I haven’t been on the computer much today, and just getting around this evening to catching up. I noticed this story at NBC that was posted yesterday. I decided to have a read to see what he is up to.
Romney foreign trip highlights significance of overseas U.S. voters
By Tom Curry, NBC News national affairs writer
This article is probably a little dated now to waste much time commenting on. There are already 648 comments, and it may have run it’s course. Not many comments are inspiring or hopeful that folks are looking for a meaningful discussion of overseas issues. Frankly a lot are inane, or at least the ones that I have read. I wasn’t going to post anything, but this got me thinking about some of the specific points, questions or assurances that I might want Romney or Obama to address if one of them showed up in New Zealand asking me for my vote.
So, I have quickly (without much refinement) went ahead tonight and posted this below. It is probably an exercise in futility, as few will read it. It seems the NBC audience is just looking for quick cute or caustic partisan talking points. However, someone (like Tom Curry) might pause and give it consideration. You never know. It does give me something to link to later in tweets, blog comments and email, and I can keep working on it to make it more succinct. The NBC posting did not take the links that were embedded, but took everything else. See below:
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As an average middle-class person who until recently resided in New Zealand, Below are the 5 issues I would like to see Romney (or Obama) address and support if they (either one) want my vote in 2012.
If Romney were to adopt these issues, and Obama does not, in my opinion he would get a large majority of the overseas American vote which probably went to Obama last time. Obama has failed on his 2008 promises to Americans Aboard, which are provided here: http://bit.ly/P201Lw
Sadly, his Administration has turned Americans abroad into pariahs that financial institutions do not want to deal with any more. He has also unleashed the IRS to prosecute in a draconian and unjust way offshore accounts, by conflating Expat Minnows with Homeland Whales in a one size fits all penalty regime just because they both might have an offshore account. What is offshore to a homeland resident American, is “on shore” to an non U.S. resident American abroad. Separate issues, but the IRS treats and penalizes them the same.
The 5 key issues that I want a Candidate to address are these:
1. Eliminate the U.S. Citizenship taxation burden on Americans abroad, and adopt a Territorial Tax system just like the 50 states in the homeland do, as does every other OECD country in the world!!
Citizenship taxation, complexity, compliance cost and penalty risk is dramatically impacting US competitiveness overseas. America is an unique outlier in how it taxes its citizens. Allow Americans abroad to function on a level playing field with all other nationalities. They pay taxes in the country where they live, and should not be double taxed or administratively burdened in a way that no other nation’s citizens are.
Elimination of this requirement would allow Americans to move overseas more readily to create export jobs for the mainland. Just like the Chinese and Indians that go abroad and contribute the export boom back in their countries. The inability of Americans to start small businesses overseas, have joint partners, or take a job (like a salesman) for US Corporations is a direct contributor to the loss of US exports and significant contributor to US trade deficits.
2. Eliminate FBARs (Foreign Bank Account Reporting) for full time US Citizens, and U.S. Persons including the military who live, work, start businesses or are retired abroad.
This 1970 FBAR form was created to stop terrorist funding and money laundering from homeland Americans. It should have never been applied to its Citizens or U.S. Persons abroad in the first place. After almost 40 years of no enforcement, the IRS is currently using the very severe penalties for failure to file, as a bludgeoning tool to raise revenue on the backs of innocent Americans abroad who are not the target of the form in the first place. They never knew about its requirement.
3. Restrict the provisions of FATCA (Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act) included in the 2010 Hire Act to apply ‘only’ for homeland resident Americans/U.S. persons instead of for all Americans and U.S. Persons including green card holders and military personnel living everywhere on our little blue globe!
FATCA is an incredibly hubristic extra territorial Congressional legislation that is requiring all FFIs (Foreign Financial Institutions) to be IRS tax collectors and reporters. They have to set up expensive and cumbersome procedures to search out all Americans and U.S. Persons that are resident anywhere in the whole wide world.
The procedures are so onerous, hated, and expensive to FFIs, that many are just refusing to accept Americans and U.S. Persons any more. This is shutting Americans out of normal banking services and makes Americans pariahs that no one wants to deal with. See this recent example: http://bit.ly/OXbZWL
How can you live, pay bills, or run a business if you can’t have a normal checking account? Exchange cash on the black market street corner?
4. End the current IRS offshore jihad for valid US Citizens / U.S persons including military personnel living abroad. Restrict its application to US homeland residents, for which it was intended.
If any offshore Citizens / U.S. Persons are currently caught up in the ridiculously complex, onerous, inefficient, 2 year long, LCU (life credit Unit) sapping IRS offshore Voluntary Disclosure Program (OVDP)……,
http://1.usa.gov/LAmWBH
,,,,,give them full amnesty for failures to file FBARS or submit tax returns. These have only recently been enforced under Bush appointed IRS Commissioner Doug Shulman in a very punitive and negative manner. End the penalties for these benign failures.
