This is the way I see the immediate future.
1. Continue our lobbying and support for the Charter Challenge;
2. Get our personal situations in order regarding the $50,000 thresholds and plans to cross or not cross the border — many solutions are possible;
3. Clarifying the Credit Union story [if they are indeed excluded because of the 2% rule this is a great chance to move the equity agenda forward and nail the banks]; and
4. Sit back and wait to see the storm that arises when 1,000,000 Canadian citizens — most of which are still probably oblivious to all this — are thrown under the bus.
Meat grinder is a good description for what’s happening to USP’s in Switzerland. What the US is doing over there under their “pogromme” is nothing short of a sin.
http://isaacbrocksociety.ca/2013/12/14/most-swiss-banks-considering-ovdp-should-not-consider-wegelin-in-their-decision/comment-page-3/#comment-1329741
The challenge in my mind is to get the opposition parties(Liberal, NDP, and Greens) on record firmly as saying it the official position not to comply with FATCA and the are quite willing to suffer the 30% withholding. I believe if this were the case the Conservative might actually back down. However, the Conservatives in my opinion believe in the similar circumstances the NDP or Liberals would do the same vis a vis complying with FATCA so there is little political risk to them at the moment as they believe at the end of the day all parties have the same position.
@ YogaGirl
“For some reason, FATCA isn’t considered the same way and it would be enlightening if we really knew what our govt has to gain via FATCA – because there has to be something or it wouldn’t be happening.”
77% of Canada’s exports go to the USA. President Obama himself issued a threat: “We will have a way of dealing with those who won’t cooperate with us on FATCA.”
This is the dilemma taxpayers are in todays world of double taxation :
I received today my final swiss tax bill/assessment for 2012. I looked at it and saw that there was a difference of 48,400.00 CHF in my favour .
After going through every item I realized that the swiss tax examiner reduced the value of my “Eigenmietwert” to 0 CHF (taxable rental value for house owners) which was of course incorrect, a simple error but since this was the final assessment the numbers were official.
My personal marginal tax rate in CH is 37% which means by keeping my mouth shut I would have received a refund of $17,908.00 !!
Since I knew that whatever I save on swiss taxes goes to the IRS I did not have to think twice to write to the swiss tax examiner and educate him about this sizeable error and make him send me another final assessment notice.
But afterwards I was wondering would I have been so honest if the “double taxation” issue was not present in my case or would I have just taken the refund and moved on ?!
Do Canadians with Clinging US Citizenship Need to Consider the Possibility of Extradition?
Extensive searches of the Brock website reveal no postings or comments that specifically address extradition from Canada to the US. So for discussion:
Canada International Extradition Treaty with the United States
March 22, 1976, Date-In-Force; As amended, Jan. 11, 1988
“ARTICLE 2
“(1) Extradition shall be granted for conduct which constitutes an offense punishable by the laws of both Contracting Parties by imprisonment or other form of detention for a term exceeding one year or any greater punishment.
“(2) An offense is extraditable notwithstanding
“(ii) that it relates to taxation or revenue or is one of a purely fiscal character.”
Source: http://internationalextraditionblog.com/2011/04/12/canada-extradition-treaty-with-the-united-states/
This Extradition Treaty excerpt seems relevant because the CRA reassures there is specific tax dirty work it won’t do, and the comment reappears frequently on the Brock site to the effect that “under the Canada-US Tax Treaty, the US/IRS can’t do anything but send threatening letters.”
Allison Christians and Arthur Cockfield in their Mar. 10, 2014, submission on the IGA and Implementation Act (p. 21) warn that, “[The problem with relying on protections of the Tax Treaty is that, by signing the IGA,] Canada appears to be putting itself in an inconsistent position because it would be furnishing tax information to the United States that could support criminal charges in the U.S. against Canadian citizens, protections against which are not covered under the treaty.”