Media and Blog Articles Open for Comments – Part 3 of 11 (Year 2016)

2,818 thoughts on “Media and Blog Articles Open for Comments – Part 3 of 11 (Year 2016)”

1. This is dated 14 May. Just put up on Twitter. I don’t recall seeing 10 days ago.

   FATCA, Tax Havens, American Competitiveness And Hypocritical Politicians

   http://www.forbes.com/sites/danielmitchell/2015/05/14/fatca-tax-havens-american-competitiveness-and-hypocritical-politicians/#22e7eb37630e

2. Above: 14 May – I don’t recall as it was 2015!

3. Compliance Complex guy claims “A non U.S. incorporated entity which has the shareholding or ownership of 10% or more by a person who was born in the U.S. or is a U.S. resident or citizen or a U.S. incorporated entity.” is reportable under FATCA
   http://www.prism.in/foreign-account-tax-compliance-act-fatca-the-act-and-how-it-impacts-your-institution-interview-of-samir-jayaswal-svp-head-of-operations-prism-cybersoft/

4. The Glossary in HSBC’s FATCA FAQ has this:

   US Citizen

   The term “United States Citizen” means:
   • An individual born in the United States,
   • An individual whose parent is a U.S. citizen,
   • A former alien who has been naturalized as a U.S. citizen,
   • An individual born in Puerto Rico,
   • An individual born in Guam, or
   • An individual born in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

   http://fatca.hsbc.com/~/media/fatca/pdfs/middle%20east%20and%20africa/fatca-rbwm-faq-mena-en.pdf

5. @Iota, are you implying its like being in a gang….you can not ever get out.

   Cheers,

6. @George – no. If HSBC are implementing FATCA due diligence in line with this FAQ, there could be a good opportunity for a legal challenge.

7. Another possible opportunity, from the same HSBC FAQ:

   . Am I only affected if I am a citizen of the US?
   No. If an individual’s account holds any of the following seven criteria, HSBC may request further information/ documentation to determine if you are a US Person under FATCA.
   • US citizenship or US residence
   • US place of birth
   • US address including US PO boxes
   • US telephone number
   • Repeating payment instructions to pay amounts to a US address or an account maintained in the US
   • Current Power of Attorney or signatory authority granted to a person with a US address
   • In Care of or Hold mail address which is the sole address for the account holder

   An “In care of” address is not allowed to trigger the Inquisition unless it’s in the US.

8. FATCA and the USA is mentioned in The War on Cash Is a War on Your Freedom to Opt Out

   Another official reason is tax evasion. But tax evasion is now so easy, once again cash is not required: The World’s Favorite New Tax Haven Is the United States:Moving money out of the usual offshore secrecy havens and into the U.S. is a brisk new business.

   THE BIGGEST TAX HAVEN OF THEM ALL? THE U.S., FATCA AND THE CRS “By resisting new global disclosure standards, the U.S. is creating a hot new market, becoming the go-to place to stash foreign wealth. Everyone from London lawyers to Swiss trust companies is getting in on the act, helping the world’s rich move accounts from places like the Bahamas and the British Virgin Islands to Nevada, Wyoming, and South Dakota.”

   The irony of the situation has not been lost on at least one foreign observer – a Swiss lawyer quoted in the Bloomberg report:

   “How ironic—no, how perverse—that the USA, which has been so sanctimonious in its condemnation of Swiss banks, has become the banking secrecy jurisdiction du jour. That ‘giant sucking sound’ you hear? It is the sound of money rushing to the USA.”

   So if large-scale money-laundering and tax evasion no longer require cash, why are governments so anxious to ban cash? The simple answer is to eliminate small-time tax evasion by making every transaction visible to authorities.

   This raises the obvious question: how much extra tax revenue would be raisedby eliminating cash purchases at swap meets, garage sales, farmer’s markets, etc.? Let’s face it–the revenues gained would be modest, as many of the people using cash don’t earn enough to pay much income tax anyway.

   As for drug-related transactions–does anyone seriously think a buyer of street heroin is going to log the sale electronically via a debit card? Or that the dealer would digitally transact the purchase as “heroin, sold by ABC Dealers, Inc.”?

   (Legalizing drugs and treating addictions as a medical issue would eliminate the illegal drug trade in one fell swoop. Look at Portugal’s positive experience as a real-world guide.)

   The real goal behind calls to eliminate cash is to limit our freedom to opt out: to drop out of the entire must-get-a-paycheck-and-pay-payroll-taxes lifestyle that supports the status quo.

   
   

9. @Iota..my comment was tongue in cheek.

   Cheers,

10. @Calgary411. I have also heard this about banning cash: it would make NIRP Negative Interest Rate Policies more effective. A problem with cash, is that once banks start charging you to keep money in the bank then you might just withdraw cash and keep it “under the mattress.” Thus state sponsored confiscation (remember Cyrus) to support state budgets would be better enabled by a cashless society.

    Some think that interest rates are about to turn around. Yet the trend (Japan, Europe) is toward negative interest rates (or near zero) to try and stimulate spending, economic activity, and inflation. One line of thought is that is 0% interest rates don’t spur people to spend then negative interest rates might do a better job of it.

    Of course, fighting money laundering and tax evasion is another part of it. Australia has a 10% GST. There is a cash economy to no only get around this but to also get around reporting income and exposing it to income tax. There are other measures that may be taken to combat these besides going cashless.

    In the US Delaware, Nevada accounts get around reporting. So once again only the minnows to get hurt.

