Liberty and justice for all United States persons abroad

The Isaac Brock Society

Media and Blog Articles – part 2 of 11 (Year 2015)

You can access all years at this link: Media and Blog Articles – Links for All Years

If clicking on a comment link brings you to the wrong comment, click here  to get on the most recent page of comments.(alternatively, to reach the most recent comment page, go to  the url in the bar at the top of your browser and delete everything after http://isaacbrocksociety.ca/media-and-blog-articles-open-for-comments-part-2-of-2  )

Media and Blog Articles

EmBee suggested that it would be good if there was a thread for new articles, so that people would be aware of where to comment. So, I created this permanent page.  You could mention such articles in the comment stream for this page, or if I see one on another thread, I can copy the link to here. I’ll keep adding to the list, but not deleting, so we’ll end up having sort of a “bibliography” too.  [Note:  Some articles are not open for comments]

For more articles on FATCA, enter FATCA into Google then click on the link “more news for fatca” just below the most recent featured article.

Note also: JC suggests to see #FATCA on Twitter for latest breaking news. JC finds that is quite a good source and there even are some international articles that one may read using Google Translate.” Others may help certain tweets and articles remain in elevated position by retweeting them.

Be sure to read the comment stream for this thread — there are usually very recent articles mentioned there that are not yet on this list.

2015.01.01
Raising revenue off Caribbean backs, Bruce Zagaris, NationNews, Barbados.
On or about 2016.01.01
16 issues to make 2016 candy for the market, Westfield Times.
2015.12.31
Tax reporting norms: FinMin updates guidance note on compliance, K.R. Srivats, Hindu Business Line, India.
2015.12.30
Top Tax Blogs from 2015, Tax Connections. (Congratulations to John Richardson and Lynne Swanson who placed 2nd and 4th!)
Global dragnet puts pressure on tax evaders as year-end deadlines loom, Jeff Gray, Globe and Mail, Canada.
IRS Employee Whose Job Was Assisting Victims Of Identity Theft Charged in $1 Million Identity Theft Tax Fraud, Paul Caron, TaxProfBlog, US.
How America’s Wealthiest Are Saving Billions Through a Private Tax System, TruthDig.
RA Returns Home, TaxProTalk forum.
2015.12.29
For the Wealthiest, a Private Tax System That Saves Them Billions, Noam Scheiber and Patricia Cohen, New York Times, US.
IRS Stirs Up New Crisis With Non-Profits Over Social Security Numbers, Eric Pianin, The Fiscal Times.
DNC Must Heed Warning Bells From 2000, Bennet Kelley, Huffington Post, US.
2015.12.28
IRS Creates “International Practice Units” for their IRS Revenue Agents in International Tax Matters, Patrick Martin, Tax-Expatriation, US.
MF investors: Les than a4th comply with US tax law, Jayshree P. Upadhyay & Ashley Coutinho, Business Standard, India.
IRS service should improve after some saw their ‘worst tax season,” advocate says, Robert Schroeder, MarketWatch, US.

Articles from earlier in 2015 are at this link

 Articles from 2014 are at this link

Media and Blog Articles Open for Comment thread, Part 1 of 2, is at this link

Media and Blog Articles Open for Comment thread, Part 3 of 3, is at this link

1,837 thoughts on “Media and Blog Articles – part 2 of 11 (Year 2015)”

  1. As to “I don’t understand.” Well, I think I do, at least partially. There are two factors:

    1) Desperation: Unable to raise enough revenue after cutting taxes to the very wealthy, the IRS and its Congressional lapdogs happened upon a new scam: revenue raising through fines and confiscation. The more they get away with it, the more they’re encouraged to do it. (Did you notice the Greek Prime Minister just yesterday telling the OECD that Greece will solve its fiscal crisis, not by raising taxes, not by cutting social services, but by “cracking down on tax evaders”. It isn’t just America who uses this as a pretend way to pay for government fiscal irresponsibility).

    2) Expat bogeymen: All governments need to perpetually create enemy totems in order to rally the population and distract them from real problems. After years of having to endure criticism about giving tax cuts to the mega-wealthy, the US government can now point and shriek: “Look! Tax cheats!” And everyone turns their heads and looks. Those made-up voodoo dolls called “overseas tax cheaters” are somehow more immoral than the innocent billionaires who are merely accepting tax breaks without violating any laws. I’ve certainly noticed a change among my progressive friends–there are many more cries lately to “tax the cheaters!” rather than “tax the rich!”

