies they belong to.

How is social credit repaid? In short, social credit must be repaid using all the wealth that the citizen possesses in all parent societies. Further, all parent societies cooperate and coordinate to ensure that social credit is repaid.

Recovering money given as social credit from citizens of multiple societies is complicated by the possibility that a substantial portion of a citizen's total current wealth may reside in another parent society. We will describe the details in a future version of this book.

Since collective credit is backed by collateral within that society, it works exactly as it does for a citizen of a single society. The collective credit given by a society to a dual citizen is based on the citizen's local wealth in that society, not on their total wealth across all parent societies.

A citizen's collective credit from one society is not related to their collective credit in another society.

For a transaction, a citizen can avail themselves of collective credit from the society whose identity they use to initiate, authenticate, and authorize the transaction.

When discussing collective credit, we also discussed lending for the purpose of collective credit. How do you think this lending works for individuals who are citizens of multiple societies?

A citizen of multiple societies can seek regular employment in any parent society but in no other society.

A citizen of multiple societies can seek social employment only in their primary parent society.

There are two major implications of these two rules. We will discuss them next.

The first implication of the above two rules is as follows: Any visit to another Utopian society for work or business purposes is still classified as "visit". Its reason is "work" rather than "tourism" or "meet family" or "meet friends", etc. The additional information that goes with the reason will encapsulate the nature of work.

When a visitor is traveling from a foreign society to our society, for work purposes, as an employee of some organization located in that foreign society, that employment status does not change.

Some examples of such work related visits are: attending conferences, consulting, visiting customers, visiting vendors, etc. These kinds of activities can happen in Utopian societies.

Work related visits will be on par with all visits for all other reasons. That is, the maximum permitted duration is the same regardless of the reason for the visit. After all, they are just visits - not a temporary or semi-permanent change of residence.

We could not discuss work related kind of visits when discussing visas and international travel, because of the above two rules were not yet presented.

The second implication of the two rules above is that Utopian societies do not subscribe to the current practice of "importing temporary workers".

In present-day societies, these "temporary workers" working in another society reside there for the duration of their employment. Usually this period of time is several years. While residing there, they pay all kinds of taxes. However, unlike citizens, they do not obtain long term benefits of those taxes. This is a subtle form of exploitation; it is not ideal.

Utopian societies regard education as either an essential or a common good. Consequently they support their own citizens in acquiring the skills needed to perform work within the society, thereby reducing the need for "importing temporary workers".

Utopian societies have a Social Employment Policy that ensures anyone willing to work can actually work and be paid. This ensures maximal participation of their own citizens in employment; thereby reducing the need for "importing temporary workers".

Utopian societies allow the import of goods and services from other societies, and there are no restrictions for such imports. The import of goods and services are paid using fiat currency. This makes such imports harmless from a monetary perspective. With the monetary harm eliminated, imports can happen on a larger scale. This reduces the need for "importing temporary workers".

Utopian societies allow short-term work related visits. These visits are limited in their duration, and the duration is on par with any other reason for visits; and they are merely visits - not in the same category as "come here, live here, and work here". This reduces the need for "importing temporary workers".

All these measures combined, successfully eliminate the need for "importing temporary workers" that we see in present-day societies.

If a rare need arises, Utopian societies can invite highly skilled individuals to become citizens. It is an invitation for citizenship - not merely a work permit. This enables these individuals to reside and work within the society; but it is their choice. If they do so, they also enjoy the long term benefits of being a citizen of the society.

A citizen of multiple societies can buy a residence using the Utopian Mortgage only in the society of their primary citizenship, and only if the citizen has not used a Utopian Mortgage in any other parent society.

There is no need to stipulate requirements for the fraction of total wealth that such a citizen must have in their primary society. Why? Because the requirements for obtaining a Utopian Mortgage have adequate safeguards. Thus the citizen's claim fraction plays no role in deciding whether a citizen can obtain a Utopian Mortgage.

Money and Asset Transfer to Self

For a person who is the citizen of two societies, the person can transfer money to oneself from the money account in one society to their own money account in another society.

Everything we said about money transfer continues to hold true except that we will eliminate the yearly upper limit to such money transfer when the transfer is to oneself from one society to another society.

Note that such unlimited money transfer to self across society boundaries does not significantly alter the assistance that the person is eligible to get as per the Utopian Payment Model. Why? Because the assistance is based on claim fraction, which in turn depends on both the total typical wealth and local typical wealth, and typical wealth does not change rapidly.

In the "Money Transfer: Part 2" chapter, we discussed the transfer of physical assets within a society, and also across society boundaries. We discussed that it is allowed, and also discussed the upper limits on such transfers.

How should we think about a transfer of assets to oneself across society boundaries? That is, for a person with citizenship of multiple societies, what should and should not be allowed for transfer of assets (both money and physical) to oneself between the person's two parent societies? What are the limits for this special case?

Here is a brief point-wise description of what is and what is not allowed, along with their limits and reasons:

  • Any amount of personal belongings with one limit
    • A lifetime limit on the value of valuable commodities component in those personal belongings.
    • The lifetime limit is the average wealth of citizens in the source society.
    • No limit in the destination society.
  • Any amount of real estate that does not have liabilities attached to the real estate.
    • For example a residence purchased using a Utopian Mortgage cannot be transferred across society boundary.
  • In general, zero amount of anything else with a few exceptions.
    • See points below for the exceptions and reasons on specific items.
  • Zero amount for ownership shares in privately owned organizations
    • This is to prevent such transfer of assets across society boundary.
  • Zero amount for ownership shares in publicly owned organization.
    • This is not intended to prevent ownership of publicly owned organization across society boundary by the citizen.
    • This is intended to not put the burden of coordinating such a transfer on the two UFIs when a proper mechanism for international investment exists.
  • Zero amount of gold (in physical or ETF form) with one exception
    • Reason: Gold in a society should remain there.
    • If a citizen intends to posses gold in another society, he can sell gold in one society, transfer money to the other society, and buy gold in the other society.
    • Exception is gold in personal belonging (like jewelry).
      • Jewelry is classified as a personal belonging.
      • Jewelry is a manufactured product and it needs to contain the dollar amount of valuable commodities in it.
      • And there is a lifetime limit to the amount of valuable commodities (as component of personal belonging) that can be transferred to oneself across society boundary.
  • Zero amount of valuable commodities with one exception
    • Reason: Valuable commodities in one society should remain there.
    • If a citizen intends to posses some valuable commodity in another society, he can sell it in one, transfer money, and buy it in another.
    • Exception is for these other valuable commodities in personal belonging (like jewelry)

Additional Comments

Readers should enjoy exploring the nuances of dual citizenship while discussing these concepts with their peers. Here are some questions to start such discussions:

What happens if a newborn is born to parents that together are citizens of multiple societies?

What happens if a parent acquires dual citizenship after the child is born? Does the child automatically acquire that citizenship?

What are the rights and responsibilities of children who are dual citizens?

For children who possess multiple citizenships, which society is the primary parent society?

Can a dual citizen give up one of their citizenships? Why would it be done?

One of the perks of being a citizen of multiple societies is that when the citizen is in any one of their parent societies, one is not a foreigner there, as long as one uses that society's ID. Therefore, there are no import duties for any of the purchases there.

When discussing the Utopian Payment Model with respect to dual citizens, we introduced the concept of "claim fraction". The presence of claim fraction nudges the individual to transfer all their wealth to a single society without explicitly mandating it.

For dual citizens, can we implement Utopian Payment Model which gives such citizens full support that is indicated by their total wealth? Would that be more complex than what we described?