Personen, die ihren amerikanischen Pass abgegeben haben, sollen künftig nur noch in die USA einreisen können, wenn sie beweisen können, dass sie dies nicht aus steuerlichen Gründen getan haben. Das fordern die demokratischen Senatoren Jack Reed (Rhode Island) und Charles Schumer (New York) in einem Antrag auf Gesetzesanpassung.
People who have given up their passports should only be allowed to visit the USA if they can prove that they didn’t renounce for tax reasons, demand the democratic senators Jack Reed (Rhode Island) and Charles Shumer (New York) in a legislation adaption request.
Warum sollte sich der US-Staat mit seinen mehr als 300 Mio. Bürgern daran stören, wenn ein paar tausend Menschen mehr als bisher ihren Pass zurückgeben? Die wachsende Geldnot des amerikanischen Staates sei der Hauptgrund dafür, dass künftig mit schärferen Gesetzen gerechnet werden müsse, darin sind sich Kommentatoren und die beiden US-Steuerexperten Steven E. Kraft, CPA aus Zug, und Alexander Marino, Moodys Gartner Tax Law aus Kanada, einig
Why should the US, with its more than 300 million citizens, be bothered when a few more thousand people give up their passports? Commentators and the two US tax experts Steven E. Kraft, CPA from Zug and Alexander Marino Gartner Tax Law from Canada agree that the growing financial trouble of the American government is the main reason why more strict laws are to be expected.
Der neue Gesetzesantrag wurde nun jüngst in die Homeland Security Bill für das Jahr 2014 eingegliedert. Kommentatoren und Befragte schätzen die Chance für diesen Gesetzesantrag aus den genannten Gründen als deutlich höher ein. Es müsse auf jeden Fall davon ausgegangen werden, dass es künftig zu einer strengeren Behandlung ehemaliger US-Bürger kommen werde. Ein amerikanischer Politiker könne es sich im heutigen wirtschaftlichen und politischen Klima nicht mehr erlauben, sich für die Belange von US-Bürgern aus Übersee einzusetzen, die ihren Pass aus steuerlichen Gründen zurückgäben, denn das gelte als «unpatriotisch», sagen Kraft und Marino.
The new law proposal has been recently added to the Homeland Security bill for 2014. Commentators and those questioned estimate the chances for this law change as being noticably greater, for the named reasons. In any case, one must expect that the US will be more strict with how it treats its former citizens. In the current economic and political climate, US politicians cannot allow themselves to be engaged with the interests of Americans living abroad who renounced for tax reasons, since such is seen as being “unpatriotic”, said Kraft and Marino.
It’s sad two US Senators have to resort to a case of ‘sour grapes.’
FATCA is stripping the US of future investment with the very people able to invest handing in their passports. It’s madness for a few billion $.
“In the current economic and political climate, US politicians cannot allow themselves to be engaged with the interests of Americans living abroad who renounced for tax reasons, since such is seen as being “unpatriotic”, said Kraft and Marino.”
They shouldn’t be representing any of their former citizens to begin with, as I highly doubt that the renunciants themselves would want it any other way. However, what of those that remain as citizens and have not renounced? When are they going to be represented?
Gee. It’s as though they’re stuck on hubris!
Ah, I see they have wised up and tucked this little gem into the next version of the Patriot Act that Congress will rubber stamp without a second thought. Wondered how long it would take them. Longer than I thought but they eventually skin the cat though with much suffering on the cat’s part.
I am so scared that this very threat of permanently banishing renunciants from ever visiting will be their stick to cower Expats into eternal compliance. It’s cruel to think that I could be banned from ever seeing my elderly parents or childhood haunts again; and all because I met a British man while studying in London in my early 20s and staying after marrying him.
Life happened and had gone native, completely oblivious to all the complexities. Perhaps.if I had had my life over again, I might have not married him had I realised how difficult I was going to make my life. I would warn other young Americans to think twice before going abroad to study, etc. But there’s something fundamentally wrong with a system that forces one to make decisions based around fear, especially when it’s a government supposedly representing the freest country in the world….
