Media and Blog Articles – Part 1 of 11 (to 26 May 2015)
You can access all years at this link:
http://isaacbrocksociety.ca/media-and-blog-articles-links-for-all-years/
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.
2015.05.26
New Survey finds US expat voting could impact 2016 Presidential Election, Greenback Expat Tax Services, NASDAQ GlobeNewswire.
This congressional committee wants to hear all your FOIA gripes, Colby Itkowitz, Washington Post, US.
The black money recovery skills of IT department are nothing to write home about, Vivek Kaul, The Daily Reckoning.
2015.05.25
The Intersection of US Federal Tax Law with Collection of International Information- – Including Other Federal Agencies, Patrick W. Martin, TaxExpatriaation, US.
2015.05.23
America the not so brave: America has led the global assault on tax dodgers and their enablers. But the reality still lags behind the rhetoric, The Economist, UK.
Cash Banned from Chase Safe Deposit Boxes, Matt Chilliak, Live and Invest News.
2015.05.22
US Steuergesetz hat unerwartete globale Konsequenzen, Colleen Graffy, Geopolitical Information Service. Also at Consequences of US widening net to catch tax dodgers, Colleen Graffy, World Review.
The horse may have bolted … but, Angelo Venardos, Asia Asset Management.
Important Correction: Passports Required to Enter and Leave US — but SSNs May be Optional, Patrick W. Martin, Tax Expatriation, US.
2015.05.21
Americans working abroad face unexpected financial issues, Sarah O’Brien, NBC, US.
Senate tax reform groups get more time, Bernie Becker, The Hill, US.
2015.05.20
Malaysia will defer FATCA reporting, FSI Tax Posts.
America’s Self-Inflicted Wound, Moises Naim, The Atlantic, US.
Janice Mays: The Tax Guru Who Guides House Democrats, Alex Brown, National Journal, US.
Sen. Rand Paul Launches Filibuster in Protest of Patriot Act Renewal, C-SPAN, US.
@Neill
“.. the government dragooning private sector actors into carrying out its functions so as to avoid presenting to the electorate a budget process with integrity that forces a debate over the tradeoffs the electorate needs to understand.”
It can also be said that the government has rewarded private sector actors by bamboozling the electorate into believing the US is acting with integrity when entering into many of its boondoggle wars.
Both are corrupt, but which party controls the dialogue – business with their hands in the government’s pockets, or the other way around?
@Bubblebustin
Corporations and the elite one percent control the Congress, Supreme Court and the White House. All these divisions of government get their payola from the corporations who are “persons.”
It is to corporations benefit to have FATCA on private citizens.. The compliance industry and the banking industry are willing to have this in effect. Corporations are given such low tax , no tax or able to legally move their corporations out of the USA. It is an unequal system that will cause the implosion of the country.
@northernstar
Rubbish. America is moving to a place where if you have nothing, do nothing and want more the doors are opened for you. You get a nice credit card to buy your stuff. You don’t have to get a drivers license to vote for more stuff. It’s OK to spend that money on dope.
Meanwhile if you have stuff because you saved what you earned working you face more and more crap. NIIT extra medicare taxes on your income. Extra paperwork on your foreign accounts with penalties. Limits on your deductions up to 80%. Limits of personal exemptions. Extra taxes on your investment income like the 20% rate and the 3.8% NIIT. Higher income tax rates. Limits on how good your healthcare can be and limits of flexible spending etc.
Obama wants to limit the deductibility of the 401k to 28%.
This is 1% stuff driven by a party that wants to punish them in the name of fairness. Where fairness means those who pay should pay more and those that don’t pay should get more.
@Neill
You and I have different values. I love my Canada “medicare”. Not everyone can drive because of disability or even want a drivers license. It has been studied that the younger generation of the USA is not rushing out for their driver licenses as in my era.. Many of Americans can not afford to have investments. In Canada we have no mortgage deduction and also we have a requrirement to put down 20 percent, at least on our down payment purchase of a home.. We are not taxed on the profit of the sale of our home, so I think this is a good form of capitalism. There is much inequality in the usa . I saw it in my last visit.
