Christophe commented (July 31, 2012 at 1:05 pm):
Some senators are starting to see the bigger picture:
http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/washington-expert-applauds-senators-scrutiny-of-fatca-hails-first-nail-in-coffin-of-bad-law-164446156.html
Also, I contacted the senators from my state regarding the subject, and I was happily surprise to receive a phone call saying that they shared the concern, and that it was on their radar.
[Editor’s note: Please also consult Jim Jatras’s Repeal FATCA website.]
Don’t know if there was ever a response to this letter, but it might have been similar to this one that Tim just sent to me. It might deserve a separate thread discussion, but I think it sets the tone for the types of responses you can expect out of Treasury… Excuse if I call “BS”… 🙂
http://www.fsitaxposts.com/2012/09/06/treasury-letter-responding-representatives-fatca/
*Just Me, interesting letter, thanks for sharing. It sounds like it was written by one who never applied for a passport to venture beyond US borders. It was a boring read, but I’m glad that someone had the time to write it.
Utterly surreal. The European Bankers Federation writes a letter complaining that “Certain Rules Remain Unnecessarily Burdensome and Potentially Unworkable in Significant Respects” and “The Limited Transitional Relief for Entities that Cannot Fully Comply with FATCA Due to Foreign Legal Constraints is Inadequate”, and Treasury says they are being “widely praised”?
I’m not sure which of the possibilities is scarier: that Mark Mazur believes the praise he’s writing about himself, or that he thinks he can get away with telling blatant lies to Congress about matters of public record by quoting people out of context.
And, re “We are committed to implementing the statute in a way that eases burdens on financial institutions in a manner that is consistent with the statute’s compliance objectives.”
The Representative who was the author of the letter, stated that his concern in a way that specifically cited the burden on US individuals, but the response from Treasury very carefully and deliberately avoids answering to that specific concern, and goes on to obfuscate about reducing the burden on institutions – with no acknowledgement of the Representative’s actual issue – and an obvious avoidance of the issue of the egregious maltreatment of those deemed US citizens living outside the US.
Thank you @Just Me for bringing that letter to our attention. Seems to me that Treasury and the IRS just does whatever they want to. I read that they gave Wachovia big tax breaks – in spite of the repeated investigations and charges re identity theft and money laundering by account holders – and charges under the Bank Secrecy Act http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wachovia . The article http://www.heraldsun.com/view/full_story/9368448/article-Official–Wachovia-rescue-relied-on–usurpation–of-tax-law went on to state that the IRS extended the tax breaks without the say so of Congress. See; http://www.getirshelp.com/irsblog/2557/crisis-commission-argues-on-irs-assistance-for-wachovia/ “The IRS made the change to the tax code on September 30 without
consulting Congress because of pressure from Treasury officials. Because of their unilateral action, the ultimate losers will be the American taxpayers in the long run because they will have less revenue. Another member of the Commission, Byron Georgiou, agreed with Thomas and explained that the tax change was a “different form of government assistance, perhaps a delayed form of government assistance”.
“The tax change was later reversed by Congress but how much Wells Fargo benefited from the change is hard to determine. Even members of the Commission are at variance in calculating the estimates.”
At what point will anyone rein them in – if ever? Jack Townsend http://federaltaxcrimes.blogspot.ca/2012/09/irs-data-mining-program-re-offshore.html has a recent column that mentions another ‘golden rule’ – and I paraphrase – that “those with the gold make the rules” and he links to this explanation http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_does_%27He_who_has_the_gold_makes_the_rules%27_mean.