In a comment, bubblebustin asked for statistics on the number of Consular Reports of Birth Abroad. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to find the actual numbers, but the State Department does make Paperwork Reduction Act filings with the Office of Management & Budget giving estimates on DS-2029 (the form parents fill out to apply for a CRBA).
State started out with an estimate of 70,000 filers per year in 1975, but apparently they found this was an overestimate and quickly revised that downwards to 35,000 per year in 1980. In about two decades after that, State increased their estimate of DS-2029 filers by about 31% to 46,000 in 2002, then increased by about 50% more over the decade to 68,627 per year. In other words, it took more than three decades for the estimated number of reported births to double. Yet the doubling time for the total population of Americans abroad is far shorter than that, apparently around a decade: in 2002 State estimated that 3.2 million Americans lived abroad, while last year they said 6.3 million.
In other words, the proportion of overseas Americans requesting Consular Reports of Birth Abroad has decreased by nearly 25% in the last decade. The obvious question: is this due to a drop in birthrates, or a drop in the proportion who choose to report their babies’ births to the U.S. government?
The data
Aside from the actual numbers, you’ll notice that the State Department has been even worse than the IRS in keeping up-to-date with their OMB filings. We’ve previously discussed the State Department’s OMB filings on DS-4079 — which is filled out by people giving up U.S. citizenship — and concluded that their estimates are not compiled with much care. Their DS-2029 numbers seem a bit better, though not by much. Unlike the renunciation figures, there’s no reason for them to be low-balling their estimates: higher numbers make them look better, and they’re quite far away from the time & cost burden threshold where any changes to the form might be deemed a “significant regulatory action”.
However, apart from the fact that State didn’t even bother filling out the “cost burden to Federal government” field correctly until 2009, there’s a bigger problem: information collections are only approved for three-year periods, but in many cases there’s four and five-year gaps between State’s extension requests. This means that their expenditures to process these forms during several years were illegal. So far I am not aware of any evidence that State Department employees have been fined a fifth of their life’s savings for these minor paperwork lapses.
| Year | Estimated respondents | Respondent burden (hours) | Cost to Federal government |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1975 | 70,000 | 17,500 | $0 |
| 1980 | 35,000 | 8,750 | $0 |
| 1982 | 40,000 | 13,333 | $0 |
| 1985 | 40,000 | 13,333 | $0 |
| 1989 | 40,000 | 13,333 | $0 |
| 1992 | Filing missing | ||
| 1997 | 40,000 | 13,334 | $0 |
| 2001 | 46,000 | 15,333 | $0 |
| 2003 | 46,000 | 15,333 | $0 |
| 2005 | 46,000 | 15,333 | $0 |
| 2006 | 52,000 | 17,333 | $650 |
| 2007 | 52,000 | 17,333 | $650 |
| 2009 | 64,374 | 21,458 | $15,868,872 |
| 2012 | 68,627 | 22,876 | $8,893,511 |
Discussion
In 2002 there were an estimated 14.4 registered births for every thousand Americans abroad, and even as recently as 2008 (when State estimated that about four million resided abroad) there were 13 registered births per thousand Americans abroad. However, according to the 2012 figures there were only 10.9 registered births per thousand Americans abroad. And if the May 2013 Bureau of Consular Affairs Fact Sheet is correct in stating that there are 7.6 million Americans abroad, there might be as few as 9 registered births per thousand Americans abroad.
Back in the Homeland, the crude birth rate among U.S. residents — the number of births per thousand population — barely moved over the same period: it’s been about 14 for the entire decade. The conclusion I’d like to draw from this is that while most Americans abroad having babies in 2002 chose to register them, beginning around 2008 large proportions of parents began not to register their babies, reaching perhaps a quarter to a third of all new parents by 2012. Is this plausible? I personally think so.
The alternative theory — that the birth reporting rate is the same, and that the slow growth in CRBAs compared to the population of Americans abroad reflects a sharp decrease in the actual birth rate — does not seem so likely. This would require either that Americans abroad are having far fewer babies than Homelanders of the same age, or that the age structure of Americans abroad has shifted towards a higher proportion of people of non-child-bearing age. Hard data is sadly lacking on the latter point, but anecdotally, far more Americans who have gone abroad in the last decade are early-career young people, i.e. of child-bearing age and far more likely to end up in a relationship with a local person in their country of residence, as compared to earlier decades when Americans abroad were primarily retirees and married mid-to-late-career executives (with trailing spouses & children) on assignment.