I came to Canada as a refugee. I believe that it is good when a country helps its immigrants. I met many in my younger days living in Canada’s biggest city . My children’s classroom was a UN representation of all the continents (except Antartica)
It is a myth that refugees and immigrants are moochers. Maybe some are but then I met many citizens of many generations in the USA and Canada that are moochers. Every barrel has them.
I believe in helping others up. not keeping them down. FATCA could be a good law… by the USA changing to RBT and then requiring all their homeland citizens to report their foreign banking outside of the USA. Instead the rich people and corporations get away with paying taxes.
You must know my brother, Bubba.
Great article:
http://online.wsj.com/articles/kuenzi-american-expats-tax-nightmare-1404924705
I am sure you will have to mess with the link to get past the pay wall.
@Neill.
What is great about the article? I will not subscribe to WSJ.
@northernstar
>What is great about the article? I will not subscribe to WSJ.
Looks like you want stuff for free. WSJ drops on the end of my driveway each day.
The article talks about the crazy rules expats face like having to deal for form 8621.
People worrying about retiring overseas.
http://www.early-retirement.org/forums/f28/concerns-over-fatca-72760.html
WSJ: American Expats’ Tax Nightmare: Fatca rules were intended to correct a tax loophole. Applied to Americans living abroad, they are absurd.
http://online.wsj.com/articles/kuenzi-american-expats-tax-nightmare-1404924705?tesla=y&mg=reno64-wsj&url=http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303473204580018943620005402.html
The article is very well done with a couple of good comments from Brockers.
@northernstar;
re the WSJ article, it can be found in fulltext if you google the title, no registration required:
‘American Expats’ Tax Nightmare
Fatca rules were intended to correct a tax loophole. Applied to Americans living abroad, they are absurd’
Excerpt;
……”officials are less willing to discuss how Fatca worsens the already profoundly unjust tax treatment of millions of middle-class Americans living abroad…..”…….
“…….One of the many ironies embedded in this Orwellian tax nightmare is that the complex foreign asset and foreign income reporting rules were not written with Americans abroad in mind. Their original purpose was to discouraging Americans living in the U.S. from using off-shore tax shelters. As originally intended, the rules were a reasonable legislative response to a gaping tax loophole. Applied to Americans living abroad, however, they are absurd.,,,,,”
@badger
Thank you so much…..I read the article and it is what I have been saying all along. FATCA was hidden in the HIRE Act. Senators with revenge in their hearts wrote it for Eduardo Saverin renouncing his citizenship. and probably the NSA had a hand it too as it is data mining.
I hope the article brings some clarity and attention to what FATCA is really about.. I am no longer an American citizen but I do care for everyone here. I did not invest in mutual funds , stock market or buy any US property after finding out about FATCA. America will not get any of my hard earned Canadian pension and RRSP money .
Now I tell everyone that I know that are Canadian snowbirds who go to the USA to not go….So many think staying 6 months every year is ok or buying USA property.. they all are getting very shocked. Perhaps there will be a lot of Florida and Arizona properties for sale. I guess the new Latino immigrants who intend to stay in the USA will buy them up.
@northernstar,
You’re very welcome. The title alone, appearing in the Wall Street Journal is priceless.
I too am warning would be snowbirds and those thinking of investing in US real estate or longer stays after retiring. Incredible how many have no idea. Have always only invested in Canada myself, so no hardship for me to continue doing only the same; and as far as I have influence, the US will not get any funds from my Canadian only household now or ever.
@badger
I think warning people is critical. I don’t think the USG can get away with this the more people know about it. The more people avoid the US or it’s investments. Notice in the early retirement group I stressed that if you want to live in a foreign country you likely have to renounce.
The HIRE Act was not written for Eduardo Saverin — he renounced some two years after the HIRE Act legislation. http://www.forbes.com/sites/briansolomon/2012/05/11/eduardo-saverin-renounces-u-s-citizenship-ahead-of-mega-facebook-ipo/
…although http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2012/05/why-the-ex-patriot-act-is-a-creepy-law/257368/
The way I read it, Eduardo Saverin, Tina Turner and others are fall guys ——— for the likes of Senators Charles Schumer of New York and Bob Casey of Pennsylvania (…are showing themselves to be irresponsible legislators by introducing a bill that they explicitly conceived in order to punish him). Eduardo Saverin renounced his US citizenship according to the law and, as far as I know, paid all required of him under the Exit Tax for ‘covered expatriates’. It makes no difference the amount of wealth you have for being victim to an unjust, punitive law.