11. My two cents (sadly relegated to Canadian history books now) on the cashless society:

    One of the many specious arguments the cashless-advocating, economic cadre will use to take away our last vestige of financial freedom and anonymity is that hardly anybody is using cash anymore anyway. So I would say USE IT OR LOSE IT. Everytime you swipe a debit/credit card, punch in your interac numbers or thumb in a transaction on your smartphone, instead of paying with cash, you only strengthen their argument for a cashless society. I’m dedicated to using cash even though I’m in yet another minority by doing this. I realized I was in this minority a few weeks ago when I paid exact cash for a food order and the woman had to count it several times before putting it in the till. I asked if it was the wrong amount and she said, “No, I’m just not used to getting cash.”

12. I’m with you, EmBee! I use cash for most of my daily transactions and will continue to do so until it’s no longer allowed.

13. I use cash for almost everything. I find credit cards not just a bonus but a danger because when tempted by something, you can indulge yourself which you might not if you see how much cash you have left in your WALLET. I actually just have a credit card for emergencies or travel.

14. @EmBee

    We do the same thing… we try to use cash for everything… Kids in the family are taught to save… if u can not pay cash for it… u do not need it… we live almost debt free… when the kids in our families graduate from university… not one dime is owed… all their cars are hand me downs… u want something better… u need to get a job to pay for it… Credit card maybe used for certain things but if it can not be paid off in full when due then it can not be used. That was how we were raised… we are passing it on

15. Apparently someone from Moodys Gartner will be on the west coast’s CBC AM radio show “Early Edition” tomorrow to advertise their complimentary US renunciation info session in Vancouver this weekend.

    http://tax.moodysgartner.com/vancouver-seminar-considering-renouncing-your-us-citizenship-2/

16. I would have signed up but I have a root canal booked and I avoid Richmond if at all possible.

17. @Duke

    I think I’d rather have the root canal.

18. @ Muzzled, Polly and USFP
    You are three people I would love to have ahead of me at the grocery store checkout … instead of the three or more I usually see fumbling with cards and keypads. The goal seems to be to eventually have everyone in debt slavery. I don’t want to ever be forced to join that chain gang.

19. Yes- it is really about living debt free. Aren’t credit cards what got Americans in such deep trouble with everybody buying beyond their means? Handing out credit cards to people who could not pay it back and then collecting late fees? That immense debt can’t be done with using cash- there you can SEE what you can spend. I live debt free and I LOVE IT.

20. When I have to choose between cash register lineups that have the same number of people, I usually choose the one with the most men. I’ve found that men are more likely to pay with cash.

21. Re: Moodys getting free air time from CBC.

    Here’s what you can expect. It’s happened before in Calgary.
    http://www.cbc.ca/homestretch/episode/2014/04/23/renouncing-american-citizenship/

    “I am writing to express disappointment with the [CBC Calgary} Homestretch interview about FATCA aired Apr. 23, 2014.

    FATCA is a U.S. law imposed on Canada through threat of economic sanctions, as if Canada were some kind of international “bad actor.” The Canadian government has capitulated and signed an Inter-Governmental Agreement (IGA) making the Canada Revenue Agency an agent of the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) solely so Canada can escape the sanction threat. But imposition of U.S. law in Canada creates a great injustice directly to about a million Canadian citizens, and indirectly to about 4-5 million Canadians if their families are counted.

    Renunciation by Canada-U.S. dual citizens is merely a symptom of this bigger story of drastic erosion of Canadian sovereignty and of injustice.

    And the Homestretch chooses to interview Alex Marino of Moodys Gartner, a firm profiting hugely from the symptom. No wonder he refused to identify the real issue. To alert Canadians would be bad for his business.

    The Homestretch would serve Canadians better if it were to focus on the cause rather than aid a profiteer of the symptom.

    Sincerely,
    Shovel”

    No response from CBC.

22. @Shovel

    We are looking into trying to get time trom same CBC channel to offer alternative viewpoint.
    If I remember correctly, the same thing happened here (Toronto) last time……..a CBC interview

23. @Shovel

    I wrote a letter to the Early Edition’s producer this morning, suggesting their guests tomorrow wish to capitalize on the FATCA goldrush.

24. It’s becoming clear to me that the idea of giving the government levers to use to coerce stuff from criminals always seems to end up with them using the levers to just extract the money from people who have broken nothing but the laws for the levers.
    So the FBAR is supposed to be a lever to use against money launderers. So they turn it to tax evasion and then just as a revenue raising instrument as the crime becomes not filling the FBAR.
    Likewise structuring is a lever to let them really hurt those will illegal income but it moved to a revenue raiser.
    We have civil asset forfeiture doing the same thing. People have died because of this as the police chased large fortunes they wanted to grab to spend locally.
    All the time these politicians think they are being so clever adding this stuff.

    http://freebeacon.com/issues/irs-took-43-million-from-innocent-americans/

25. Although the Tax Foundation has spoken out against the tax and enforcement policies against non-resident Americans here:

    http://taxfoundation.org/blog/more-americans-ever-are-renouncing-their-citizenship-and-taxes-are-blame

    http://taxfoundation.org/blog/americans-living-abroad-deserve-simple-fair-tax-system

    http://taxfoundation.org/blog/fatca-makes-life-tough-americans-who-live-abroad

    It’s president chose not to mention them in his recent presentation to the Ways and Means Subcommittee on Tax Policy, confirming once again that we are persona non grata even to those who claim to support us. His presentation focused entirely on adopting a territorial tax system for corporations:

    http://taxfoundation.org/article/perspectives-need-tax-reform?mc_cid=766f50bb2e&mc_eid=6f30773d2e

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