Liberty and justice for all United States persons abroad

The Isaac Brock Society

Yearly Archives: 2012

A Residence Based Tax Proposal – working paper issued by ACA

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A new working paper tax proposal is now posted at the American Citizens Abroad (ACA) website with the recommendation for fundmental reform of the US tax law affecting Americans resident abroad.

ACA will be sending this document to members of the House Ways and Means Committee and Senate Finance Committee, and urges all Americans overseas to contact by phone the tax staffer of their Representative and Senators in D.C. to inform them of this proposal and to encourage them to consider supporting legislation to move forward with this concept.

Please distribute this information as widely as you can in the US Expat community.

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Unnecessary

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Check out this Reuters story by David Cay Johnston: More Than 100 Million Unnecessary Tax Returns Filed Each Year. Highlights follow —

On March 28, the U.S. Justice Department sought to close a nationwide chain of income tax preparation shops it accuses of fraud.

Individual income tax returns … for most people are make-work that creates a drag on the economy, provide tidy revenues for Intuit, the maker of TurboTax software, H&R Block and other legitimate corporations that profit from preparing tax returns.

Riling up voters against the Internal Revenue Service attracts votes and campaign donations.

The average time for each criminal tax prosecution the Justice Department completed last year was 740 days, more than double the 345 days in 1992. Last year, the Justice Department completed only 3,656 criminal cases in which tax was the main charge.

Canada, with a ninth of the U.S. population, listed all 204 tax convictions last year at the Canada Revenue Agency’s website.
 

Civic groups filling in where the IRS falls down on the job: educating immigrant taxpayers about FBAR and FATCA

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Thanks to Congress and the IRS, ordinary taxpayers who migrate from one country to another face incomprehensible tax reporting and payment obligations, involving a burden of time and accountants’ fees all out of proportion to the actual monetary amounts involved. Immigrant and emigrant taxpayers who have failed to comply with these requirements despite their best efforts face huge fines. In response, voluntary groups are picking up the slack and holding seminars at their own expense to warn immigrant taxpayers about the burdens they face. The World Journal, a Chinese-language newspaper based in New York, reports on one such seminar held in Florida this past week. I’ve translated their article below.

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Column by MP Jean Crowder (NDP) on FATCA

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While this is fairly old I have never seen it before. MP Jean Crowder (NDP) seems to be very much aware of the provisions of FATCA in this writeup and is none too pleased.

http://jeancrowder.ndp.ca/post/jeans-column-on-the-u-s-foreign-account-tax-compliance-act-fatca-for-the-cowichan-valley-citizen-september-2011

Given where Jean Crowder sits on the political spectrum in Canada this could be seen as something pretty close to a ultimate betrayal by American “Progressives” coming from their Canadian “Progressive” brethren.

Shulman won't accept a 2nd term (Did anyone really ask him to stay?)

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IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman, on Thursday (April 5), in a question and answer session at the National Press Club in Washington, indicated he would step down when his term expires in November. As we have all heard before, he repeates the numbers of how many have come forward  (33,000) and how much they have collected ($4.4 billion).  Yawn, yawn.  And particularly offensive is the following:

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Civil disobedience in the face of desperate government: John Rubino video

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The United States is in serious financial trouble.  In 2011, the Federal Government borrowed over 40 cents for every dollar it spent, and the Federal Reserve Bank bought 61% of all the debt that the United States Treasury issued.  When the Federal Reserve buys the debt, it is called “quantitative easing”, which is a euphemism for creating money out thin air (not money printing--but the creation of electronic money).  Eventually, that will lead to high inflation, which is already becoming painfully visible in the prices for food and gas. Continue reading →

IRS Letter: "If we don't hear from you, we may have to increase the tax you owe or reduce your refund"

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As I reported earlier, I sent my 2009 tax return to the IRS and this is the letter that I received back in duplicate.  I suppose I just have to fill out the dates in the space provided on page one, send one copy of the form back, and that’s it.  Not sure what to do.  IRS speak (a.k.a. gobbledygook) is not always so clear.

Of course, it seems that they need my verification that I’ve lived in Canada in 2009, even though my accompanying letter indicated that I had become a Canadian citizen last year, and of course, my address is in Canada, whence I’ve filed at least ten years worth of returns.  What gives?

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