From: Vuko Brigljevic < >
Date: Wed, 22 May 2002 19:33:40 +0200
X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.76 [en] (X11; U; Linux 2.2.14-5.0 i686)

Hi Marc,

Marc Audard wrote:
>
> I've got a J-1 visa to come to the States. I am unclear whether there
> are requirements (IRS,INS,University, etc) on whether I must take my
> papers to the USA or if I can keep it in Switzerland. Probably it's
> easier to have the papers in the USA, but are there people with some
> experience?

If you're being paid by a US institution while in the US,
my advice is to take your papers to the US, i.e. officially
to leave Switzerland and to register with the swiss embassy
in the US. You'll pay taxes in the US and not in Switzerland
(but for the military one).

As far as I know (and I have been on a J-1 for the last 3 years
myself), US authorities (IRS, INS,...) don't really care where
you have your papers (in the swiss meaning of the term), i.e.
whether you still officially live in Switzerland or register
with the swiss embassy in the US. For them you do stay officially
a permanent resident of Switzerland and I think you may need
to be able to give an address over there (may be your parents
house) but nobody's requiring you to keep your papers in
Switzerland. And you'll probably have to pay taxes in the
US both ways if you're actually living there, even as
a non permanent resident (may be different if you're not
being paid by a US source but somebody else may comment).

However, I think that most of us (it's what I did anyway)
moved our residence away from Switzerland for the swiss
authorities and registered at the swiss embassies/consulates
in the US. If you do keep your papers in Switzerland, you'll
have more trouble figuring out how not to pay taxes at both
places, so in principle I don't see any reason for keeping
your papers in Switzerland.

I did think more than once nevertheless that the situation
is a bit funny: for the US government we (people with J-1 visa
who did not keep their papers in Switzerland) are officially
permanent residents of Switzerland while we are abroad swiss
citizen for the swiss authorities. Go figure...

Worked out well for me anyway.

Vuko

-- 
========================================================================
 Vuko Brigljevic                        | Mail : SLAC, Mail Stop 35
 Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory |        P.O. Box 20450
 Nuclear and Particle Physics Division  |        Stanford, CA 94309
(USA)
                                        | SLAC-Office : B48- room 229
 Member of the BaBar Collaboration      | Phone : +1-650-926 8512
 <
>          <http://www.slac.stanford.edu/~vuko>  
========================================================================
=================================================================
To unsubscribe from the swiss-list mailing list send the
message body of "unsubscribe swiss-list" to majordomo_at_swiss-list.com
or visit http://www.swiss-list.com/mailing/