    I’m entirely serious when I say that I believe these are the real issues we’re up against, not the logical arguments about CBT and usurping other countries’ privacy laws.

    We are bogeymen. We are voodoo dolls having pins stuck in us to alleviate someone else’s pain. And we are being hosed by people who put the most clever Nigerian scammers and Mafia debt collectors to shame.

  2. @Barbara, you forgot that we are indeed Ex-Patriots…..aka TRAITORS…..aka YELLOWBELLY.

    Those terms have been used to my face……..

  3. @BarBara
    In the case of Greece- it actually is tax evasion that is very important. For Greece, tax evasion had become like a national sport. I know a lady who told me that the little hotel she stayed in told her their machine was broken so they had to write her bill by hand. Yeah sure. It happened EVERYWHERE. I dont know what percentage of the population was evading taxes but many many businesses would collect monies and not tell anybody.
    As for America- if tax evasion plays a roll then it isn’t the expats who are the reason. It is the tax evasion within America that plays a roll, IMHO.

  4. Hence the excitement for FATCA making GATCA.

    Scandinavia , with history of astronomical tax rates, has gone from extensive cash business outside the system to today nearly eliminating cash.

  5. I really enjoy going to a market in the not-rich countries down south, and purchasing home goods which were produced at small farms. Every sale they make is 100% markup as they have grown it or spun it or skinned it themselves. There is no receipt and they get to go home with cash.

    The only problem is that they often have to pay “special fees” to the lord of the public market.

  6. George, Barbara, usxcanada,

    You’re correct, and…

    I do see that our own countries as enablers who buy into the exceptionality of the US narrative, too weak to stand up for their own sovereignty and ALL their own people. That is why I find Canada’s Bills C-31, C-24, C-51 so dangerous for us — and for others. Protections we once had legislated away as we experience what two-tier citizenship is.

    I’d say that the Delaware (and similar) US hypocrisy is part of that US exceptionality, Polly.

  7. @Barbara re: “I’m entirely serious when I say that I believe these are the real issues we’re up against, not the logical arguments about CBT and usurping other countries’ privacy laws.”

    Today the problem Canadians with US taint face is CBT, and tomorrow it may be something else. We need a strong Canadian defence (a Canadian government reflecting the true will of the Canadian people) to stand up to whatever the USA throws at us next. US laws stop at the boundaries between the USA and Canada no matter what new ones(limited only by our imaginations) USA dreams up next .

  9. @Whitecat:

    (a Canadian government reflecting the true will of the Canadian people)

    There is no such thing as the will of the Canadian people.

    Each person has different wishes. There is the will of the majority who might just as soon throw Elizabeth May, MP under the bus as a “U.S. citizen living in Canada.”

    Remember what your math teacher said: For a statement to be true, it must be true for all cases. To say that the Canadian people oppose the FATCA IGA-enabling legislation is not a true statement.

    If you speak of “people” in the other sense of the word, a body politic, it cannot think, desire, love, hate or do any other mental action verb. It is common to speak of non-animal creatures “thinking” for example (“The bank still thinks I work at the factory.”) but in reality this is impossible. Bankers can think, but banks cannot.

  10. Sounds like the Minister for Financial Services laid his country a great foundation for FATCA success right before his departure to work at a “magnificent opportunity” in the private sector.

    “I’ve got my CLN and my career, screw the rest of you chumps” — Getting Ready For FATCA, the Ryan Pinder WayTM

  11. @TomAlciere,

    I was referring to the ‘will of the people’ as described by political philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau. In an ideal world/Canada, the ‘will of the people’ or ‘general will’ would “protect individuals against the mass, not require them to be sacrificed to it.” It is more of an idealistic concept that I was referring to which in essence is embodied in our Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

  12. As George pointed out:

    We need T Shirts, “Dual Citizenship is a Myth, I am Canadian.”

    Bill C-24 that takes protections from *dual citizens* from any other country, making them second-class citizens of Canada. Bill C-31, of course, first made *US Persons* second-class citizens of Canada. All should be protected by the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

    http://www.sfu.ca/education/cels/bilingual/bilingual-corner/bill-c-24.html

    …
    With the new Bill, Citizenship Canada redefined narratives of citizenship, what it means to be a Canadian, and what can be seen as an exemplary Canadian. But the critical issue is that new changes to the requirements for Canadian citizenship are not in the right and democratic direction.

