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US Person in Canada, Diane Francis: Is this person 100% FBAR, 8938, 1040, etc. US Tax Compliant?

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Financial Post: Diane Francis: Shaming Won’t Prevent Tax Avoidance

Does she take advantage of a Canadian Tax Free Savings Account (TFSA), have mutual funds, RRSPs? Are these profitable investments for her after her US tax compliance with 3520 and 3520A’s, 8621, 8891 form preparations? Does someone handle and pay for this compliance for Ms Francis?

And, why does she use the term “Tax Avoidance”? Does the CRA take their lead in terminology from Ms Francis?

But now the big nations — the United States and the European Union with its tax havens — are finally preparing to crack down on tax leakage as they struggle with debt and entitlement burdens and slow growth.

They have few choices: High profile tax evasion in Greece, Cyprus and Southern Europe has rattled the EU, as has Russia’s no-tax enticement of Gerard Depardieu to its jurisdiction. Finally, steps are being taken to remove secrecy in financial centers such as Luxembourg, Ireland, Austria and even the Switzerland.

The United States is also realizing that its tough system is being eroded by international tax gamesmanship. This week, the CEO Tim Cook of America’s Darling, Apple, was grilled by Congress on its clever tax avoidance schemes around the world and pilloried alongside Wall Street’s greedy and parasitic sector. Britain attacked Google’s and Amazon’s tax games, too.

But shame won’t do the job. Only an international tax regime, and rewriting of tax treaties that facilitate cheating, will.

To that end, the Organization of Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) is preparing a template for international tax collection to eliminate loopholes and rein in evaders that will be presented this fall to the G20.

36 thoughts on “US Person in Canada, Diane Francis: Is this person 100% FBAR, 8938, 1040, etc. US Tax Compliant?”

  2. Diane Francis seems to personify the height of hypocrisy, not that I wish anyone to have died in the jungles of Vietnam. Why is she a supporter of US citizenship-based tax policy? Does she even know what that means?

    Besides hypocritical, she seems delusional. She doesn’t even mention the word, FATCA.

  3. Tim,

    What is the information that Diane Francis’ husband from the US — do you know if he was a British person who immigrated to the US and then to Canada? This earlier blog of hers says he was a Brit: Diane Francis – an Old Blog, which says she married a Brit.

    More recent:
    Diane Francis’ ‘About’ Page, which says “Diane divides her time between Toronto and New York City.” So, perhaps she’s a delusional “homelander”?
    Wikipedia, Diane Francis

  4. http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/diane-francis/tony-merchant-pana-merchant-offshore-tax-havens_b_3023216.html

    Frankly, Canadians and others should adopt American tax laws where citizens are taxable irrespective of their residency. That’s how Washington stopped its crooks and gangsters from setting up shop in the Bahamas decades ago and how it catches most of them now.

    Meanwhile, Canada lets its richest go offshore; allows the economy of a province to be owned by Bermudian trusts; allows the family of a former prime minister to make a tax-free fortune offshore and then leaves the rest of us to pay the tab every Tax Spring.

    http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/diane-francis/canada-america-tax-system_b_2411458.html

    I occupy the unenviable position of being both a Canadian and an American citizen which means that I must file and pay taxes to each country.

    The Americans, and now the Australians, are the only nations that tax people on the basis of citizenship irrespective of residency. So whatever taxes I pay in Canada on Canadian earnings is disclosed to the IRS and, if tax rates would have been higher there than here, I send them the difference. And vice versa.

    Americans pay lower income taxes than Canadians, but some taxes are lower here than there. After this week, many Americans will pay higher taxes on dividends than Canadians as well as higher corporate taxes, estate taxes and gift taxes. Then Congress will begin to slash spending so expenditures don’t exceed their new income tax revenue ceiling.

    My expensive perch provides a unique perspective on what has been going on in Washington: the American process may be nasty and noisy but frankly I’m more than a little jealous that the taxpayer is the focus of their attention. That’s not the case in Canada where politicians have carte blanche, put everything on the tab and easily hike taxes. Here, the best one can hope for is to find oneself under the control of a fairly enlightened regime occupying all three levels of government.

  8. I am curious how she was able to naturalize as a Canadian citizen in the 1970s when dual nationality was prohibited.

  9. Why doesn’t she really write a National Post column of real interest — or include all her and her husband’s story on her “About” page?

  10. She likely changed her mind and went along with the US changing their law. She would know the US (wishy-washy) law which requires that US passport to cross the border and had no qualms about it re-instating her US citizenship and that of the Mr.

  11. I don’t believe the Mr. was ever a US citizen. As a Green Card holder he was subject to the draft but I don’t believe he ever was a US citizen. Not that I personally oppose dual nationality I am surprised that someone like Diane Francis would be in favor of it. Many Conservative minded people oppose it.

  12. “Divides her time between Toronto and New York City.” How she divides is not at all clear. Frank Francis receives no mention in her 2007 entry in Canadian Whos Who, only the two children. Career based mostly on writing about Canada.

  13. “Finally, steps are being taken to remove secrecy in financial centers such as Luxembourg, Ireland, Austria and even the Switzerland.”

    “The Americans, and now the Australians, are the only nations that tax people on the basis of citizenship irrespective of residency.”

    Does this woman not have an editor?

  14. Diane Francis again in the (Canadian) National Post this morning on “Why shaming won’t work with tax cheats”:

    http://opinion.financialpost.com/2013/05/24/shaming-wont-prevent-tax-avoidance/

    She ends with a strong statement:

    “And the last {best?] word goes to Seymour Schulich, Canada’s foremost philanthropist: “I think you owe allegiance to the place that gave you the opportunities. Americans [individuals] pay taxes no matter where the profit was made and that’s the way it should be.””