With regards to the former point, there are far more countries today than in 1980 which can offer first-world wages & standard of living to their populations, and an even greater number of middle-income countries which used to be “hardship posts” but now have an acceptable level of educational & health infrastructure for those with the money to pay. This fact has two implications, both of which we’d expect to result in an increase rather than a decrease in the number of Americans having babies abroad. First, American couples temporarily resident abroad are today more likely to trust their local hospital rather than delaying pregnancy until their international assignment is over or flying the wife back to the U.S. during the first trimester. Second, bi-national couples at the beginning of their new lives together are more likely to choose to settle outside the U.S.; in particular, as the European Union has expanded and the provisions on freedom of movement for workers apply to an increasing number of countries, even Americans married to people from poorer countries of Europe may move, for example, to the United Kingdom.
A view from the Homeland
A New Jersey resident identified only as “Jean Public” submitted one comment on the most recent OMB filing during the 60-day period after it was announced in the Federal Register:
ds2029 must now require a picture of the claimed birth person and a fingerprint of
the claimed birth person.it is time to truly document who is being claimed as a us
citizen.
there is alot of lying and fakery and bribery in this entire process.since
citizenship is worth thousands of dollars, it is clear that workers in this area can
make money for themselves by
allowing people to pay them off for fake documents.we need investigation of the
alleged 68,000 births abroad. we want birth pictures of the claimed citizen to be
attached to the file, we want indication of the race and color fo the claimed new
citizen and we want fingerprints.
it is clear there is criminality in this area of our govt.
Nothing much to say about this, except that it reflects the typical Homelander view that U.S. citizens who inexplicably choose to live outside the Greatest Country on Earth are un-American criminals who would happily sell out the U.S. and help fraudsters get U.S. citizenship. On the other hand, in the unlikely event that this woman’s conspiracy theory is true, it would suggest that my above estimate of 25% of new parents choosing not to request CRBAs for their own children is too low, because the other 75% would include many fraudulent applications filed on behalf of non-citizens hoping for their children to get U.S. citizenship by posing as the children of U.S. citizens.
What happens if you don’t register your child?
If both parents of a baby born abroad are U.S. citizens, or one parent is a U.S. citizen who fulfills the five-year residence requirement, then in theory the baby is automatically a U.S. citizen at birth under 8 USC § 1401. In practise, there are obvious barriers to the U.S. government’s ability to identify such children if they have another citizenship and do not wish to be identified, to the extent that dual citizenship is demonised as a “loophole” in FATCA.
Naturally, it is more difficult for a child born abroad to remain an “undocumented American” if both parents are U.S. citizens — a U.S. border guard who sees two parents presenting U.S. passports but their two children presenting non-U.S. passports will probably get suspicious. Similarly, it’s hard for citizens of non-Visa Waiver Program countries: visa application forms ask for biographical details on the applicants’ parents. Even if a determination is made that the children are non-citizens (for example because the American parent did not reside in the U.S. for long enough), the consular officer may well deny them tourist visas to go visit Grandma on grounds of alleged “immigrant intent” and force them to get green cards instead as the only way to get around this de facto travel ban — which also has the effect of turning them into U.S. persons for tax purposes.
Just a couple of months ago calgary411 pointed us to some very interesting comments from attorney Stephen Flott of U.S. tax and citizenship law firm Flott & Co. on this very topic:
However, I believe that “shall” in the context of subsection 7, where one of the child’s parents is not a US citizen and the child has obtained citizenship by birth or heritage of a country other than the United States, to mean that the child has the absolute right to US citizenship upon providing adequate proof of his heritage AND that his US citizen parent meets the residence requirements of the section.
However, Mr. Y’s citizenship is not “self-executing”. Someone must do something to establish his citizenship. His mother did not obtain a certificate of registration of birth abroad before Mr. Y turned 18 and cannot now do so. Mr. Y has not yet sought to assert US citizenship by obtaining proof of same which he would do by obtaining a US passport. That process would require him to present evidence of his US citizenship. He is, of course, free to do that at any time he wishes. However, until he takes some action, his US citizenship in an “inchoate right”, that is, something that he can assert and cannot be taken away from him by the US government. Clearly, he must be a “citizen” to obtain a passport. However, being “entitled” to citizenship is not the same as “being” a citizen. In other words, US citizenship in Mr. Y’s case is not self-executing.