    First, under the old system, citizenship has always been secure. Whether born in Canada or not, once a person was granted Canadian citizenship, his/her citizenship was secure. Unless he/she obtained citizenship by fraud, no one could revoke it. Even then, a Federal Court judge made that decision after a full court hearing. Under the new law, citizenship can be rescinded for reasons other than fraud, the decision will be made by a citizenship officer, and there will be no opportunity for a live hearing or an appeal.

    Second, the new law divides Canadians into two classes: First-class Canadians with no other citizenship or possibility of obtaining another one, and second-class Canadians who have dual citizenship or the possibility of dual citizenship. Interestingly, one may not be aware of possessing a second citizenship. In some countries, as long as you are married to their citizen, or you have a parent or grandparent of that country, you are also a citizen of that country without applying or even knowing about it.
    …
    It means that government would reward them citizenship for “good behavior” and could take it away for “bad behavior”. This is a form of “punishment,” and in fact, an unnecessary punishment, especially when there are other avenues to deal with the so-called “bad behavior”. The introduction of citizenship as merely a privilege, and not a right comes from the negative perception that immigrants are cheaters. It constructs the idea that immigrants, refugees, foreign workers, and naturalized citizens are terrorists or criminals and need to be deported to their “home countries.”

  13. Greenback Expat Tax Service

    http://www.greenbacktaxservices.com/blog/2015-us-expat-opinion-survey-infographic/

    86% of US expats surveyed said they did not feel their interests are well-represented in the US government.
    76% of expats surveyed do not feel they should be required to file US taxes while living abroad.

    I did get after them for sales dressed as survey, yet they did a nice job with the graphic representation of their survey.

    That 86% might not be too different from homelander Americans who give Congress an 18% approval rating.

  14. @Calgray411…..lets have a flashback moment to lets say….1982…..in the USA.

    What would the USA have said if Poland, the USSR, Hungary………

    all demanded that their respective citizens which included the children of certain parents to enter said country on said countries passport?

    So a child of a Pole born in Nebraska was required to enter Poland on his/her Polish Passport.

  15. George, we know the outrage of what would have happened then — and what would happen now if that was the process for any other country than the US. The same as the US homelanders can’t easily see the comparison of what is happening to persons living abroad (some of whom may return to the US eventually) to moving from one US state to another and being taxed by each US state.

    It all comes under *US Exceptionalism and Blind Patriotism* that allows, without the blink of an eye as it cannot be seen, the US hypocrisy. And, we don’t dare try to point it out or we shall be called traitors and get wishes that doors hit our posteriors as we cross (or crossed decades ago) an invisible new Berlin Wall.

  16. Re Greenback survey – 24% of expats agree with CBT? Must be made up of a lot of people who are living abroad temporarily.

  18. “Tax Laws Pushing Americans Living Abroad to Renounce Their US Citizenship,” Gabrielle Cintorino, CNS News, June 16th, article about Prof. Klekowski von Koppenfels’ Univ of Kent research study on why people are renouncing.

    This article is a follow-up to Ms. Cintorino’s June 10th article “Record Number of Americans Renounced Their US Citizenship in 2015.” The June 10th article also dealt with the Univ of Kent study, but it erroneously attributed high taxes as the primary reason for renouncing citizenship. Prof K von K and several commenters pointed out this error.

    Seems that Ms. Cintorino has taken a good look at Professor Klekowski von Koppenfels’ research study and communicated with her; and this new article gives a more accurate picture of the true situation than the June 10th article did.

  22. JC, snooze you lose….

    Actually I did make mention of this post but not under this thread. I put it under one of the two threads dealing with the Vatican signing on to FATCA. If you had been paying better attention you would have noticed.

    <<>>

  23. ooops …i meant article, not post.

    Also, in between those <> at the end of my comment I wrote something which disappeared after I hit submit for some weird reason. I wrote: STICKS OUT TONGUE AND RUNS…….

  25. State Department computers are busted again
    http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/06/17/us-usa-passports-delay-idUSKBN0OX2FY20150617

    The U.S. State Department does not expect to resolve a technical problem affecting travel visas before next week, a spokesman said on Wednesday.

    “Our Bureau of Consular Affairs continues to experiences problems with the visa system. This is a global issue and we’re working around the clock to fix it,” State Department spokesman John Kirby told a regular press briefing. “That said, for all the hard work, don’t expect the system will be on-line before next week.”

    For some reason a lot of the mainstream reporting is focused on the impact on temporary agricultural workers
    http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jun/17/government-computer-glitch-visas-migrant-farms
    http://www.wsj.com/articles/visa-glitch-stalls-workers-straining-u-s-farms-1434411601

Comments are closed.

%d bloggers like this: