Please find below a very interesting article from Switzerland which a frequent contributor to the site, Skay, has found. I have reposted this here on the main page to increase the visibility of this article.
Skay says (from a post on the relinquishment thread):
If you can read French, a good article just appeared today in today’s Swiss Hebdo entitled “Hounded Americans are giving up their passports.”
In it, the Director of the Swiss-American Chamber of Commerce says, “Double nationals who have no real need of their American passport are well advised to give it up, because it has become too onerous to keep it.”
What a shame this all is. Bad on you USA! You’re only shooting yourself in the foot in the long term.
If you google the title you can then ask Google to translate the article: Pourchassés, des américains rendent leur passeport
BANKS
Hunted, Americans make their passport
By Cyril Jost – Posted on 08.02.2012 at 11:02
DISCLAIMERS. To track down tax evaders, Washington has established a bureaucratic war machine. The point of disgust many of its citizens living abroad.
Denise * is exasperated. As an American married to a Swiss and in the Canton of Vaud, this bi is ready to make his American passport. “My son has done, because he has just founded his business here and had to complete a string of forms each year to the IRS (Internal Revenue Service, ed), then he has never lived in the States United. My husband must declare all accounts and all assets in Washington, as he is Swiss and pays taxes here. This becomes unlivable. ”
The subject is talking in circles American expats. “There are three or four years, renounce his citizenship was considered unpatriotic and taboo, but today, everybody talks about it, observes Jackie Bugnion, member of American Citizens Abroad association, whose world headquarters is in Geneva. The pressure builds and greatly disturbs my fellow citizens living abroad. In Switzerland, banks no longer want U.S. customers: we have become toxic. ”
At the U.S. Embassy in Bern, the subject of waivers, as it is referred to in bureaucratic jargon, is known. The spokesman, Alex Daniels, gives no figure but confirmed that he had to reallocate resources in recent months to deal with the upsurge of such requests. “In most places in the world, people are literally willing to die to become U.S. citizens, then we take these requests very seriously,” he says. The procedure, tedious, takes about two months and costs about 450 U.S. dollars. As for binational who feel unfairly harassed by the IRS, the spokesman simply recalls the principle – almost unique – that the United States applies: “Any American citizen must pay taxes in the U.S. regardless of place of residence. ”
UBS’s fault. What may look like an efficient principle for tracking down fraudsters is transformed in recent years, in a real trap for thousands of American citizens who consider themselves to be perfectly honest. “For decades, many Americans living abroad do not take the trouble of filling in the forms of the U.S. Government. It requires the assistance of a professional to do – which costs about 2,000 francs a year – and in most cases, no tax is due, under the treaties of double taxation, “says Jackie Bugnion. But there are exceptions, such as capital gains, which remain in any case be taxed by the IRS, where a certain gray area in which many Americans find themselves today.
The UBS case and delivery of 4,450 client names to U.S. courts in 2009 was a turning point. Since then, Washington has launched three successive programs of voluntary disclosure (voluntary disclosure), to encourage holders of undeclared assets to denounce, with a fine. Some 33,000 people – for fear of being suddenly discovered – have denounced spontaneously within the first two programs. The third, launched in January 2012, provides a puncture of 27.5% (against 25% previously) on assets not reported. In Canada, home to one million binational U.S., even the Premier of New Brunswick, David Alward has been “trapped” in this way and had to come into compliance.
The number of waivers to U.S. citizenship has exploded (see graph) in recent years. Since 2011, a further complication is added with the entry into force of legislation FATCA (Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act), which requires taxpayers to provide more documents. “A witch hunt that turns to the absurd” for Jackie Bugnion, who travels to Washington this week to meet with members of Congress and encourage them to get the law repealed FATCA. In the meantime, advise Martin Naville, head of the Chamber of Commerce suisseaméricaine, “which the binational U.S. passport has no real utility would be wise to make, because it simply costs too expensive to keep.
This is the way it Translated..
It’s strange how the US just disregards your other nationality or the country where you live. They seriously think that you are under their control and must pay taxes there instead of paying where you live. With this point alone, I’m a little shocked that more countries haven’t put their foot down. This is contrary to the basis of taxation in the first place!
But hey, that’s life. The US’s policy towards people that leave is terrible. They think we are traitors. All we can do is renounce/relinquish, or keep US citzenship and try to stay under the radar. My vote is renounce.
@Don, I’m kind of curious: since you have multiple nationalities (lucky guy!), have you renounced already?
The same guy from the Swiss American chamber of commerce was interviewed this week on Swiss english language radio on the repercussions of the Wegelin indictments, here is the audio in english is anyone wants to read more into the swiss bank mess http://worldradio.ch/wrs/news/switzerland/not-going-to-be-easy-to-find-a-solution-after-wege.shtml?28965
@geeeez
Oh, I’m working on it, trust me! Will definitely post here though when I do it though.
I just read an article where one commentor said that his son has four nationalities: US and Mexican through the father, German through the mother and Brazil by being born there. Assuming that he dumps US citizenship eventually, that is a real winning combination in my head (Brazil/Germany) in terms of work and travel. Mexican citizenship is a nice bonus I guess as well…
With a Brazilian and German passport you could travel to the vast majority of the countries in the world. For example, with an EU passport travel to the Americas, Australia and obviously the EU is easy, but it is difficult in Asia and old Soviet Union countries. Brazil has easier travel to most of these countries, and Russia is even visa free (which it is sadly not for EU passport holders). I would be very envious of such a passport combination…
“that is a real winning combination in my head (Brazil/Germany) in terms of work and travel. ”
Not to mention football (aka soccer).