Anyway, if the birth and registration rates among Americans abroad had remained the same from 2002 to 2012, we’d expect the State Department to project 90 to 110 thousand applications for Consular Reports of Birth Abroad in 2012; instead they estimated not even seventy thousand.
Those missing registrations — potentially as many as twenty to forty thousand per year — represent a population of Americans abroad who, though not willing to make the big jump of renunciation for themselves, either don’t consider proof of U.S. citizenship to be important enough to be bothered to fill out a 20-minute form for their children, or are actively choosing to keep their children hidden from the U.S. government in their tender age. Presumably they plan to let the children themselves make the decision whether or not to register as U.S. citizens when they are old enough to understand the restrictions it will impose on their ability to lead a normal life outside of the United States.
Along with the rising number of people giving up citizenship — an estimated eight thousand last year, based on the FBI’s report of 4,650 renunciants added to NICS — this is more evidence of a shift in attitudes among Americans abroad towards their relationship with the country from which they emigrated.
I did not register the birth of my child born outside the USA. (I am American, but my partner is not.) I also have absolutely no intention of doing so either. Why saddle the kid with the hell that comes with having an American passport? If the kid wants it later, it can be obtained.
Same here, if I have kids before I relinquish, no way am I registering them at a local US embassy; they can make their choice when they reach 18.
@MakkaPakka
@CHFForever
Ditto! My spouse is Canadian. Never registered our Canadian born children. When they’re older, they can make an educated decision. I got the application and began filling it out after my first was born in 2003. Life got busy, my second one was born, and the half filled-out application got pushed to the back of a drawer. Last spring I dug it out and put it through the shredder.
I had this conversation with the spouse this morning. I have a young son who I would rather NOT register. But I’m afraid that the US Consulate is going to require my son to get a US Passport to travel (as a tourist) to the US. Can anyone confirm this?
I’m still a US Citizen. The paperwork is taking a looooong time where I live. I’m patient. Just biding my time.. keeping everything small for now, on purpose. I would rather stay small and make less money than make a lot of money and have to give them a piece for providing me with absolutely NOTHING. Let their NSA-IRS computer bots sniff this message. My middle finger is raised as I click “post”.
Eric, thank you for covering this. The shrinking number of registrations of births abroad will be another indication that America’s global presence is diminishing.
Had I known what my citizenship meant I would have renounced US citizenship long ago, long before I had children, or I certainly would have thought twice about registering them. Certainly, the non-US spouses will now have a heightened awareness of what it brings. As I’ve said, now that America’s dirty little secret of CBT is out, the dynamic will change for America.
The Guess Who’s “American Woman”, will certainly take on a more profound meaning for some!
I certainly like the word certainly, don’t I?
@geeez –
There’s no need at all to register a birth overseas. The parent, or later on the adult child, can assert a claim to US citizenship at some future point, or not as the case may be.
Renunciations, specifically by those who’ve yet to have children is an effective sterilization process in the transmission of US citizenship.
a broken man,
what I was asking is WHEN we go to get the visa for my wife (she needs a visa to go to the US), are they going to look at me and tell me that my son MUST use a US passport to enter the US because of me? This is what I DON’T want….
Bubblebustin, yes the Chief Consulate Office explicitly told me last Friday when I renounced that any future children born will not be US citizens. Out of ignorance I registered my kids at the Consulate and they even have Social Security numbers which will make their US tax filings easier, if they choose not to renounce. Things really changed for me in 2009 when all in a sudden I had to file 7 years of backtaxes and the IRS started their threats about FBARs. But when I registered them in early 2000 I thought US citizenship was the golden ticket! (NOT!!). Also the US has changed in many other ways since 2000.
geeeeez, I don’t think so. I have traveled to the U.S. with my son while he carried his Canadian passport, my spouse carried his Canadian passport and I had a U.S. one. I was told I HAD to get a U.S. passport and so not knowing how this might affect my future I did. You know trying to follow the rules of course.
However, at no time did anyone ask my son about his citizenship *born in Canada* and mine not matching or assume he was American. I’m just going to leave it at that and if I were you I wouldn’t worry about it going forward. IF you never registered your son or caused him to be American in any other way.
