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FATCA Discussion Thread (Ask your questions) Part Two

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Please ask your questions here about FATCA.

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3,498 thoughts on “FATCA Discussion Thread (Ask your questions) Part Two”

  2. This is speculative, and “considering” can mean anything, but I am noting it here for the record;

    ‘IRS Has Received Many Requests to Delay FATCA; Prepares Technical Corrections to Regulations’
    Posted on 05/01/2014 by Cch

    “The IRS is “considering” many requests to delay the July 1, 2014, effective date of the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) (P.L. 111-147), a mid-level Service official said on April 30 during a webcast sponsored by the American Bar Association, Section of Taxation..”………….

    http://www.cchgroup.com/wordpress/index.php/tax-headlines/federal-tax-headlines/irs-has-received-many-requests-to-delay-fatca-prepares-technical-corrections-to-regulations/

  4. May 1, 2014

    Senators Roberts, Enzi, & Thune Introduce Bill to Block Bonuses to IRS Employees Who Break Tax Law or Have Tax Debt

    U.S. Senators Pat Roberts (R-Kan.), Mike Enzi (R-Wyo.) and John Thune (R-S.D.) today introduced legislation to prohibit the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) from providing performance awards to employees who owe outstanding federal tax debt or who have violated U.S. tax law.

    “Given what we know about recent IRS actions — and the growing discontent with the agency that I hear every day from Kansans — continuing to award personnel bonuses to employees who have outstanding tax liabilities or have violated the tax laws is outrageous and should be stopped,” Roberts said. “This isn’t a partisan issue – it’s just commonsense. Until the IRS gets back on course, it should not be in the business of awarding bonuses – particularly to its agents who are unable or unwilling to abide by the tax laws they are directed to uphold.”

    “The agency directly entrusted with the mission of making sure Americans pay their taxes should not be rewarding its own employees that are delinquent on their own taxes or have broken the law,” said Enzi. “This revelation just shows how out-of-touch this agency is with the real world and it’s a double standard that should anger every tax payer.”

    “It is unconscionable that while the American people spent $168 billion complying with the tax code, many of the IRS employees responsible for collecting federal taxes failed to pay their own taxes,” said Thune. “Even worse, these IRS employees actually received bonuses for their subpar performance. Congress has a responsibility to the American taxpayers to ensure we institute a permanent fix to this egregious behavior by moving forward with our common-sense legislation to prevent the IRS from awarding taxpayer-funded bonuses to employees who have failed to pay their taxes or fulfill their responsibilities.”

    At issue is the report from the Treasury Department’s Inspector General for Tax Administration on Internal Revenue Service on bonuses awarded to personnel who have violated the tax laws or who have been subject to serious infractions of employee policy.

    According to the Inspector General, close to $3 million was awarded to staff with violations on their records, with about half of that amount going to people with tax violations on their record.

    Other personnel at the IRS received cash bonuses or other awards despite being cited for drug use, making violent threats, fraudulently claiming unemployment benefits, and misusing government credit cards.

    In fact, the report indicates that close to 70 percent of IRS personnel receive some sort of performance reward.

    The bill, the “No Bonuses for Delinquent IRS Employees Act” would:
    prohibit the IRS from providing any performance award to any IRS employee who owes an outstanding federal tax debt;
    block any performance award to an employee who has entered into an installment payment plan for an outstanding tax liability until the payment plan has been completed.

    Companion legislation, H.R. 4531, has been introduced in the House by Representative Sam Johnson (R-TX).

    Roberts, Enzi, and Thune are members of the Senate Committee on Finance. The bill is also cosponsored by Republican Leader, U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).

    Permalink: http://www.enzi.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/2014/5/senators-roberts-enzi-thune-introduce-bill-to-block-bonuses-to-irs-employees-who-break-tax-law-or-have-tax-debt

  11. @Badger, your link puts to be the myth that Canada worked hard at negotiating exemptions.

  13. @WhiteKat maybe we should ask the Republicans Overseas for help with the charter challenge.

    Legal action for different angles is good, it keeps the opponent on edge and off balance.

  14. @George, good idea. I wouldn’t be surprised if one of our tweeters has done this already.