Special Note: Also, for immigrants to America, forgive the penalties for non willful failures to FBAR file forms, which they were never informed about in their “Welcome to America” State Department packages. (Still aren’t) Give them equal treatment with Timothy Greithner who had no penalties for his tax failures. Allow them an easy route to compliance by paying back taxes plus interest without stealing high percentages of their family savings in their homelands of India, China, Canada, Mexico, Iraq, Afghanistan, Kenya, etc.
Most homeland Americans are unaware that the IRS has been on this jihad for the past 3 years. If they have heard about it, they have some vague perception that it was about Rich Whales living in America who were hiding funds in secret Swiss offshore Accounts. Some definitely were, and this proposal is not about them.
Unfortunately, the IRS has not restricted itself to just resident Americans engaged in this evasion activity. In its global search it also applied severe FBAR penalties on Americans and U.S. Persons the world over who just had innocent accounts in their “on shore” banks where they live and work.
These IRS programs have unjustly separated significant amounts of retirement savings from benign Minnows who were not the Whale tax cheats the IRS was targeting. Commissioner Shulman has NOT been telling you and the press the full story of how “successful” these programs are, and at whose expense!
It is shameful how he has been conducting himself. He has refused to release even the most elementary statistics like how many had overseas addresses? What was the Minnow to Whale ratio in his programs, or what portion of revenue collected is taxes and what portion is penalties?
He has refused to address or respond to the “Bait and Switch” issue, as criticized in a Tax Advocate Directive (TAD) spelled out in item 5 below.
5. Promise to read and respond to the National Tax Payer Advocate Report by Nina Olson, which has been ignored by Commissioner Shulman and Congress. It lightlights many of the issues I have described in items 1-4. Here is a link to a copy: http://bit.ly/xIqDb7
In Conclusion: If either Candidate wakes up to the damage this current administration has done to the community of Americans abroad, and adopts these 5 recommendations, they might stem the rising tide of U.S. Citizens relinquishing or renouncing their citizenship.
It is NOT just the RICH who are figuring out that the cost vs benefit of the U.S. Passport in the past 3 years has become too high. An inflection point has been reached, and many are abandoning the little blue book. Not because they really want to, but in order to survive abroad, they have surrender their passport. http://bit.ly/KTlVT5
I know this doesn’t fit the popular narrative you hear in the MSM these days with sensational stories about Eduardo Saverin and Densie Rich fleeing America to save on Taxes. It is misplaced and WRONG emphasis!! Here is the real untold story of what is going on. It is not the taxes per se that people are fleeing. Rather, with the IRS offshore jihad against Citizens / U.S. Persons abroad, the FBARs, plus FATCA, it’s the tax complexity and penalties, stupid! 🙂
Interestingly, another round of speculation is making the rounds that the reason Romney went into the OVDI in 2009 and that’s the reason he doesn’t want to release his tax return from that year:
http://middleclasspoliticaleconomist.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/is-noose-closing-around-romneys-tax.html
Officials in governments around the world should be required to read Nina Olsen’s report.
*Very good. Very well done. This should circulate all around and reach the candidates. This also should be sent to ACA and AARO. I am going to copy and circulate it. Thank you.
Just Me, well crafted as always. And a pleasure to read – useful too, as an outline for our comments and letters!
@Eric
Don’t see how releasing tax returns would show he was in OVDI. Even if they did, it would be a great opportunity to bring the IRS into the discussion.
If Romney was in OVDI and he becomes president, that would be great. He can give himself and all the rest of y’all a refund through executive order. That’s exactly what we need to become president. Another victim of the Tax Jihad.
http://democrats.waysandmeans.house.gov/press/PRArticle.aspx?NewsID=12196
Representative Sander Levin — Carl is his younger brother. Two Levin’s, twice the fun.
This is not on the tax subject, but it does concern word-crafting and is funny:
http://washingtonpostsmensainvitational.com/
Great article. Thanks!
@Eric
Wild speculation on Matt Yglesias part at Slate, and I am not convinced. Not sure how that would show up in released returns unless there was a BIG increase of unreported income in an amended 2009 return. I would have thought he had enough good International Tax advisers and Accountants that would have known about the FBAR requirement and not let him get caught out on that. As he says, he doesn’t know where his money is, but hires the best to keep track of it for him. Also, a 20% penalty on all offshore accounts and assets would not have been insignificant, and given his enemies surely someone at the IRS would have leaked it by now.