    Well, it is clear that my email to Ms. Francis suggesting more balance in her column was not effective.

    Perhaps you could give it a try.

  15. Wow! She’s a freaking loon! 8^O

    Okay. Hubby dodges the draft, and they headed north to Canada. Now she’s all pro America? Pro FATCA, and pro CBT, too?

    She thought Canada was good enough to take Canadian citizenship in the time where dual nationality was not allowed, yes? But now she’s waving the Stars and Stripes proudly, espousing the virtues of their bizarre and Byzantine tax code, and how it’s such a grand model for others to follow? To harass people for doing nothing wrong, and call them tax cheats? Really?

    Send her fucking ass back south now! We don’t need trailer trash like that in OUR country!

  16. @IRSCompliantForever, maybe later. I’m rather exhausted after getting verbally attacked by a gang of pro-double-tax advocates bothering Switzerland. They attempted various insults, intimidations and gang-support to silence me. For now, it seems that I’ve concluded the battle with the following statement:

    In Danemark, a resident is taxed at a rate of 60%. We both agree on that. It is not double-taxation when a resident of Danemark is only taxed by the Danish tax authorities.

    Yet, when the Dane works in America, the Dane is only taxed at a rate of 15%. America thus refused to tax the Dane at a rate of 60%, the highest of both rates. America refused to tax the Dane at the highest rate of 60%. Yet, you say that America must tax at the highest tax rate of both jurisdictions. Yet, America refused to do so.

    So, according to your argument, America is a greedy, slimy tax-evading tax cheat which robs money from the coffers of other nations. That’s a symptom of double-taxation.

    For your argument to be justified, America must tax Danes who are resident in America at a rate of 60% and refund the 45% difference to the Danish government. Yet, America refuses to refund the difference, refusing to pay its fair share.

  17. Seriously! How can someone relinquish one citizenship for another in the time that was a requirement to do so, and then take back the citizenship she relinquished like it never even happened? And yet she can lecture others on their ‘wrongdoing’?

    Why is nobody taking a hard look at her blatant dishonesty?

    We don’t need people like that here!

  18. Perhaps it’s similar to the “tax avoidance” that Ms Francis speaks of — milking the country of each of her dual citizenships as the journalist???? she is?

    Who wrote her bio?

    Diane Francis is a Canadian-American award-winning columnist, bestselling author, journalist, broadcaster and entrepreneur. She is the Editor-at-Large at the National Post and a Distinguished Professor at Ryerson University Ted Rogers School of Management. She is one of the world’s leading business writers and keynote speakers on the trends and geopolitics that transform companies, individuals, governments and societies around the world.

    Diane has written nine books on white collar crime, politics, immigration, economics and finance, including the bestseller, Who Owns Canada Now: Old Money, New Money and the Future of Canadian Business. Diane is a regular guest on Canadian and U.S. news television and radio and was a columnist for Maclean’s Magazine, New York Sun, the Financial Post and Toronto Sun Newspapers. She was a Visiting Fellow at Harvard University’s Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy and has been a Media Fellow for the World Economic Forum for 20 years.

    Diane divides her time between Toronto and New York City.

  19. I feel that letters to the editor that are actually printed and published have much more exposure and impact.

    I suggest that those who have an opinion on Ms. Francis’ position (now stated unequivocally at least twice in her Post columns) send in this weekend a letter that is very short (e.g., three sentences) and absolutely courteous but “determined”, to the “letters” site of the National Post:

    http://www.nationalpost.com/contact/letters/index.html?name=Letters

    You will need to disclose your name, address, and phone number.

    Even if no letter is individually printed, the National Post might well comment on the editorial page that many such letters raising this issue have been submitted.

  20. Thank you, IRSCompliantForever!

    I filled out the form but get no icon to “Send”. I cannot find an email address for the National Post. Were you successful in sending through their online Contact page?

  21. @calgary411, I just sent my (three sentence) letter off and hope others do the same.

    There was a blue send button just below the letter form using the link in my posting above. I tried the website a second time and the blue send button is still there.

    [Sorry that names have to be disclosed, but you can try “name withheld by request” with an explanation.]

  22. The “Send” button doesn’t come up for me. (It may be my computer — I seem to be having issues and am doing a ESET scan right now.) Thanks — I will keep trying.

  24. Ms Francis, the US may have finally realized that CBT is harmful to itself as a nation. When they do eventually change to residency based, you can keep both your elitist attitude and “expensive perch” and elect to keep paying US taxes. Just leave the rest of us the hell alone.

  25. Similar to my sentiments, Letter to the Editor:

    Ms Francis is way over the top on her latest contribution to the National Post.

    Does anyone there read what she writes before publication? That the National Post allows this person to blur the lines of “tax avoidance” and “tax evasion” and blatantly declare US citizenship taxation is better tax law than what Canada has is self-serving.

    She has absolutely no regard (and likely no knowledge) of the immense “collateral damage” that US tax law is presenting for US citizens and residents in Canada in punitive penalties imposed by the IRS OVDI programs.. The IRS and US Congress fail to see the reality of FATCA and its reciprocity blow back to the US. The National Post fails to see that Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms privacy law will be breached.

    Unfortunately, Ms Francis, to me, seems to be a true elitist and not at all grateful for the opportunity Canada gave her and her “draft dodging” husband decades ago.

    Why would she even retain Canadian citizenship if she allows herself to run down Canadian tax law in favour of the law of the US?

    Does the National Post actually agree with what Ms Francis spews?

    (I would appreciate my name and contact information be kept confidential.)

    Regards,
    calgary411, etc.

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