Today (11/16/2017) the floor of the House passed the House tax reform bill. The earlier version is here .
Today also the Senate Finance committee passed the Senate tax reform bill. See link
Do not yet have the final versions of either bill but suspect that we are not helped in the bills. Will post here final versions when they become available.
Listen to the C-span clip found by BB in which Residence-based taxation is mentioned by Golding and Brady in the House tax bill debate — none of this however, appears to have been incorporated into the House or Senate bills passed on 11/16/2017
Republicans Overseas (RO) continues to press on, to make changes in the final tax package that will help us. The fight is not yet over, but it continues, right from the beginning, to be an uphill battle — and the odds don’t seem very good right now. RO says: “Again we need to focus on the Senate side since this fight is far from over.”
Personally, it makes no sense to me to blame Solomon and the handful of people at Republicans Overseas for trying to make a change and, so far, failing. Yesterday a friend reminded me that there was this Ismene, who kept telling her sister Antigone that it was pointless to even “try”: “…but you’re bound to fail…No sense in starting a hopeless task…Go then, if you are determined, to your folly, etc. etc.” Antigone responded: “When I have tried and failed, [then] I shall have failed.”
@ George (GB)
I don’t give a hoot about the tax reform package now, unless something pro-expat is pulled out of someone’s hat in the days to come. As for putting Reps in the dustbin, only to let Dems slither into power again? Well, one is as bad as the other. The Rep/Dem damn establishment is like a casino … all odds are in its favour.
america remains the last feudal state on earth.
We will not obtain anything until we stop shying away from the word “slavery” and actually shame them for what they are.
That said, I appreciate the incredible work done by our friends at RO and thank them for it (and Keith…). If we are upset, think of where they stand after having spent so much time and money trying to stir the swamp. Fat chance, right now, the american government is about as functional as the Somalian one.
Now we finally need to advertise our plea not as a money issue but as a basic human rights one.
america will get a capital A when it deserves it.
I’m surpringly not that choked about this. No point in waiting anymore for the US to do the right thing, as the right thing in their minds is to treat its non-resident citizens as persona non grata.
Like banging your head against a wall, it feels good to stop. It’s clear they don’t deserve to have me as their citizen.
Still waiting for RO to make it official.
SIREN SIREN SIREN SIREN
RO has a post;
https://www.facebook.com/pg/republicansoverseas/posts/
“Republicans Overseas didn’t expect TTFI to be in today’s the TAX CUTS & JOBS ACT. The TTFI inclusion was not even considered before our two petition drives: 1) to President Trump on Oct 2 and 2) to the Congress on Oct 24.
On Oct 25, Chairman Brady told the Financial Times that his committee is seriously considering TTFI. Our TTFI now is in the Joint Committee on Taxation. Last week, we were told that we need to wait for Chairman Brady’s markup to see if TTFI is included.
We are confident that our friends of the House Ways and Means Committee will do their best to get our TTFI included in Chairman Brady’s markup. When we started this TTFI in January, Nobody on the Capitol Hill has ever told us the TTFI inclusion is a easy fight. We are committed to fight and win this uphill battle.”
George thinks the RO post should be posted on the front page as part of the original post.
I have nothing but great things to say about RO!
But let us call CBT what it really is — a modern form of slavery!
So if CBT continues to remain after this once in a generation tax reform, then RO should give its full support for helping expats renounce US citizenship en masse and organizing a mass tax revolt by those who cannot or will not renounce. It will be all we have left and in reality the patriotic thing to do.
I guarantee that America’s founders would have renounced or rebelled a long time ago if they were expats today. .
“I guarantee that America’s founders would have renounced or rebelled a long time ago if they were expats today.”
America’s founders got to be America’s founders because they sure did renounce and rebel.
All roads…
Bob: You’ve got a great idea brewing there! If an organization such as RO (for example) wanted to get the ball rolling on a mass renunciation … along with a refusal to pay the illegal renunciation fee … I’d sure be on board with that! (That fee needs challenging in court as well as the taxes!) We need to do something audacious and VERY visible so that news organizations can’t miss it.
Although, I am just astounded that after all our verbiage we were STILL not the Ways and Means’ radar before the current petition and letter-writing campaign, let’s wait until after the “mark-up” to get REALLY mad. We may yet be able to save our collective blood pressure. One more week.
Today I renewed a W8-BEN form on-line for a zero balance RBC Direct Investment account here in Canada with the help of a friendly customer service agent.
Agent: What is your country of tax residence?
Me: Canada.
Agent: Any others?
Me: No.
Agent: What is your country of birth?
Me: Canada (I was born in Boston, Massachusetts).
Agent: OK, everything looks good. The people in the back office will look over your form but you should be all set.
All roads lead to renunciation. Here in Canada, they may lead to Do It Yourself Renunciation. Much easier and less expensive (no need to pay a $2350 Exit Tax Lite)– one or two White Lies included.
