Author Archives: Tim

Any thoughts from the Brock community?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guilty_Men

Guilty Men was a British polemical book written under the pseudonym “Cato” and published in July 1940. It attacked 15 public figures for their failed policies towards Germany and for their failure to equip the British armed forces adequately. It is the classic denunciation of appeasement, which it defined as the “deliberate surrender of small nations in the face of Hitler’s blatant bullying.”^[1]

The book’s slogan, “Let the guilty men retire,” was an attack on members of the National Government before Winston Churchill became prime minister in April 1940. Most were Conservatives, although some were National Liberals and one was Ramsay MacDonald, the late leader of the Labour Party. Several were current members of Churchill’s government. The book shaped popular thinking about appeasement for 20 years and effectively destroyed the reputation of ex-prime ministers Stanley Baldwin and Neville Chamberlain and contributed to the defeat of the Conservative Party in the 1945 general election. According to historian David Dutton, “its impact upon Chamberlain’s reputation, both among the general public and within the academic world, was profound indeed”

 

At the Vancouver Convention Center

I know many here place blame for FATCA and the FATCA IGA on the Harper Conservatives, and I generally agree with that view. However, I do think in the video below John Robson (Canada’s equivalent of Daniel J Mitchell) makes some important points. I know many Brockers will not like the idea of shrinking government for the sake of shrinking government, but I do think Robson is on to something.

and worse than Shulman: http://www.taxanalysts.com/www/features.nsf/Features/C21A42AD927007A285257D780057410A?OpenDocument

MR. HOFFMAN: What did you think of Steven Miller’s comments last week that he’s not sure that FATCA’s benefits will outweigh its costs, which were followed, I believe, followed shortly thereafter, by Nina Olson’s comments somewhat along a similar vein, concerned about the cost versus benefits of FATCA? COMMISSIONER KOSKINEN: Well, I think it’s always an important question if you’re going to make statutory changes and increase, by definition almost, some burden to some extent. You know, what do you gain from that? You know, we’ve already collected 6 or 7 — now over $7 billion in additional revenues that would otherwise not have been collected just through the offshore voluntary disclosure program. And, you know, that’s — there the burden was simply people had to come forward. It was a fairly straightforward process, so there was a fairly significant amount of money in return. I’ve always thought that the problem you have is you can’t measure the benefit just by the taxes you collect. What you have to do is measure the benefit by the overall impact on the system generally. And what I’ve always been, even before I got here, concerned about was if the average taxpayer felt I’m paying a greater burden of supporting the government because rich people with fancy lawyers and accountants don’t have to pay taxes, they can hide money in Switzerland. You know, hiding money in Switzerland has been a visible issue for 50 years. It’s corrosive to compliance and corrosive to the system. So when you’re going to talk about measuring the benefit, you can’t look just at the burden and the additional resources we get out of the filings there. But having said that, there are indications, not surprisingly, there was a preliminary review that said between 2011 and 2012 — in fact, you guys reported it — we got 500,000 more returns about foreign accounts with $100 billion of income. And we’re seeing the same thing in 1099-Ks.   But even as we do that, as I say, and we’re tracking, the voluntary compliance rate is going up as we go. In some cases, when people match, the revenue goes up, then suddenly their expenses magically go up. But those are signals that we can follow. So I think in FATCA, when you look at it, you won’t be measuring just by the amount of money we collect from the people we catch. You won’t be measuring it just by the increased reporting and money we collect from people who now are with the program. Ultimately, the benefit is, again, protecting the overall compliance rate in the sense of the average taxpayer that it’s a fair system.

Interesting Article:

http://www.amazon.com/National-Security-Government-Michael-Glennon/dp/0190206446/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1413856139&sr=8-1&keywords=double+security+and+national+security

http://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2014/10/18/vote-all-you-want-the-secret-government-won-change/jVSkXrENQlu8vNcBfMn9sL/story.html

IDEAS: Why would policy makers hand over the national-security keys to unelected officials?

