Hacker News Reader

Comment by LeonM | Hacker News Reader

This.

In most parts of the world, $100k/year allows you to live very comfortably indeed.

Yes but the author is American So he'll always have to pay US taxes even if he moves out of the US.(I'm aware about tax treaties but in most cases they still have to pay the difference)

Most places inside the US allow you to live a comfy life with 100k/year too. No need to be in Silicon Valley.

Yes but being American he will be double taxed living outside of the US.

this is not true.

It is true depending on the country he lives in. As he's a US citizen, even if he lives overseas he needs to fill in a W-9 form to get the money from GitHub.

You can exclude the first $107.6k/year from US taxes.

https://www.irs.gov/individuals/international-taxpayers/fore...

He can spend $300/month in many parts of Europe, get good healthcare. Even with paying some taxes to support the US billionaires, he'll live a very good life. In SV for that money he'd have to climb over zombies to go get the groceries

But you can get groceries delivered here. Problem solved. :/

> Even with paying some taxes to support the US billionaires

Medicare and social security alone account for nearly half of the US fed govt spend.

Taxes do not support billionaires. The lack of them does.

Is GitHub sponsors considered as Salary though? Might have some tax breaks if that is not the case.

It may depend on what country you're in, but in the US if you're just some rando, "donations" are still taxable income. The form GitHub sends you for filling purposes is the same one used for contractors.

You only need to pay tax back to the US on your earnings > $100k/year

If the earnings are made outside of the US then he doesn't pay tax on less than 100k. The earnings are in the US so he would need to pay, he still has to fill in a W9 form as he's a US citizen.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com