ZURICH, SWITZERLAND – Ed. note: William Olenick has been active in Republicans Abroad in Switzerland, where he is a longtime resident. He sent the following email letter to friends 28 January; we reprint it in full as part of our coverage of the ongoing problems for US citizens in Switzerland.“Dear all,
Read the article below my comments and you will see why I also have my problems with the banks and I am tax compliant.
For the last 25 years I have been busting open nitch markets for American products, contributing to lowering the trade deficit, developing new markets for US producers, creating employment for my brethren back home, increasing the tax base where they live.
The only way to do this is to be on the ground in the countries you are selling.
In my case, my markets were Europe, North Africa and the Middle East so it made sense to set up a base of operations in Switzerland, as it was close to the markets, was a well run country, my wife happened to be Swiss, from a large, close-knit family, so it was a no brainer.
Two months ago my bank informed me that I could no longer make wire transfers to the states.
That being the case how will I pay my suppliers?
More
@Swiss Pinoy
That’s surprising given how many employees they have in Switzerland and how long they’ve been there. I used to go to the Citibank cafeteria across the street from Bahnhof Enge many many years ago and from talking to their employees then was under the impression they offered normal banking services. I guess it must have changed.
Why couldn’t he have his Swiss wife set up a business bank account and use that to transfer the funds?
That’s much less drastic than packing up and leaving and/or splitting the family apart.
*His devotion to America tends to paralell that of Job in the Old Testament who when suffering unbelievable disasters in his life that caused his friends to advise him to just curse God and die, replied: Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him.
This guy is a jerk!
Seriously! He’s going to leave his wife just because he can’t transfer money to the US? Has he considered WHY he can’t transfer money to the US? Could it be that boneheaded US policies are causing his headaches?
Why doesn’t he just find suppliers outside the US, and reconsider the thought of retaining his US citizenship? I mean really, he’s going to piss away his business, his wife, and all that is good where he’s at, just so he can work on some farm and wrap himself up in the flag of the country that is screwing him over?
He doesn’t sound like someone that I would care to know! Meanwhile, I hope for his sake that he gets his head out of his ass and seriously reexamines his priorities in life.
Man, I am waiting until I get fragged by other US persons for Writing a stand that supports their cause
FIgure it out—the guy is exagerrating his situation in order to have it used over the internet to support the point.
It’s not possible for everyone to renounce their citizenship.
*Just spoke with William Olenick. Good man with a busy schedule. He might help you guys to make more noise in Washington. What’s your suggestion? Petition? Burn FBARs? What do you guys want to do?
*SwissPinoy
Let me try to get a hold of JustMe.
*As a friend of Bill’s, maybe I can explain the situation a bit. First off, he and his wife are both near retirement age and they have no children, so moving to the US with his wife and giving up his business isn’t as devastating as it might seem at first. It is more a case of the straw that broke the camel’s back than one thing that caused his decision. Plus, he’s a pretty good farmer and enjoys doing it immensely:-).
Finally, though it doesn’t always quite fit in with the Brock narrative, I’d like to add that the idea of an extremely patriotic American working overseas creating US jobs, but being undermined by Washington policy is a message that will resonate far more with homelanders, and which might help repeal FATCA, and (if we’re lucky), even citizenship taxation.
AJ
What do you mean by the “Brock narrative”?
Vermont is not such a bad place, it has a “socialist” Senator! However, I absolutely love Switzerland, and certainly feel that it is a better place to live out one’s life than the USA. But at least give the guy credit for speaking out.
I am surprised that he couldn’t find some other solution. Especially that he is tax compliant, it should be possible to open retail or commercial accounts with another Swiss Bank such as UBS or Credit Suisse, or perhaps Postfinance or one of the Cantonal banks that has not yet decided to exclude USP customers. Clearly there is a case for invoking federal nondiscrimination laws in both Switzerland and the US.
I can understand though if he is close to retirement and has gotten fed up and wants to retire to a farm in the US.
By the way, the GenevaLunch article mentionns Zermatt at the bottom. Zermatt is not in Zürich, it is in the Canton of Valais (Zermatt is a tourist village below the Matterhorn.) Perhaps he has a vacation appartment there or visits there frequently.
At the very least, Olenik’s story will be another anecdote alongside Roger Conklin’s Brazil story. Olenik and Roger both had to pack up and leave, and the result was not only lamentable for them personally, but also bad for US exports and the US economy.
I agree with the comments about unelected staffers. Term-limits and an end to the two party system might make congresscritters more serious about actually doing their job and not just signing off on things presented to them in late night last minute sessions. I have often spoken out about the need to avoid omnibus legislation that contains modification or addition of statutes on unrelated matters.
The “rider” strategy is used to blackmail groups in congress to accept things they wouldn’t normally in order to pass something they want. This practice should be outlawed. Bills should deal with one subject at a time, otherwise the result is muddled.
