MASSIVE jump in people who renounced US citizenship last quarter http://t.co/jDzLCCxN0y via @thesovereignman
— U.S. Citizen Abroad (@USCitizenAbroad) August 8, 2013
Includes:
While still embryonic, it’s difficult to ignore this trend– more and more people are starting to renounce their US citizenship.
After all, the number of people who renounced citizenship this past quarter is roughly the same as the number of people who renounced for the previous four quarters COMBINED.
This movement shouldn’t be that surprising for a species that began as nomadic hunter gatherers, or for a society that was founded by foreigner settlers in search of a better life.
Yet, in a rather anomalous twist, the emotional ties we have for our passports are incredibly strong.
This Simon Black post dovetails rather well with the James Dale Davidson discussion we have been having.
Of course the Homelanders will say: But there are numerically more people immigrating to the U.S. than renouncing. Maybe. But the percentage increase in those renouncing is far greater and is in a growth mode.
In 1968, Benjamin Braddock (of the The Graduate Fame) was advised to invest in plastics. Today, I would advise people to invest in expatriations. Remember the letter written by the Canadian businessman to his son.
There should be millions in line to give up US Citizenship – it is a toxic passport to hold as an expat. Having said this, the problem is that unless a US Person has dual citizenship in a country on the Visa Waiver Program getting a US visa later to visit family in the US is a very real concern. US Dept of State will put a former US Citizen through the ‘ringer’ and he/she must apply for a visa like any other non US citizen and will be viewed with suspicion. They can simply deny the visa, thereby cutting off the former US citizen from contact with family, doing business, etc in the US.
@Steve Klaus I getting one of thee Double Robotics devices in the States so I can go to parties, wonder if immigration will seize them for a violation of some sort.
http://www.doublerobotics.com/
Thank you- so that’s where they got the idea for last year’s South Park Halloween episode re BlockBuster LOL. It may well come to this, visiting family and friends in the USA when the government refuses to give a visa. Just remember the NSA will be listening to the conversation.
@Steve Klaus and @Stateless, my biggest fear now is that it may become harder to visit the US, or that I’ll be interrogated at customs. It seems inevitable that people who’ve renounced will be viewed with suspicion.
I hope that if the numbers surge into the hundreds of thousands, they’ll instead try to appreciate why people feel forced to expatriate in order to be able to survive where they live; wouldn’t be so much better if they reform their policies and perhaps even make an official apology and even offer to restore citizenship or at least generous visas. Unfortunately, I don’t see that happening any time soon.
If the worst comes to the worst, my family and friends in the US will have to visit me or perhaps meet up in Canada.
My name is here but I renounced in the 2nd Qtr of last year, so we shouldn’t assume that all the names are from the last quarter. Evidently, the government is playing catch-up administratively.
@Mona
You say:
“I hope that if the numbers surge into the hundreds of thousands, …”
You are being far too conservative. Unless the USG stops waging (what only can be described as a reign of terror) over U.S. citizens abroad, there will be ONLY two kinds of Americans Abroad left:
1. Those who are in hiding, cowering under a rock, and possibly exploring how to change their identities (not the comment about the forged CLN);
2. Those who will renounce.
There are way more than the 5 to 7 million people who the U.S. might try to deem “U.S. citizens” living outside the U.S. None of them can afford to be persecuted by the USG
My prediction is that that the trend will accelerate (within the next decade or so) into the very high hundreds of thousand if not millions.
Want proof? I have been reading your comments for about two years. At the beginning, there was NO way you were going to renounce. Where are you today? Furthermore, I would point out that you are completely tax compliant. You renounced because there is NO way that you can live as a Tax Compliant U.S. citizen abroad. It was a practical decision. Agonizing perhaps but practical and driven by necessity.
The message is:
If you are not tax compliant you need to renounce, because, if you ARE tax compliant your problems have just begun.
___________________________________________________
In the 70s, movie was made called “The Paper Chase”. It was about Harvard law school and seeking a Harvard law degree. Somebody should make a movie called “The Paper Chase”. Only this time it’s a chase for that one piece of paper that is more valuable than any other:
A CLN!
A CLN is priceless. For everything else there is Mastercard.
monalisa,
The US — mongers of fear. The US — purveyors of punishment. The US — labeling of innocent people as Traitors.
I refuse to buckle under to their methods of operation. I would never want their apology. What an insult it would be for them to offer to restore my US citizenship.
The problems that are created for US persons when they move abroad are self-correcting, eventually everyone will have renounced and no one will leave the US anymore. American nationals will vanish from the face of the earth outside of America.
@USCAbroad, you’re correct about how, in the beginning, I couldn’t imagine renouncing. I originally had hoped to be able to become fully compliant end retain both passports…but as I became aware that I’d have to rely on an expensive accountant for life and continue to be severely restricted in my financial planning, I finally realized I wanted out! I so resented this intrusion on my life after 25 years abroad.