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Sorry to all those who were anticipating hearing some good news today. As a non-Republican (and loather of Trump), I still won’t be surprised if something favourable toward ex-pats is put in last minute. Given that the tax reform bill has to make its way through Congress, there is still much pork-barrelling that still has to occur.
Also, my appreciation to the efforts of Solomon, Michael, Keith, and any others who have been lobbying hard behind the scenes on behalf of “US expats”.
“America’s founders got to be America’s founders because they sure did renounce and rebel.”
And thank God they did, otherwise we might all be Canad…oh, wait.
Have you ever noticed that we’re like rats running from one side of a sinking ship to the other trying to escape the angle of the ship sinking? Each side of the ship is like each party in the US elections. The Democrats on the Left; the Republicans are on the right. Since the Democrats forced the HIRE Act into effect, life has been hell. And we expected the Republicans to do something about it. So we all run to that side of the ship. Well…the Republicans don’t give a shit about us either. So what do most of us do…we run back to the Democrats. ARE WE FUCKING STUPID?
Maybe it’s about time to just get off the fucking ship and let it sink.
@BC_Doc
“All roads lead to renunciation. Here in Canada, they may lead to Do It Yourself Renunciation. Much easier and less expensive (no need to pay a $2350 Exit Tax Lite)– one or two White Lies included.”
Sounds good to me. FUCK ‘EM. I don’t mind telling a whopper if it will save my family some dollars. In fact. Who deserves my wife’s income. My family or some fucking scumbag who won’t get up off his ass and get a job down Stateside?
@ Bob
So you are saying we should spell reform — r e v o l t. I like that although I can’t renounce something I never had but I’d be there in spirit for a mass renunciation.
@ MuzzledNoMore
Do you think RO would promote renunciation? Wouldn’t that reduce their membership?
@ BC_Doc
Sweet DIY!
BC Doc — well done! Unfortunately not possible here in Belgium where national ID cards are necessary for just about anything. Still, passive resistance remains an option for many of us.
“Do you think RO would promote renunciation? Wouldn’t that reduce their membership?”
Would anyone decide to renounce on the advice of an American politician?
“Unfortunately not possible here in Belgium where national ID cards are necessary for just about anything. Still, passive resistance remains an option for many of us.”
You know, when ID cards are mentioned in this neck of the woods and there is a cry of outrage from one section who do not want their identity including place of birth recorded on national database and a plastic card, there is another section who cry “what have you got to be afraid of if you’ve done nothing wrong”?
The US government provides a perfect answer to that.
As to headlines about the rich renouncing to avoid their taxes, those authors are almost criminally irresponsible.
That article has whipped up what could be described as an online mob baying for blood from those renouncing. Suggestions include permanent banning from the USA, confiscation of all US property including intellectual property, 100 percent taxes on any US income.
Still, we’ll see what the next few days bring.
I just had a look at the ways and means committee membership to see if someone from my former state (MA) is on the committee for me to complain to. It turns out that the ranking democratic member on the committee is Richard Neal of MA.
Before calling I thought I should see what Mr Neal’s views were on those overseas. It turns out that one of the original proposers of FATCA in 2009 was one….. Richard Neal of MA.
RO may or may not have dropped the ball here, but the guy running the show on the Dem side of the committee is just about the worst possible person for us.
@Biscuit
People who arn’t concerned really don’t care about us !
I even think they get pleasure in deceiving those who left USA to go live someplace else.
They don’t even see it’s harming US economy and destroying jobs IN the US !
Homelnadres are blocked on “stupid”.
https://www.google.co.uk/amp/thehill.com/business-a-lobbying/business-a-lobbying/327287-americans-abroad-lobby-for-tax-changes%3famp
I believe nothing anymore. RO will have to prove the accuracy of their words and Republicans generally will have to prove their worth with action. I will watch from the sidelines while supporting neither side.
@plaxy Rep Neal still does not get that the US is losing more by #FATCA than she is gaining. Hard to cure Stupid.
Who cares, as long as he doesn’t obstruct any expat-related improvements that might possibly, against all the odds, turn up in this wretched US tax bill.
Just left this comment at RO:
“You know, if RO had spent less time posting utterly ridiculous and irrelevant stories about Hillary’s emails and God knows what else then maybe you’d have been a lot further ahead by now. Being dutiful little foot-soldiers to the Fox and Breitbart nutjob conspiracy wing of your party doesn’t seem to have given you any additional political capital in Washington, so why don’t you just try focussing on the real task at hand from now on?”
Has anyone on this site commented about the Paul Manafort indictment that consists, in a large part, of FBAR violations? (Apologies if I missed it.)
I agree, Deckard. It turns a lot of people off, including me. It detracts from the good work they’re doing and does nothing to gain the support of those otherwise willing to support them on the single issue of US taxation.