  16. @Just Me,
    re the letter to the editor in the South China Post http://www.chinapost.com.tw/commentary/letters/2014/05/03/406741/p2/FATCA-to.htm

    This quote stood out because the exact same disingenuous misdirection has been offered up to constituents and those affected in other countries, including Canada (and NZ?) ;

    “..In fact they had the audacity to call FATCA a U.S. domestic law and redirected me to AIT and the U.S. Treasury. If FATCA is a U.S. domestic law, then why is Taipei trying to impose it?…..”.

    There is a body of stock responses and phrases that keep coming up when those objecting to FATCA complain to their local officials and their political representatives in the NON-US countries they live (and often are voters and citizens) in abroad. The one quoted above is one we’ve heard from some Canadian MPs and the Canadian government as well.

    Is there an official FATCA propaganda manual or crib sheet that they are reading verbatim from – with blanks to fill in the country in question?
    Similar to Stack’s Myth generator?

    Did they work up their script together or did Treasury thoughtfully provide them with a helpful tip sheet on useful phrases/concepts to use as FATCA PR – just cut and paste them and fill in the blank for your country’s name…. ? Handy FATCA tip#1 ; don’t forget – at all times, refer to your own nation’s citizens and taxpayers only as; “Americans/American taxpayers in ________” or “US citizens/taxpayers in ______”. As i; “American taxpayers in Canada” or “US taxpayers” in New Zealand”. “Never refer to or acknowledge your own nationals as such; always reverse the Master Nationality rule and refer to them only as US persons”.

    By now, we could probably come up with a list of the stock phrases and excuses that have been deliberately promulgated by those who have signed us over via a FATCA IGA in the countries we live in abroad.

    Isn’t it pretty unusual for a sovereign country to direct their own native born or naturalized citizens and legal residents to treat directly with a foreign country for redress?

    Does Canada direct Canadian citizens and businesses to treat directly with the US government when a NAFTA or WTO dispute arises? Or advise Canadians of Eritrean descent in Canada that they should contact the Eritrean government Eritrea for relief from extraterritorial Eritrean tax laws applied on Canadian soil?

    Does the US tell American citizens of Cuban descent who live in the US, to seek remedy directly from the Cuban government on their own if a dispute arises?

    I would have liked to ask the academics at the CBT debate how they view a situation where the sovereign government of the country where we actually live and of which many are also citizens by birth or by oath, actively denies that we are part of the ‘polity’ and national community, and rather, refers us to a foreign country outside our borders for relief from a foreign law applied to us extraterritorially within our home country’s jurisdiction?

    Can a government pick and choose which of its legal citizens it will acknowledge are members of the ‘polity’, and which are not? Or pick and choose who to defend according to which other country also makes a claim on them?

    Canadian citizenship stands for nothing – acquired by birth or oath, if the Canadian government denies its own citizens equal protection and equal status while we are on Canadian soil – and refers us to the US for relief from a US domestic law that Canada signed on to with the IGA to enable a foreign law to be enforced within Canada.

  17. yes, they did. It’s the same rhetoric everywhere. Look at FATCA Dick Harvey’s interviews.

    The script is written everywhere. It is the only thing that the Obama circus orchestrated in their term–and it is total destruction of USA’s own population.

    You will hear again and again the same rhetoric.

  19. @MarkTwain…
    Re Emma… I don’t do Google+ or Facebook, but I did tweet her tonight…

  21. Is this really a 6-month delay to the start of FATCA, or are there some sneaky details hidden in there?

  23. Lots of interesting details (consitutional issues and FATCA, expatriations, etc.) in this story;

    http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/may/5/superlawyer-jim-bopp-takes-on-mccain-backed-tax-ac/

    ‘Superlawyer Jim Bopp takes on McCain-backed tax act that targets Americans overseas’

    …..”…Mr. Bopp, as general counsel to Republicans Overseas, presented to its board two other constitutional objections: violation of the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition against unusual punishment in the form of gargantuan monetary penalties and violation of the 14th Amendment’s ban on unreasonable search and seizure of the financial assets of Americans abroad…”..

  24. @Badger…
    You should probably put that WaTimes article over on the Republican lawsuit thread….. Never mind, I see you did… 🙂

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