GLENNON: It hasn’t been a conscious decision….Members of Congress are generalists and need to defer to experts within the national security realm, as elsewhere. They are particularly concerned about being caught out on a limb having made a wrong judgment about national security and tend, therefore, to defer to experts, who tend to exaggerate threats. The courts similarly tend to defer to the expertise of the network that defines national security policy.

The presidency itself is not a top-down institution, as many people in the public believe, headed by a president who gives orders and causes the bureaucracy to click its heels and salute. National security policy actually bubbles up from within the bureaucracy. Many of the more controversial policies, from the mining of Nicaragua’s harbors to the NSA surveillance program, originated within the bureaucracy. John Kerry was not exaggerating when he said that some of those programs are “on autopilot.”

http://www.usatoday.com/story/todayinthesky/2014/09/12/us-customs-preclearance-coming-to-more-european-airports/15505645/

The United States reportedly is asking five European countries to set up preclearance checkpoints at airports for customs and immigration. The expedited checkpoints for foreign travel are now available only in Canada, the Caribbean, Ireland and United Arab Emirates.

The Guardian newspaper in England reports no formal request has been made yet. But U.S. authorities approached England, France, the Netherlands, Germany and Sweden about setting up the checkpoints, according to the Guardian.

The exclusion of certain foreign-earned income (up to $95,100 in 2012) and housing benefits privileges income earned out of the country and encourages the movement of United States citizens to foreign jurisdictions.

1.    With respect to tax evasion and fraud, work to maximize wealth and income transparency. The Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA), and similar laws adopted by other countries, represents an important legislative step forward in requiring foreign financial institutions to report balances, financial activities, and transactions to a taxpayer’s home jurisdiction. Communions that recognize the fallen nature of humanity support transparent financial reporting. This transparency fosters equality and fairness, and helps address tax avoidance and fraud, including money laundering.

2.    Work with international coalitions and communions to oppose “race to the bottom” policies enacted by states and countries that seek to attract business investment and wealthy depositors by assessing extremely low tax rates and creating secrecy jurisdictions. These policies hurt economic competition by disadvantaging companies that do not engage in tax avoidance strategies and reduce government revenues needed for domestic social and economic development.

http://pc-biz.org/PC-Biz.WebApp_deploy/%28S%283502ffivihwvy1izhaly2rpl%29%29/IOBView.aspx?m=ro&id=4857

http://www.bostonglobe.com/news/nation/2014/08/25/massachusetts-licenses-rejected-parts-washington/iQl5H871MxTHAqpnN1Rj7N/story.html

Susan Podziba couldn’t enter a federal building near Washington this month because her driver’s license revealed an unacceptable home state: Massachusetts.

Bay State residents can no longer use their driver’s licenses to get inside some government agencies because the state is one of nine that have not signed on to a federal law called REAL ID. If nothing changes, they will even lose the ability to display their licenses to board a plane.

The REAL ID measure presses states to verify citizenship and update security standards when they issue licenses. Congress intended the act to prevent terrorists who arrive in the country illegally from boarding planes. But officials in Massachusetts and elsewhere have balked at a program they contend costs millions, raises privacy concerns, and infringes on states’ rights.

States face no direct penalty other than the frustration of their citizens.

Some restrictions — such as the one that kept Podziba, a public policy mediator from Brookline, out of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration — began in late July.

“It was bizarre, and then I really felt embarrassed,” Podziba said. “It was like wow, I am a US citizen and suddenly my Massachusetts ID isn’t good enough?”

She ended up conducting the high-level meeting in a cafeteria outside the security gate.

http://video.cnbc.com/gallery/?video=3000305368

http://online.wsj.com/articles/amity-shlaes-and-chris-edwards-a-simple-tax-reform-can-help-families-and-promote-economic-growth-1408919408

I have just started reading this book but it is giving my insight into American Homelanders and the desire for citizenship based taxation. Many of the claims cited in the book from the late 1800s are quite similar to those Prof. Kirsch and Co. make today.

http://www.cambridge.org/us/academic/subjects/history/economic-history/making-modern-american-fiscal-state-law-politics-and-rise-progressive-taxation-18771929

Here is an excerpt.

http://assets.cambridge.org/97811070/43923/excerpt/9781107043923_excerpt.pdf