As far as I’m concerned, Eduardo Saverin did a lot of good while he was a US citizen, directly or indirectly providing jobs for thousands of US homelanders. He knew when the writing was on the wall to be able to carry on business with more fair rules in another country. I say damn good for Eduardo Saverin!
Great article by Kuenzi at the WSJ. It gets my vote for best anti-FATCA article of the week!
@Calgary411
Thank you for clarifying this on Saverin…. I also agree with you on Schumer and Casey. They really show how hateful some Americans in power can be..
Maybe someday one of their family will fall in love with a foreigner who will want to move out of the USA to live in their partner’s home country. Then the shoe will be on another foot..
Here is more on the same vein that we should all be aware of http://www.moodysgartner.com/renouncing-your-us-citizenship-new-law-may-keep-you-out-forever/ — the evil punitive legislation like an Ex-PATRIOT Act. Does anyone wonder why the “homelanders” have the general mindset they do.
To me, it is just more brain-washing, rah, rah claptrap for why we are branded “traitors”. Let’s us not swallow the blatant picture they try to paint of Eduardo Saverin — the same one they paint of us as “wealthy fatcats”. This is not the rich vs the poor and middle class story. This is another chapter in US exceptionality and let’s call it what it is — truly a smear against any US slaves that leave the plantation.
One small psychologically uplifting thing we can do is when referring to Eritrea and the US as the only countries to inflict CBT on their citizens, be sure to mention Eritrea first 🙂
The author’s name and writing style is familiar to me. I think we’ve come across this piece before. One of the sites where it’s not pay walled, shows comments from several months ago. Is the WSJ recycling stories?
An opinion piece from July 6th — David Bly: Harper needs to stop this American invasion
http://www.timescolonist.com/opinion/columnists/david-bly-harper-needs-to-stop-this-american-invasion-1.1194259
National Review (a conservative magazine) has a piece riffing off the recent WSJ article: “The Tax Treatment of U.S. Citizens Abroad Is Absurd and Unfair, and Getting Worse”
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/382350/tax-treatment-us-citizens-abroad-absurd-and-unfair-and-getting-worse-veronique-de-rugy
Some commenters are sympathetic, others aren’t.
The author, Veronique de Rugy of George Mason University’s Mercatus Foundation:
https://twitter.com/veroderugy
@Eric
Its just amazing- we keep getting the same bullshit over and over again- about paying our “fair share”. It is like it is such a privilege to belong to this illustrious club that we should pay….. and actually in truth get nothing in return. Its like a scam we should buy into. Then they will twist it any which way to make us look bad – but if anything like this happened to them (=homelanders) and they found themselves paying for healthcare they didn’t receive ( many don’t want to pay for healthcare the DO receive) or being taxed doubly- they would hit the ceiling and revolt.
But come to think of it- where would a revolt get them? Nobody is getting anywhere with this government because nobody is being heard. But it is a shame that they continue to resort to persecuting somebody – which is the very modus operandi the government uses.
And FINALLY Forbes has got it right, it is about control: http://www.forbes.com/sites/greatspeculations/2014/07/10/not-just-fat-cats-hopping-through-fatca-hoops/
@Polly “It is like it is such a privilege to belong to this illustrious club that we should pay….. and actually in truth get nothing in return. Its like a scam we should buy into.”
If you do not complete the “membership form” each year you should be thrown out of the club “involuntarily.”
The US Supreme Court got it wrong. The violation of rights is keeping people in who thought they were out or want to get out simply and cleanly in line with typical Western Standards.
Petros understood the concept far longer than I but it finally sunk in. Citizenship can not be involuntarily imposed on someone who already has another nationality and does not wish to retain the former.
Seriously, getting out of Hotel California is like having a psycho “ex.” He/she will not take no and keeps after you and after you.
@George
I like you “Hotel California” description of FATCA.
@Charl
Great article you posted. Control, are the chains now starting to rattle?