I can’t bear to break my parents’ hearts…it’s blackmail, all these threats; it leaves such a bitter taste. Who’s to say they won’t assume I left for tax reasons, especially as I suffer substantial double taxation from unintentionally holding non-US mutual funds and, thus, the dreaded Byzantine PFIC Byzantine tax treatment.
But to have kept my dual nationality would have crippled me with the huge annual compliance costs…how can it be reasonable for someone on a below average income having to have to budget over 10% of my take-home pay for the rest of my life for a cross-border accountant to prove I’m tax compliant every year?? How is that reasonable to be burdened with +100 page tax returns to a country I haven’t lived in for 25 years, especially when I no longer even have any assets there???
I only have to file approximately a ten page tax return to HMRC and, unlike with my US return, can file online and don’t even merely an accountant!! It all feels like extortion…:'(
monalisa,
If it feels like extortion, it sounds like extortion; it smells like extortion; it reads like extortion, then …
similar to “If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck.”
You have done the right and only thing you could do — you got away from the extortion / the abusive relationship with the US. Don’t look back and don’t let fear of what will likely not happen run your life. We’re here to remind you from time to time. You were brave and you can continue to be so.
Interesting article and comments on the NYTs Those not joining the club and the comments give insights as to why.
Making Choice to Halt at Door of Citizenship
I like the German-English translation. It reminds me that I used to know German. Just like I used to know the USA (sorry German language). Is having no tax due yet filing endless forms to “form nation” a reason to renounce for “tax reasons”?
Yes, kermitzii — what will be the definition? As we’ve all been saying, it is not about taxes owed. It is about the huge compliance costs for some (most?) who cannot do their own US taxes and be confident of its correctness in order to escape draconian penalties, as well as the immense stress caused by the persecution we feel. The latest is just icing on the cake in continuation to brand us all tax evaders and traitors of the US. Screw them.
@monalisa1776
Frankly, at this point, if the US wants to ban me for leaving and renouncing, then I really just don’t care anymore. I refuse to be the victim here.
As for my family, I will tell them flat out as to the nature of why I was exiled, and they can draw their own conclusions. I will learn real quick whether or not I will even have family to go back to. And, if they want to buy into the homelander propaganda about tax cheaters and ‘fair share’ and all of that bullshit, then I will have no reason to enter that damn country, anyway.
Of course, since I have little to lose to begin with, I doubt I am even a target. At least for now. Nevertheless, the trend is disturbing, and I see it only getting worse. Not better. Sooner or later, they’ll end up exiling everyone that wants out, and if that doesn’t work, then perhaps that old concept of ‘perpetual allegiance’ will have a revival, and then nobody can leave. Sort of like Hotel California. Oh, sure. You are free to leave, but you’ll never be able to function outside Fortress America if you’re unable to erase the Mark of Cain that is your US personhood.
RBT is our salvation.
“People who have given up their passports should only be allowed to visit the USA if they can prove that they didn’t renounce for tax reasons, demand the democratic senators Jack Reed (Rhode Island) and Charles Schumer (New York) in a legislation adaption request.” says the translation from the Swiss German article.
I haven’t been able to find the actual wording of the latest Reed-Schumer amendment. So let’s assume the quotation is reasonably accurate as it stands. If so, I wonder how Reed and Schumer propose that the policy be implemented if it is adopted. How would an ex-citizen “prove” at an entry point that they “didn’t renounce for tax reasons”? Would a document from the IRS be required in addition to a Certificate of Loss of Nationality?
RBT is not going to happen soon enough – or ever – to help those of us caught in this now. And I am with mjh49783. If the USG wants to banish me, so be it.
My ancestors came to the Midwest from Ireland and never saw “home” again or anyone they left behind for that matter. I can use Facebook, Skype, Facetime. Exchange photos or video via email or over any of a number of social media sites. I am hardly cut off without recourse.
But it’s not going to happen. They don’t have the manpower to figure out why anyone gave up their citizenship. And why would they make examples out of ordinary folks anyway? We are beside the point in all of this.
They tried the banishment threat legislation back in the 90’s and in the end were too afraid to enforce it. This things are for the homelanders, a dog and pony show.