But what I still can’t determine is how aggressive they’ll actually become because they’ll still have to prioritize who they’ll target. I suspect most accidentals will stay underground while most Expat US citizens will either have their accountant fees covered if they work for a US company with the wealthier learning to absorb the compliance costs.
If I were on a six figure salary, I wouldn’t have probably resented an annual accounting bill of $2000-$5000 because it would be have been proportionally low enough to have afforded it. I would also have been rich enough to just invest directly in stocks of individual companies.
But with my low-paid job, my compliance costs would have continued to cost me at least 10% of my income each year, even with full consolidation. I would have been stuck with either moving my remaining investments back to a US brokerage account (and thus a lower hanging fruit for the IRS) or in a US-compliant account where I live with ridiculously high administrative fees eating up most of it’s produced income.
There was also the very real risk that compliance burdens and costs would get even worse. So, Yes, I concluded I had to renounce in order to be able to survive.
@Calgary, it goes without saying that I feel bitter about everything and wouldn’t even want my citizenship back but it will always break my heart that I had to give up my birthright.
monalisa,
As Victoria so aptly points out, the US cannot take away from you your birthright if it is defined as your heritage, your memories. Your US birthright as a Person Broad is worth squat. There are choices we US Persons Abroad must make, some of them extremely difficult. In the end, my choice was easy as the US turned into my oppressor (the abusive partner). The US is NOT the country we grew up in. It has NEVER been the country we believed it to be. It is no more an entitled country than any other in this whole wide world.
Interestingly, I was just contacted by the Wall Street Journal — cold calling people who are listed on the just-out quarterly “Name and Shame” document. What was the reason I felt I had to renounce — was it the taxes? I may or may not be quoted. I absolutely tried to convey in the short conversation due to deadline that it was not about taxes owed. The taxes I paid to the US from 2005 through 2012 were almost nil (the 2012 US taxes $250, when my Canadian tax bill was $0.00). The US tax law and US tax accounting firms I hired (three — two of them that did actual work for us), their retainers (some of it lost because I “fired” the in-US firm), the immigration / nationality lawyers I hired on both sides of the border totaled just over $40,000 of Canadian retirement savings, 2005 through 2012, for my husband, myself and my son.
@Calgary, I agree with Victoria that I will always identify myself as an American because of my heritage and memories even though I am no longer a US citizen. I share your belief that things are different now though can’t help suspecting that the US has never been as free as were led to believe growing up.
However, I will always consider it a human rights violation that I have had to forfeit the right to ever move back there though. It’s just downright mean for it to be set up that way!
This is only the beginning. Many, many more will be on this list in the next few years. I don’t feel the U.S. will learn anything positive from it and will rather become even more punitive. Look at the comments sections on any article about this and you will always find those who tell you to not let the door hit you on the way out. Calling us “creeps” and “traitors” with very little understanding of any issue. Nor do they want any understanding.
Every time I see the sort of comments I’ve seen lately it makes it easier to renounce. Mona Lisa is right this situation IS a human rights violation since many of us are literally forced to renounce. There’s no viable or workable solution other than that if you want to have a normal, affordable life in your current country of residence. What do they expect to happen. I believe they knew ahead of time that many would have to renounce. I believe they don’t care at all. They’ve had ample time to address this if they wanted to. They don’t want to. I can’t even look at Obama on television anymore. The irony that Snowden is considered a traitor to the U.S. while Obama is forcing people to renounce left and right who are innocent Americans abroad leaves me speechless.
@Atticus, I fear you may be right. In my heart, I didn’t want to renounce but would have found it impossible to lead a normal life where life had I not. I thus essentially felt that I had no other realistic option….had I learned of all this back in my 20s, before I began retirement planning, I would have gone for my British cutizenship and relinquished far earlier or, instead, just have kept a simple savings account and kept any investments in a US brokerage account with straightforward individual stocks. I would probably could have then retained dual nationality because it would have been fairly easy to stay compliant and could have could possibly even used tax software or at least a less expensive tax preparer…but the problems arise even if you set up just a employer pension plan because of possible foreign trust reporting issues…unfortunately, these types of accounts are impossible to close after being opened, at least where I live.
The foreign tax credit form 1116 is, to my mind, far more complex than even FBAR and 8938. Especially if you’really having to deal with carry-back or carry-over of foreign tax credit!!
@Calgary, I also wanted to mention that it’s absolutely appalling how much you (and others such as’Crystal London’ and ‘Not that Lisa’ have had to shell out in professional fees though agree that we required it. After all is said and done, I will have to pay out over $40,000 in total when combining professional fees and double taxation. It almost seems like protection money…
And look who we’ll be lumped in with:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/01/nidal-hasan-citizenship_n_3692533.html
@Mona Lisa, what I feel the U.S. is effectively doing is dis allowing dual citizenship without actually putting that restriction into law. Of course those with unlimited funds will still be able to be dual if they want to. Isn’t that ironic that they are saying FATCA is to get the “FATCATS” while those it is really forcing to renounce are anything but, that? Really it’s an outrage that anyone should be forced to renounce just to be able to live normally but, here we are. Forgive me for repeating that point so often but, I don’t think I’ll ever reconcile with that decision being so forced upon so many. I’ll learn to accept it of course but, the sheer number of people put in that situation and the lack of real reporting of the truth on it is frightening. What other things has this government done to innocents that we know nothing of? There’s enough that we do know. How dangerous is the question “What else don’t we know about what we once thought the U.S. stands for around the world?”
