Media and Blog Articles Open for Comments – Part 5 of 11 (Year 2018)

1,714 thoughts on “Media and Blog Articles Open for Comments – Part 5 of 11 (Year 2018)”

1. From The Hill—

   http://thehill.com/policy/finance/395869-hundreds-of-thousands-stand-to-be-denied-passports-due-to-unpaid-taxes

2. Would be nice if the journalist had asked how many of those US taxpayers did not live in the US.

3. Would also have been nice if they reported correctly that the amount owed to trigger losing passport includes not only actual taxes owed but also fees and penalties too.

4. The Wall Street Journal article that the Hill article is based on states:

   This amount includes assessed tax, penalties, and interest, but it doesn’t include “Fbar” penalties for not reporting foreign financial accounts, according to an IRS spokesman.

   https://www.wsj.com/articles/thousands-of-americans-will-be-denied-a-passport-because-of-unpaid-taxes-1530869401

5. Travel industry blogger covers passport revocation. Usual kneejerk reactions in comments & tweets: “you’d probably be better off buying fewer plane tickets and instead mailing that money to Uncle Sam”
   https://twitter.com/thepointsguy/status/1015673327598362626
   https://thepointsguy.com/news/irs-blocking-americans-from-getting-passports/

   And of course similar responses to Politico’s article on Fabien Lehagre
   https://twitter.com/politico/status/1014566776942755840

   “if you’re not evading taxes, there is also no real reason to renounce”
   https://twitter.com/nick_kapur/status/1015374025680289792

   “it appears they want to keep US passports but no responsibility or obligations”
   https://twitter.com/VoiceofBasildon/status/1015315530121728005

   et cetera ad nauseum

6. IRS mails Mexican child’s passport to Canadians in Nova Scotia;

   ..”The Turners, who are both Canadian citizens, had been in touch with the IRS for more than a year after selling a property they owned in Florida.

   Part of the process included sending copies of their passports to the tax collection agency as supporting documents. They received those copies back in the mail earlier last week.

   They didn’t expect any other letters from the IRS.

   However, on Friday they received an additional letter addressed to Richard Turner, which repeated that Turner was receiving his supporting documents. It came from the IRS in Austin, Texas.

   This time, though, the envelope contained the young girl’s passport. …”….

   https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-scotia/antigonish-couple-receives-child-passport-from-mexico-1.4738155

   And IGA countries like Canada are sending them FATCA data and assure us that it is safe and secure in the arms of the IRS?

7. Great! And it is these people to whom we are to entrust our “Name, address, account number, tax identification number, transaction records (account balance, change in amounts, etc.)”. What could possibly go wrong?

   Wait a minute. I thought that there was no communication much less coordination between State and Treasury because they hated each other or some such reason. What on earth was the IRS doing with anyone’s passport for any reason what so ever?

8. “ I thought that there was no communication much less coordination between State and Treasury ”

   It’s a Mexican passport.

9. ““ I thought that there was no communication much less coordination between State and Treasury ”

   It’s a Mexican passport.”

   And?

   The IRS has no business handling anyone’s passport, period. US, Mexican or Martian, they have no business even touching a passport. State handles passports.

10. “The IRS has no business handling anyone’s passport, period. ”

    Think you may be mistaken on that point. Mr and Mrs Turner sent their Canadian passports to the IRS; a Mexican family might well do the same for similar reasons.

11. From the article.

    “Part of the process included sending copies of their passports to the tax collection agency as supporting documents. They received those copies back in the mail earlier last week.”

    They sent copies, not the actual passports.

12. So it does. I stand corrected.

13. Off-topic, but may be of interest:

    The following item of hate speech was correctly identified as hate speech by Facebook software, and was therefore auto-blocked:

    merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.”

    Regrettably, the human owners of Facebook decided to overrule their own Code of Practice and allow the hate speech to be posted on their site.

    http://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/07/05/us_declaration_of_independence_labeled_hate_speech_by_facebook_bots

14. “Can you claim a refund of your wilful FBAR penalty?”

    The judgment [in US v. Dominique G. Colliot, May 16 2018] provided that the IRS acted “arbitrarily and capriciously” and could not assess a “willful” civil FBAR penalty exceeding $100,000 per account even though the law permitted an FBAR penalty assessment of the higher of $100,000 or 50% of the maximum amount in the unreported foreign account.

    https://www.angloinfo.com/blogs/global/us-tax/can-you-claim-a-refund-of-your-willful-fbar-penalty/

    This tax adviser goes on to express the view (right? wrong? who knows) that:

    Taxpayers who have already paid “willful” FBAR penalties in excess of $100,000 per account have a very strong argument that the excessive amounts should be refunded as they were improperly assessed under the rationale of the Colliot case.