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@Eric:
A 2013 “Annual Population Survey” for England and Wales (88.7% of UK’s population) contains data on births of children in the UK by nationality/ region. For N. America the figures are:
N. American mother with father of any nationality: 3,465
N. American father with mother of any nationality: 4,382
Both N. American mother and father: 1,037
Total N. American children born in England/ Wales in 2013: 6,810 (3,465 + 4,382 – 1,037 (to remove double-counting)
http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/dcp171778_375070.pdf
Table 5 in report, then Excel table 3
The following extrapolation is problematic but will proceed with it. Using EU population figures in the Overseas Vote Foundation report, the UK is 33.16% of Europe’s population (177,500 / (501,688 EU + 15,472 CH). Then 6,810 “US children born in UK” / .3316 = 20,537 “US children born in EU + CH”. This compares to 18,131 “US children born in Europe, 2009”, or 13.3% higher.
https://www.overseasvotefoundation.org/files/counting%20american%20civilians%20abroad.pdf
Assumption: N. Americans in UK are 90% USCs and 10% Canadians, which essentially cancels out the fact that the 2013 APS is for England and Wales only, 88.7% of UKs population.
Conclusion: The above analysis loosely supports that some US parents are not registering their children born abroad.
An analysis of the North American children born in England and Wales may indicate that there are far more US citizens, as defined by the USG, in the UK than has been reported. An analysis follows:
Total N. American children born in England/ Wales in 2013: 6,810 (see above Comment)
Extrapolate from England/ Wales to entire UK population including Scotland/ N. Ireland: 7,678 (6,810 / .887)
Eurostat data on number of N. Americans in the UK: 280,117
US citizens in the UK by virtue of being born in US: 223,071 (2013)
Canadian citizens resident in the UK: 57,046 (2010, most recent available)
US citizens as a percentage of N. American citizens in the UK: 79.6%
US children born in the UK in 2013: 6,112 (7,678 x 79.6%)
Calculated US birth rate in the UK: 27.4 per 1,000 (6,112 / 223,071)
If the expected US birth rate in the UK is 14 per 1,000, then there really are about 2 times as many US citizens resident in the UK as reported based on US place of birth of 223,071. The calculated number of US citizens resident in the UK, using the standard 14 births per 1,000 is: 436,571 (6,112/ .014)
The above analysis hinges on several key elements:
1) The reported births to US citizens is accurate.
2) The UK figure for its residents born in the US is a reasonable proxy for the number of US citizens in the UK.
3) The US birth rate of 14 per 1,000 residents holds for US citizens resident in the UK.
In order to move from the 223,071 “ius soli” USCs born in the US to the calculated 436,571 needed to hold the 14 to 1,000 birth ratio, I will use “Statistics Netherlands” figures to calculate the number of nominal US citizens (born in the UK to one or more US citizens). In the Netherlands, there is a ratio of .640 second-generation (nominal) US citizen to each first-generation (US-born) US citizen. Applying this ratio to the 223,071 first-generation Americans results in 142,666 nominal Americans. Adding first and second generation Americans in the UK together yields 365,737 US citizens resident in the UK. This figure is much closer to the needed 436,571 USCs resident in UK to hold the 14 to 1,000 birth rate.
Conclusion: The actual number of US citizens in the UK appears to be far higher than the 165,963 self-reported US citizens or the 223,071 US citizens by US birth place, both reported in Eurostat. Including an estimate of 142,666 nominal US citizens in the UK suggests that there is a calculated 365,737 US citizens resident in the UK. Further, using the births to US citizens and the US birth rate of 14 to 1,000
shows a calculated 436,571 US citizens resident in the UK.
Statistics Netherlands:
2013: 35,357 with Origin: USA
of which:
First generation: 21,565
2nd generation: 13,792 (one or both parents w/ USA origin)
http://statline.cbs.nl/StatWeb/publication/?DM=SLEN&PA=37325ENG&D1=a&D2=a&D3=0&D4=0&D5=241&D6=11-17&LA=EN&VW=T
@Innocente: belated thanks for that analysis.
Two other strange figures I just came across.
In 1961, Francis Walter (chairman of the House Committee on Un-American Activities) claimed that there were 50,000 American citizens being born abroad every year
https://archive.org/stream/congressionalrec107aunit#page/n732/mode/1up
The Senate estimated at around the same time that the total population of Americans abroad was 600,000, excluding military
http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uc1.b3997037;view=1up;seq=13
That would be a crude birth rate of 83 per 1000 (maybe a bit less if you include soldiers stationed abroad who married locals or were accompanied by their spouses). Perhaps they overestimated the number of births or underestimated the size of the diaspora population.