At any rate these numbers will climb and I anxiously await the spin of both the U.S. government and press on this matter. I’d like to be hopeful it will spur a change for the positive, I’d like to be, but I’m not.
@Atticus, what I still can’t fathom then is why they’re proportionally hitting the little guy so hard. Even the Byzantine pfic taxation treatment is an attack on minnows since it tends to be the middle class rather than the rich buying mutual funds as a safe way to spread investment risk…after all, the wealthier investor can more easily afford to invest in a wider spread of individual company stocks….seems to me as though Congress is a private club catering to the rich’s special interests via lobbying. Little people don’t matter any more. We effectively have no true representation either because Expat votes are diffused and thus not heard.
@AtticusinCanada
This is the State Departments opinion of dual citizenship:
http://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/cis/cis_1753.html
In the State Department’s words: “The U.S. Government recognizes that dual nationality exists but does not encourage it as a matter of policy because of the problems it may cause”. They don’t encourage it as a “matter of policy” yet their policy allows children born abroad to be registered at birth. So I guess what they’re saying is that they don’t encourage Americans to move abroad, or if they do, to renounce US citizenship or don’t take the citizenship of the country you’re living in, therefore live as a mere resident of that country. At the same time they encourage you to register your children’s births abroad, and what, have those children renounce their native citizenship when they are able to? How can they encourage something they discourage?
@Atticus
“I can’t even look at Obama on television anymore….”
When Obama the assclown was on TV today, I just changed the channel and muttered ‘fuddle duddle’ under my breath.
@monalisa1776 personally the only way I’ll visit the USA is by my Double Robitics device, I’m sure this type of tech will only get more advanced, but I know this won’t work for most people.
@bubblebustin: yeah, I saw the story about Hasan “renouncing” too. If only it were as simple as sending a letter to Fox News! Even news outlets which should know better, like the
MordorWashington Post, claimed he “renounced citizenship” by sending that letter.http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2013-08-01/national/40962017_1_hasan-s-fort-hood-u-s-citizenship
It was left to a third-tier news site to actually call up someone who knew what the $*)!(@ they were talking about and set things straight: “Last week, in another statement he declared his intention to renounce his U.S. citizenship. The statement renouncing his citizenship has no legal standing, officials said.”
http://www.newsmax.com/US/fort-hood-shooter-attack/2013/08/05/id/518645
Basically it’s just like the old garbage about “sovereign citizens”: the US media just blindly repeats police claims that they “renounced citizenship” and imply that they should be lumped in with those of us outside of the US. For a while even Wikipedia’s article about renouncing citizenship had a long section about the “sovereign citizen” BS, until someone took an axe to it.
@statelessman, I’m not sure that the US won’t start considering taxing based on a virtual presence , or presence via an avatar or robot – with the IRS declaring that a proxy equivalent to a US presence’ for US tax purposes!
: )
If people start conducting their business via Skype or via a robot on US soil, maybe the US will start claiming that is enough presence in the US to claim a piece of the action.
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@Eric
Thanks for finding the newsmax article that says that simply stating you renounce citizenship has no legal standing, as I couldn’t find one myself. A formal trip or two to the US consulate is the only thing that distinguishes ‘renouncing’ from ‘denouncing’ US citizenship.
@badger
The ‘Prince of Pot’ Marc Emery’s selling of pot seeds on the internet got him extradited to the US where he received a 5 year prison term for his virtual presence in the US.
http://www.vancouversun.com/news/Prince+Marc+Emery+gets+approval+transfer+Canadian+prison/8643040/story.html
@bubblebustin, I know what state thinks of dual citizenship but, you know I didn’t until recently when this all came up! I had no idea they discouraged it. They should just go back to dis allowing it. Honestly, it would be easier than this!
@mjh, It’s very hard to see someone say they are going to fix infrastructure by repatriating taxes while all this is going on and people abroad are suffering from it. I felt ill hearing him say that. It said a few things to me. He’s lying about it being taxes they are “repatriating” he knows it, he also has to be fully informed about what this is doing to people and knows no one inside the U.S. will care especially if he frames it a certain way *LIES* It is very sad but, I believe the man to be a narcissist of the first order. If he thinks he can score points with “reforms” then he will do it and damn the consequences to innocents. And I am liberal and no I did not vote for him, thank GOD! That would make this even harder.
@AtticusinCanada
If he’s saying they’re going to rebuild their infrastructure by repatriating taxes, then that’s basically a warning shot across our bow.
And yes, I also get deeply nauseated to even see Obama’s face on the TV anymore.