Do other countries care if I paid taxes to my own country for visa purposes?

Upvote:2

If country X requires you to provide tax statement, they make it not because they care if you do pay taxes in your country of residence, but to find out, if you have economic bounds with your country of residence and a stable income.

Tourists are welcome because they bring money to the country. However, tourists that are likely to look for illegal work and overstay their visas are not welcome.

Not paying your taxes because you actively avoid paying them is even worse. No country want foreign criminals on their territory.

Upvote:4

There are quite a few scenarios I see where you would not pay taxes to your country of citizenship:

  • You are resident in another country, where you pay taxes.
  • You live in a country with no income tax.
  • You have very low income, which makes you not an attractive proposition for many types of visas (but not all, e.g. student visas).
  • You fail to declare your income or pay your taxes, which may make you a felon or criminal, probably not someone they want.

And probably quite a few more. Some are quite legitimate, others much less, so there definitely can’t be a hard rule about it.

Also, in many cases the people reviewing your application will not have access to that information, though in others they will (because you justify your income by providing tax returns, or because you provide payslips which include at least part of that information in countries with pay-as-you-earn). Again, no hard rule there.

So there’s really no clear cut answer. It depends on your specific circumstances, why you don’t pay taxes, what visa you may be applying for, what evidence you provide, the country of destination, your country of origin…

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