@Innocente
I know a few Canadians who would also count as U.S. citizens living in the U.K. Some of them knew of it, some of them did not. I thought that they were only Canadian until I started blabbing away about FATCA. If you are a U.S. person because you were born abroad to a U.S. citizen parent who did not register you, the UK census would not pick this up.
US citizens who obtain citizenship for their children are people with a minimum number of years lived in the US. Accidental Americans, people just born in the US, cannot, in theory, transmit their citizenship.
I proudly registered my children in 2003 & 2005 and obtained US passports. I am not sure I would do it now. At least they have non-US birthplaces and the same citizenship as their mother. And we have no mentionable family wealth (first time that makes me happy). The advantage with a child is that you can plan ahead as far as being totally compliant from age 18 or so (or before, since children would need to file their FBARs in some conditions). And a US passport is an advantage should they choose to go live there at some point. But, of course, it is a hindrance in every day life, such as banking or founding a company.
WSJ “For Expats, Fewer Barriers to Having a Baby Overseas”:
“It’s increasingly common for expats to give birth abroad. … In 2014, there were 70,449 American babies born abroad and an estimated 7.6 million U.S. citizens living abroad, according to the U.S. Bureau of Consular Affairs. By contrast, a decade earlier, in the 2004 fiscal year ended Sept. 30, there were 49,822 American babies born abroad. The U.S. State Department doesn’t break down those births by country, a spokesman says. ”
For 2014, that would be 9.3 births per 1,000 Americans abroad. For 2004 I calculate that there were 10.8 births per 1,000 Americans abroad. (Interpolated USCs abroad in 2004: 4.588 million*).
Either the number of American births abroad has declined in the past 10 years and/or they aren’t being registered.
* Americans abroad:
2009: 5’256’600 (DoS)
1999: 3’784’693 (DOS/ BCA)
http://www.wsj.com/articles/for-expats-fewer-barriers-to-having-a-baby-overseas-1424121493?mod=WSJ_LatestHeadlines
Mexico is part of North America
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexicans_in_the_United_Kingdom
Central American countries are too:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_North_American_countries_by_population
No bloody way am I nor is my wife going to register our children as US born abroad with the United States being the money-grubbing, scum-sucking leeches they are.
This thread is 1.5 years old. As I said before in confirmation with the Animal, I would never now register birth abroad for my kids (I was US Citz, my wife not). Hindsight is 20/20. My kids are stuck somewhere. My middle kid will work for Google in SF this summer as a University intern and the agent issuing his passport said he has to register for the USA draft, although he has never lived in the USA! He is 21.
It’s nice to know that the rest of the world’s safe enough for American babies now. Little do they know, the single biggest threat to Americans abroad is the US government.
Finally, U.S. mainstream media covers CRBA non-registration: “When Americans Expats Don’t Want Their Kids to Have U.S. Citizenship”
http://blogs.wsj.com/expat/2015/02/18/when-american-expats-dont-want-their-kids-to-have-u-s-citizenship/
Oddly enough this came out just a few days after another story about a Homelander baby who is having trouble because her birth wasn’t registered at all
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/02/14/homeschool-teen-can-t-prove-she-s-an-american.html
Stollar wasn’t talking about Americans abroad, but if the U.S. government starts to consider that non-registration of emigrants’ babies is a serious problem, I expect they’ll make similar arguments about it.
@Innocente: regarding UK births, just came across this factoid: From October 1 2013 to September 30 2014, the U.S. Citizen Services Unit at the Embassy in London registered over 3800 babies and children as U.S. Citizens born abroad.
http://www.usembassy.org.uk/specialrelationshipmagazine/?p=1112
However, some American parents might not have registered in London since it’s farther away than Edinburgh. Back-of-the-envelope overcompensation: assume that all American babies born in northern England were registered at the Edinburgh consulate instead of the London embassy, and that American babies born in northern England were a quarter of all American babies born in England & Wales (i.e. roughly the same as northern England’s population as a proportion of the population of England plus Wales).
That implies a total of ~5,100 CRBAs for babies born in England & Wales, Your calculations above came to about ~6,100 U.S. children born in England & Wales (though for a different time period), i.e. about 17% non-registration. That proportion is slightly below the bottom end of the range calculated in the main post (70,000 registered births and 20,000 to 40,000 non-registered births).
@EllenDownunder: true, but for purposes of those statistics the ONS classifies Mexico & countries further south as Central America, and groups all the countries of the Caribbean separately. See the “Country Code Listings” sheet in the Excel spreadsheet for Table 5.