15. More on that Canadian couple who were mistakenly sent a Mexican child’s passport by the IRS. They are refusing to follow the IRS’ instruction to return it to them. Bad idea?

    https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-scotia/antigonish-couple-receives-child-passport-from-mexico-1.4738155

16. I think I’d send it to the Mexican Embassy in Canada.

17. Delaware supports bill to end its status as tax haven:

    http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/intfinlaw/2018/07/delaware-supports-bill-to-end-its-status-as-tax-haven.html

18. Percentage of US Persons Overseas filing tax returns

    Solomon Yue says:
    https://twitter.com/SolomonYue/status/1016679949971828736

    #CBT is unjust/must be replaced w/ #TTFI. All ur complaints R legit. But I can’t defend no filings w/ them. Proponents used 600K of 9M filed returns, all expats have foreign accts & must be FATCATS hiding tax, 1099 4 expats is needed, renunciation is 4 tax avoidance 2 pass #FATCA

    If we as a community have a good come back to this with referenced statistics then, IMO that would be helpful.

    Here was my first response:
    https://twitter.com/JCDoubleTaxed/status/1016786702369579008

    That information is not correct. 9M of those who file is much greater than 600K. Many more file to their country of residence. Perhaps best not to perpetuate that those who live overseas pay no tax, when most live in higher taxing countries.
    Doubletax Sinkhole, not Loophole!

    I tried to look it up but did not see much. 45.3% pay no tax in the U.S. Yet the percentage who file is not the same as those who pay tax.

    @CrossBrit on twitter says 55% for Britain pay tax. Yet is that who pay tax or who file? If we say for Britain that 55% file, then there is the leap of statistics if we say that of the U.S. persons living in Britain 55% file taxes, not the 7% figure you suggest.

    There are others on Twitter giving reasons why people don’t file such as they don’t have the money to pay for it etc.

    The statistic of those overseas who file to the U.S. and those who owe can be a useful one for us as many many more overseas who file don’t owe any U.S. tax, then with the same comparison for U.S. resident filers. Then this gets caught up as the U.S. system is meant to encourage people to file to get a refund – and while they then owe no additional tax they certainly have paid tax. So maybe it should be stated those who either owe or who have paid U.S. tax.

19. Time to give up on Solomon Yue. In the first place his tweets are incomprehensible.

20. “ Proponents used 600K of 9M filed returns, all expats have foreign accts & must be FATCATS hiding tax, 1099 4 expats is needed, renunciation is 4 tax avoidance 2 pass #FATCA”

    I’ll never be able to understand such thinking from citizens of a country that was founded upon the principles the US was, especially the principle of “No taxation without representation”.

21. I also have no idea whatsoever what Solomon Yue is saying in his tweet.

    “But I can’t defend no filings w/ them.” (Did anyone suggest he do so?)

    “Proponents (of what?) used 600K of 9M filed returns” (for what purpose?)

    “1099 4 expats is needed, renunciation is 4 tax avoidance 2 pass #FATCA” (Say what? Come on, Solomon, use proper English. This is no longer the days of SMS text messaging. People like us might take the time to decipher your hieroglyphics, but no one you’re trying to influence is going to.)

22. “I also have no idea whatsoever what Solomon Yue is saying in his tweet.

    “But I can’t defend no filings w/ them.” (Did anyone suggest he do so?)”

    I for one stopped filing years ago because of the threat of $10,000 fines for missing or inaccurate information when I was unable to provide the information the IRS demanded. So for me, any change that requires filing is of little use.

23. “Proponents (of what?) used 600K of 9M filed returns” (for what purpose?)”

    I think he means “proponents of FATCA”. The FATCA fanatics are unsupportive of his arguements because they see that he is advocating for evil non-filers, whom they couldn’t care less about.

24. ““1099 4 expats is needed, renunciation is 4 tax avoidance 2 pass #FATCA” (Say what? Come on, Solomon, use proper English. This is no longer the days of SMS text messaging. People like us might take the time to decipher your hieroglyphics, but no one you’re trying to influence is going to.)”

    I think this tweet is for people like us. He is tellling us the opposition’s view. They will not repeal FATCA unless there is some kind of 1099 system for us. They believe that the only reason to renounce is to avoid taxes.

    Wish someone would school them that avoiding taxes is not wrong in any way and that there are many reason relating to FATCA that have nothing to do with taxes to renounce.

    Guess nonsmokers should take up smoking because they are avoiding tobacco taxes by not smoking.

25. Is he saying there should be1099 information returns for ex pats or that FATCA proponents say there should be.
    in either case this is batshit f***ing nuts. 1099s report independent contractor income, interest, dividends, government payments,withdrawals from retirement accounts, and debt cancellations. There are probably other items requiring a 1099.
    So they suggest everyone in the world reports all of this on every known expat. give me a break.

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