As long as you have money to spend there as a “tourist”, they are going to let you in regardless.
@YogaGirl, re; …”…As long as you have money to spend there as a “tourist”, they are going to let you in regardless.”
No matter what happens or doesn’t re RBT, or this latest incarnation of the threat to ban renunciants forever, I’m not going to spend my tourist dollars in the Schumer state of New York, or anywhere else in the US (like Michigan Mr. Levin) now. And my Canadian family won’t either.
This is old news. The article is referring to the proposed amendments to the immigration bill that already passed two months ago (without the amendments). Reed and Schumer haven’t proposed anything in this area since then.
@AnonAnon, this is the magical question. Living involves paying taxes and everyone who renounces US citizenship benefits taxwise one way or another. It is impossible to prove that there was no tax-related gain by abandoning US citizenship. Even those with limited income who file free online and owe no taxes benefit taxwise with the time saved. Time is money. Renouncing US citizenship saves time on tax filing and thus it saves money. Everyone who renounced, renounced with some tax-related issue in one way or another. So, technically, all would be banished. Treating everyone equally would certainly be more fair.
America is broke. I`m sorry to sound so pessimistic, but I think the worse things become, the worse behaviors we are going to see. LIke the article points out- the few expats dont matter in times of crisis for the country, and that crisis is growing. Detroit just declared bankruptcy. What happens when the whole country does that?
The deficit goes from $16 to $17 trillion in the last year, which the President stated “we have cut the deficit in half”. Social Security has $15+ trillion in unfunded liability, medicare has $30 trillion+ in unfunded liability, and the total of the whole mess is estimated between $85-$110 trillion. And the President says “we don’t have a deficit problem”.
So, they’ve got to steal their money from somewhere.
The whole thing is one big disgrace. I have the luck (or had the intelligence :-;) not to be born as US American, so it doesn’t affect me directly. But I have very good friends who are troubled and I’m seeing what they are going through. It seems that the US with all their democracy every few decades takes a fashistic turn. It’s no less. Whoever here is old enough to remember the Mac Carthy-ism of the 1950’s decade knows what I’m talking about. That dark and sinister period ended all of a sudden, when some illustrous person – I don’t remember who it was – exclamed during a senate hearing he was put through: “Gentlemen have you lost all your decency?” That exclamation electrified the country and within a short time the whole indecent spook was over. Let’s hope that soon something similar will happen this time too.
@Mona Lisa, I really feel for you. I’m with you in that I DO care if I’m allowed back. I’m relinquishing my faith in the government not my family or childhood home. However, if they ever do take that step I’ll deal with it when I step up to it. Rest assured there is no other choice people in our position can make except to renounce. I can’t and you can’t put your foreign spouse and children in the position the U.S. says we should.
@Alex, I agree with you. It reminds me of McCarthy too. Fantastic comment, I too keep waiting for the “Gentleman, have you lost all decency” moment. Won’t hold my breath.
This is outdated as the proposal was defeated.
You also forgot to mention from the NZZ article:
Ausgenommen vom Gesetz wären Doppelbürger seit Geburt, die in ihrem zweiten Heimatland leben, und solche, die mehr als zehn Jahre vor dem 18. Lebensjahr nicht in den USA lebten.
Accidental Americans are safe.
@CHF Forever, I didn’t have the time to translate the entire article, so I left some parts out. The outdated part could be the result of sloppy journalism, but I don’t know if one should expect for non-Americans to be more updated on US legislation than Americans. In my view, the key point of the article is that things probably won’t be getting better anytime soon.
The question we US Persons Abroad should be asking the US: http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/6444/
The USG needs to create a bogeyman to throw billions of dollars at ever few decades.
If anything will get the attention of the USG, it will be the renunciations. The big unknown at this point is whether they’ll do anything at all to stop them, and whether stopping them will involve the use of a stick or a carrot. With the US’s propensity for using sticks to stop what they consider bad behaviour, I’d be careful of what you wish for.
Special Counsel for the Army Joseph N. Welch
http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/6444/
@AnonAnon
The language of the Amendment was discussed here at IBS in two places…
Here
and
Here
and Here is how Reed characterized his own amendment.