Author Archives: Tim
How the US treats its citizens as "Chumps". The example of Emirates Airlines
Alberta launches skilled worker "recruitment" program to get US Workers to come to Canada
I thought I would link to an article I saw today mentioning that Alberta is launching a new recruitment drive to get skilled US workers to move to Canada. At a purely economic level it makes a lot of sense for Alberta is they have an unemployment rate that is starting to drift toward 4% at which point labor shortages start to occur. However, I can’t help but notice no mention is being made by the Alberta government of the US tax and filing requirements that these prospective US Citizen migrants to Canada are subject to.
1998 Treasury/IRS Report on US Citizens abroad and expatriation
Hi, I found an interesting report from the 1990s the US Treasury did that deal with many of the issues being discussed here. For everyone’s reading pleasure I posted a link below.
http://www.treasury.gov/press-center/press-releases/Documents/tax598.pdf
Additional 1993 Report
http://archive.gao.gov/t2pbat6/149177.pdf
What is interesting is neither of these reports mention FBAR
EU Parliament and FATCA
I wanted to post a link to a recent article showing some favorible remarks from some members of European Parliament related to FATCA. It appears MEP Catherine Trautmann is of France is quite fond of FATCA and recently called for the EU and US to join together to make FATCA a new global standard. Trautmann appears to have no regard for the issues raised here.
Canadian Parliamentary Delegation Visiting DC This Week
Canadians for Tax Fairness Summit March 29th and 30th
Interesting historical source of US Canada tax information
I found a rather interesting website of a now deceased Vancouver tax lawyer/preparer who at one time dealt with US Canada tax issues. The site has a series of newsletters and question and answers going back to 1993 (This is was in the “day” when there was an IRS attache located at the US embassy in Ottawa who dealt specifically with Canada). I would not necessarily bet my life on information from a dead person that is 15 years old but going through his newsletters (I am still going through starting in October of 1993); he appears to at least have some answers from the then IRS attache in Ottawa that “may” in fact explain some of the situations people find themselves in. The real funny thing is at least as of 1993 the IRS could administratively require anyone living outside the US who hadn’t filed to file returns going back to 1967.(I guess there was a big tax law change back in that year. This was definately before my time maybe Roger would know).
Here is his first newsletter from October 1993 that deals with the filing requirements.
This is the newsletter I am studying right now from March 1994 that talks about dual nationality and loss of citizenship issues.
Interesting Columns from Peter Clark
I actually found an interesting columnist at ipolitics.ca named Peter Clark if anyone needs reading material. Nothing he talks about is related to FATCA or FBAR but as a former high level official in the Department of Finance he gives a good idea in many of his columns as to how the US negotiates with many of its trading partners. As he puts it a steel fist in a velvet glove. Much of what he talks about is the US’ “hardline” take it or leave it negotiating stance in something currently known as the Trans Pacific Partnership. Clark is not at all against free trade he is just very much against the US’s hardline negotiating tactics.
Flaherty's original Sep 16 2011 Letter
I though it would good as I am not sure everyone has seen it to repost Flaherty’s original letter on September 16th 2011 sent but unpublished, to several major American newspaper (i.e. NY Times, Washington Post, WSJ):