I could make a wild speculation that he may just concerned that the level of Tax engineering prior to 2010 would be disturbing for Americans to see when he actually paid less than 15% tax because of all the special structuring he has engaged in. These are the special deals that normal Americans can not have, that would be even more harmful for him for an electorate that still isn’t paying attention to the election details like us Wonks do. Also, I could speculate that the closing of the UBS account in 2010 was because he saw the hand writing on the wall with FATCA being passed. Who knows???? He could just be old fashion stubborn and doesn’t think it is anyones business!
The Big problem for Mitt, from my perspective, is that he is not confronting a problem head on, but is disassembling. The speculation just gets wilder and finally does enter the consciousness of the masses. That hurts him even more when he even has high profile Conservatives asking him to release his tax returns. He is making a classic mistake. He should have done exactly what Obama did when under attack for Reverend Wright! One speech, confront the issue, and it is dead.
Americans could forgive him for not filing some dumb form. They might actually have sympathy for him when it was revealed how stupid the OVDP was. I think they can even handle that the Rich get special deals, but his obfuscation (IMHO) harms him more as it hands unchallenged rumors to his enemies and keeps dominating the cable news cycle. Look what happened with Obama and the birthers because he was dismissive of the charges and didn’t confront it. This issue plus his “retro-active” retirement to 1999 from Bain keep him in the spot light as the butt of the comedians jokes. The more he tries to brush off or justify the reasons he won’t release his returns, the more silly he looks.
Jon Stewart is able to rip him apart, and when Jon spends two segments on the issue, that is not good!
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-july-16-2012/democalypse-2012—bain-damage
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-july-16-2012/democalypse-2012—bain-damage—romney-s-blind-trust
BTW, from strictly a political angle, it appears that Obama and the Dems are much more aggressive than they have been in the past. They have learned from their counterparts on the hard core Right, I.E., Karl Rove. You have to pay hard ball and attack your opponent on his “so called” strength to put him on his back foot. Surely Romney saw this coming and had a better strategy to deal with it than what we have seen to date. This is “almost” like the Swiftboating that Kerry endured, which was darn effective. Kerry tried to ignore it to, at his peril. As deplorable as all the SuperPac ads, charges and counter charges are, it is better than taking out the guns and bombs as in Syria. It does provide for endless entertainment! 🙂
#releaseyourtaxreturnsMitt
Regarding Mitt… drip, drip, drip..
@FATCA_Fallout
Right Wing Rips Mitt Romney for Refusing to Release Tax Returnshttp://bit.ly/NB9Txt
@thedailybeast @HowardKurtz #releaseyourtaxreturnsMitt
@nobledreamer16
New Thoughts About What‘s Hiding in Romney‘s Tax Returns#offshore #
releaseyourtaxreturnsMitt http://bloom.bg/NuYjoU via@BloombergView
Is Romney too big not to fail?
Funny article: http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/10383-mitts-kampaign-klown-kar
@Bubblebustin, thank you! I needed a laugh and your link certainly provided one. Had to share it around! I think several members on this site could contribute to the next contest!
@outraged, no kidding, and you know what they say about hanging around smart people!
@Just Me, Christophe, Others: You have to love this cartoon image of Mittman, A Superhero Of Sorts and the accompany commentary in LA Times about what secrets Mitt may be keeping.
@bubblebustin and Blaze
Yes, endlessly entertaining. IMHO, Romney needs to lance the boil on this, and quit adding hot packs on the wound. He is not helping any of us out by maintaining this negative offshore image.
Then again… Maybe no one in the electorate is listening yet. And, the Olympics will be here soon, so if he can last until then, that news will capture the attention of the masses, and leave the chattering class (us and media pundits) to continue talking to ourselves. LOL
There was a response from Republicans Abroad Norway—I believe those DA & RA pages are manufactured in the social-media-advertising-factory, that Newt Gingrich’s team was assigned to craft a policy tailored to acquire the americans abroad vote.
@bubblebustin,
Clowns, reminds me of the US Ambassador to Canada. Wonder what all his views are on this; we’ll never know.
Ran across this, which amused me, anyway. I would have preferred to find one on Flaherty or Kenney, but metaphorically smacking Harper actually felt just fine.
http://smackstephenharper.com/
I gave him several slaps just to vent a bit, then posted the below reason..
Many slaps – For bowing down to the US Government on FATCA which calls for an invasion of privacy of every Canadian with a bank account. The IRS is looking for people with US connections (snowbirds, born in the US) to force them to submit tax forms and reports on all financial accounts to the IRS – with no recognition that someone might actually have relinquished US citizenship. It’s a travesty that Harper’s government is allowing – Canadian banks enforcing the laws of a foreign government!