@Joe, yes Bill deserves credit for speaking out. Switzerland would be a very difficult place to begin farming if you don’t already own a farm–the land base there is extremely limited.
@AJ, thanks for your comment. I think that most of the comments have been relatively charitable, until about seven comments back. Personally, I only question the choice of the US over Switzerland, but for some people it’s not really a choice. It has to do with what kind of job or pension he would have Switzerland vs. what opportunities are available in the US. Access to owning a farm, it seems to me, is probably easier in the US, unless you want to become a raw milk farmer:
Shared by Simon Black via Zero Hedge, Guest Post: You Know You’re Not Living In A Free Country When…
By the way, “Brock Narrative”–I like that. The Brock Narrative as I see it is this: Brock prepared Upper Canada for an hostile armed invasion of the United States. He died in his effort to protect Canadians and Canada exists today thanks to his valiant foresight in the face of political leaders who thought that the best route was diplomacy. He defended Canada at her most vulnerable point in history, and he gave his life in the effort. Today, the United States represents a fiscal threat to the well being of our countries (esp. Canada) while our political leaders negotiate an FATCA Inter-Govermental Agreement with the United States. We need leaders like Isaac Brock to stand up for the sovereignty of our individual countries.
My life is so deeply entrenched in Canada that I had no choice but to renounce the United States and to protect my family from the invasion. This is why I took the route that I did instead of moving to the United States. My wife is the main bread winner in the family, and moving to the United States or coming into compliance would have been like throwing her to wolves. I had to distance myself from the United States in order to protect my family. The Obama administration gave me no choice but to renounce the United States.
*@AJ< a resounding “Amen” to your posting on the reason why Bill has decided to return to the US.
\Althoujgh my reasons were different than his, I also chose shut down my business and return to the United States from Brazil when Congress fired its first cannonball that began its supression of US exports and the destruction of American jobs producing for export with the Tax Reform Act of 1976 which made it impossible for me, as well as many other thousands of Americans working abroad, to survive the effects of being taxed twice on the same income under two vastly different sovereign tax systems.
It was in 1975 that the US recorded its largest trade surplus in history. That very next year, with the overseas presence of American entrepreneurs decimated by that tax legislation, the US trade balance became a deficit. Never since 1975 has the US ever again recorded a trade surplus and the US cumuilative trade difict to date, which began that very year, now exceeds US$9 trillion and is increasing every day by $2 billion.
That is the message Congrress desperately needs to hear and understand. Exports don’t sell themselves, and foreigner are not coming to the US, begging on bended knee, to purchase American-made products. They have plenty of choices in meeting their requirements for products they must import from other countries whose citizens have located abroad to sell them and who come knocking on their doors, order books in hand, to vigorously pursue satisfying their import and in-country product support needs.
This is a concept that so far has totally excaped the undeerstanding of those on Capitol Hill who write the nation’s tax laws as well as the very President himself.
Bill’s story is just one more that supports the message that we must get across if this suicidal approach to world trade by the US Government is to ever be turned around.
Whatever we feel about Olenick’s motives for returning home or his deciding appearantly just to throw in the towel, the best we can do is spread the story around as much as we can, just like Roger’s story, just like Amy Webster, or the woman living in Armenia on Swiss disability benefits whose account was closed.
@Joe Smith
I once heard Vermont described as being the most “Canada-like” of all US states.
When I gave a talk there I was struck however by how many people had never visited Montreal which was only a couple of hours north of Burlington.
I have a few Americans who won’t come to Canada because it involves having to get a passport.
*@bubblebustin, There are lots of countries that Americans used to be able to visit besides Canada without a passport, including Mexico most oif the Caribbean islands. But it is the US that requres that US citizens, once they have traveled byone the US borde, must have a valid passport to return home. It is alol fall-out from the Patriot Act that folloed the terrorist attack on the World Trade Building in New YHork on 9/11.
But the fact is that it is also a means of overlooking the UN Declaration of Basic Human rights which gurantees that ever person shall have the right to freely leave and return to any country, inconcluding his own. US passports are now very expensive, so it is not a surprise that people who used to think nothing of drving across the border to spend a day on the Canadian side have decided that it is simply not worth the cost and inconvenience of having to obtain a passport.
I suppose that also cuts down on the outflow of dollars from the US to “foreign” countries. US citizens are not prevented from visiting Canada, it is just that they now have to jump through the additional hoop of applying for and being issued a US passport in order to do so. for some elderly folks it may also be difficult to submit proof of US citizenship if they were born in a county where the courthouse burned down and all early birth records went up in smoke.
My own mother-in-law, now deceased, was born at home in a small town in Pennsylvania and her birth was never recorded. So she had no birth certificate and found it extremely difficult to get one. We invited her to visit us when we lived in Brazil in 1970. mShe was 79 at the time. She was finally able to take an even more elderly aunt with her to testify under oath when my mother-in-law was born and where, but she almost blew it when her aunt blurted out int the presence of the person before which she was to testify “now when was it that I am supposed to tell them you were born?”
AJ, yes, I can see where your friend’s situation would appeal more to homelanders than mine. But I wonder really if his scenario is the norm. It seems to me that more of us are in other countries with foreign spouses who aren’t mobile and have kids and grandkids and, like Petros, have spouses whose careers or businesses are being put at the mercy of the IRS through marriage to a USP.
Though I wouldn’t lay claim to being staunch patriot personally, choosing your spouse and kids over Uncle Sam doesn’t exactly make one a Benedict Arnold either. If I could stay dual, I would, but I can’t b/c it means endangering my husband and all he has worked to build – mostly before I even knew him.
Obama made a big deal over immigrants yesterday but he once again was silent on the flip-side – emigrants. I don’t think I owe anything to a govt that thinks my marriage should be the lesser loyalty in my life.
Bubble, my best friend’s husband refuses to get a passport. My sister and her husband won’t get passports. Some of it is money but mostly it is that they don’t feel the need to leave the US for any reason. Everything they could possibly want is there. Conversely, I have a daughter with a boyfriend here who feels the same way about Canada. No need for a passport or travel beyond the borders. Some people are just very flat-earth types.
*a, if it is the norm or not, is irrelevant and it doesn’t matter how his situation relates to that of others. What matters, rather, is the potential of making noise in Washington with a possible impact. As Jefferson D. Tomas mentioned, the best thing to do here is maybe to spread the word. One should probably better organize the data on Roger, Amy Webster, etc., making it more visible and accessible while spreading the word. A policy which causes American patriots to renounce or forces them to abandon the exporting of US products, just can’t gain any support in the US when people are made aware of such. The main difference between 1979 and today is that today expats have the ability to make Americans better aware of the issue. If you guys want to abolish FATCA and citizenship-based taxation, this just might be your chance.
I agree that getting the word out is good, but there are differences in scenarios and they are all equally valid and should be presented that way. The businessman who is forced to come back to the States is no more violated by USG’s thoughtless policies than the housewife of a foreigner who has to renounce in order to stay with her husband. If Bill understands this than by all means, see if he will speak out for us. But it’s all of us who are being hurt not just some of us. We don’t all have his resources or freedom of movement.
bubblebustin:
Tell me about it! I have family that live less than an hour from me, but none of them have came over to visit my family, simply because it involves them getting a damned passport. But be that as it may, they live in a state where it is possible to get an enhanced driver’s license, which would let them cross the border and back. But they won’t do that, either. What else am I supposed to do next? Pay for it? It gets to the point where if all they’re going to do is find excuses, then I just throw my hands in the air and say ‘to hell with it!’
Mark Twain:
What ties does he have with the US that compel him to come back, other than the ‘love’ for a country that made it impossible for him to do business abroad? My government has made it impossible for me to enjoy even a normal banking relationship with my wife without them wanting to snoop into her business. Frankly, I’m willing to renounce over just that issue alone because they have no right to snoop in her financial business. Period. They made their choice, and it forced me into a position to where I had to make my choice.
Roger Conklin:
Since 1976? If Congress hasn’t caught on to their error after the past 37 years and counting, they either are criminally incompetent at serving the country, or they simply don’t give a shit. I’m thinking both, and I highly doubt that the homelanders will care any more than the crooked politicians. I would bet that the homelanders might actually scorn him for moving overseas to live his life in the first place. After all. why would anyone leave the greatest country in the world? There must be something wrong with him! Even my own mother has asked me why I don’t want to move back. Why would I? Am I supposed to leave my wife for a police state that makes me miserable? My wife has MS. Am I supposed to uproot her, and place her in a country where she will have NO medical insurance, and she doesn’t even want to be at herself, and then maybe we get to play the Obamacare game in 2014? Maybe we’ll get something crappy out of the high risk pool at our expense, too? Bullshit! Us staying here is simply a no-brainer, yet I can’t even get my own family to understand.
Jefferson D. Tomas:
If he’s willing to just throw in the towel after all of that, that says all I need to know about his character, and it indeed isn’t favourable. Meanwhile, he has a wife, so it’s really not just about him. What if she doesn’t want to go? Shouldn’t she have a say? I know if I just threw in the towel, my wife will not follow me back to the US. Canada is her home, and now it’s our home. So with that said, I’ll be frank. Giving this good life of ours up, because my government wants to act like a bully towards us Americans abroad, is simply the act of a coward, and no self respecting American should ever have to accept this kind of abuse. Therefore, I would implore him not to think from his heart what he feels he should do, but to think from his head, look at his wife, and take the most logical course of action on what they need to do.
*a, he’s not just a businessman who exports US products, but also a Republicans Abroad activist for 26 years, former MSCLANT and one with connections and influence. I’m under the impression that he’s doing this for people like you. Now, if only Democrats Abroad would do similar…
mjh. yeah,right.
Let’s tear the guy up
Great then. I hope he can make a difference.