Category Archives: Issues regarding US persons abroad

Most Homelanders think Americans abroad renounce citizenship because they “hate America” and “don’t want to pay their fair share for being a citizen of such a great country”. But really, if your only motivation is hatred, you might well come to regret your decision to renounce. In reality, as pointed out in a heartfelt piece by Dr. Leigh-Davis, now a proud citizen of the United Kingdom, people are happiest when they renounce for love, whether love of a person or love of the country which took them in and gave them a wonderful life:

Sure, one could argue, if you are making over $155,000 in another country, one will have to pay the U.S. taxes on this excess. But certainly, if you are making a lot of money, isn’t it worth spending a little of it on the pleasure of having a U.S. Passport to go back and forth as one desires, and benefit from all the great attributes of the United States? Moreover, the process of renouncing one’s citizenship and getting one’s U.S. affairs in order is an arduous and confusing one, which will most likely require the “expensive” assistance of financial professionals and attorneys. Additionally, if you are truly making so much money, the exit tax alone could offset any financial benefit.

Many people thought I was crazy, when I left the U.S. for love, and then thought I was pathetic when it turned out to be an unrequited love, and today I may never find the love of another. However, when weighing the financial benefits against the financial disadvantages, I would reiterate my argument: that love is always the motivating factor. Whether it be love of a new country; love of a new culture; love of new people; or love of a career; few people would undertake the complicated and difficult task of renouncing their citizenship, if there was not some love in there somewhere.

This is what the people in the country we left behind find hardest to stand: that among nearly two hundred other countries & territories on earth, the U.S. is not only one that is worthy of love. There are many places that can give us a good life, there are many that take in foreigners to whom they have no obligation and treat them as neighbours, and there are many in which we emigrants can become proud citizens.

Go read the whole piece.

UPDATE: This is the interview we’ve been waiting for:
Roundtable Full Interview
I wish I had time to listen to it, but I’m off to Calgary demonstration soon — almost an hour’s worth of Roundtable on this link. THANKS SO MUCH!!

Again,

James J Puplava, CFP, President, Chief Investment Strategist at PFS Group, with:

…Mark Nestmann, President of the Nestmann Group, Ltd.; Marylouise Serrato, Executive Director of American Citizens Abroad; Daniel Küttel, American expatriate living in Bremgarten, Switzerland; and Douglas Benedict, Canadian citizen and retired investment advisor. Daniel and Douglas share personal testimonials as expatriates enduring the overzealous pursuit of a government that has wrongfully identified them as tax evaders. Mark sheds light on the draconian FATCA compliance regulations that have erroneously identified law-abiding citizens as suspects, and Marylouise provides insight into the challenges of Americans who have elected to live abroad, offering help with the rigors of tax compliance and life away from the homeland.

Dear Doug,

I wanted to follow up and say thank you very much for your participation on our program for our recent expatriation roundtable discussion, and for helping to make the event a success. Jim was very pleased with the discussion, which I am sure will be very helpful and a welcome voice to expatriates in our listening audience.

Our recording of the discussion has been posted to our website, and is available for listening at http://www.financialsensenewshour.com/broadcast/insider/fsn2013-1022-expatrt-j8d3k9s.mp3.

Please accept my best wishes for your health and happiness in all your future endeavors.

Cheers,

Kyle

Kyle Otto
Program Manager

Greetings, Brockers!

I’ve been asked to recruit a panel of people who have been affected by FBAR/FATCA/Ex-PATRIOT, and to recommend an outline for a round table discussion on the FinancialSense Newshour. The purpose of this thread is to facilitate a community discussion about who would best represent the community and what topics should be discussed. Specifically, I’m hoping participants here will both volunteer to participate on the panel, and/or nominate or endorse others who they think would make good representatives of the community. Panelists need not be Brockers, but I’m hoping the Brock community will help me identify and recruit the panel.

Jim Puplava’s Financial Sense Newshour (www.financialsense.com/newshour) is the biggest investment-related podcast in existence, and is also one of the top 50 podcasts on the entire Internet, with over 250,000 regular listeners to the weekend program. There is also a weekday “premium” service offered on a paid subscription basis. The subject matter is primarily focused on markets and investing, but often extends to political and social issues.

Mr. Puplava would like to host a round-table discussion about how both American citizens living abroad and American expatriates are being treated in the “new normal”, including FBAR, FATCA, Ex-PATRIOT, etc. Specifically, a goal is to dispel the common assumption that the people involved are all greedy, rich tax-evaders, and shed some light on the reality of the situation, i.e. that most people being affected do not have a tax evasion motive, and are being unfairly targeted. I’ve been asked to help recruit the panel, and to suggest talking points for the discussion.

Continue reading →

Message from PoliticalXPat:

Admins take note.

Please forgive me for posting in the wrong place… I wanted to post a new topic, but it appears that is only available to users with a login id and password, and it’s not obvious how to obtain one. Also couldn’t find any e-mail contact info for the Brock society or Eric.

I have an exciting media opportunity, and would like to present for group discussion which Brokers would be best suited to participate in a round-table discussion about FATCA, Ex-PATRIOT, and its impacts on Americans living abroad and American Expatriates. This is for a very popular podcast (one of top 50 on the Internet on any subject). I need to either collaborate with Eric or other Brock leadership to decide who to invite to participate, or (better in my opinion) describe the opportunity in detail in a new post so the community can discuss which Brockers would be best candidates.

Could someone post an e-mail address for how I can “contact the management”, else advise me how to post a new topic myself? I also suggest a contact button be added to the site’s about page. If it’s already there, it needs to be made more obvious – I looked and couldn’t find it.

Thanks!

This was proposed by Just Me and seconded by a few others so I thought we could take a shot at it together.

The basic idea is to create a one page (maybe two) tract that could be used as a template – something that could be adapted to the local circumstances.  It could be sent to journalists, passed out during demonstrations or just emailed to people we know who are still very confused about what FATCA is, what it means, and why they should care.

Here are the latest updates as of  September 17, 21:51  Paris time.

What is FATCA?

The Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA)  is an extra-territorial U.S. law that demands that all financial institutions in the world report to the United States’ Internal Revenue Service (IRS) the confidential account information of millions of people it classifies as “U.S. persons”.

What is a U.S. Person?

A U.S. Person can be a U.S. citizen, a Green Card Holder, or the citizen of another country who has a connection to the United States.

Here’s how you may have a US connection:

* born in the USA
* born outside the USA with one or two American parent(s)
* lived in the USA for a number of years
* visited too long in the USA in any given year
* married to a US person
* share signing authority on an account with a
US person

Chances are very good that you, or someone you know, is a U.S. Person.   That means FATCA affects you personally.   Millions of people worldwide who do not consider themselves to be U.S. citizens are still considered U.S. Persons by the U.S. government even if they have never lived or worked in the U.S., are citizens of another country, and have never held a U.S. passport or Green Card.

But I’m not a tax evader or a U.S. citizen or Green Card Holder!

Under FATCA you are presumed to be guilty until proven innocent.

If your local bank suspects you are a U.S. Person, they will require that you prove you aren’t.

If you clearly are a U.S. Person, and your country has signed an agreement with the United States (called an “IGA”), then your local bank will send your account information to your local government who will then turn it over to the United States.

Under these agreements, this will happen even if your country has strict laws protecting personal privacy.  So far the following countries have either signed these agreements or have agreed to do so:  UK, France, Germany…..

What will the United States do with that information?

Under American law U.S. Persons are also U.S. taxpayers.  Those who live outside the United States are required to file tax returns, bank account reports and pay American taxes.  This is true even if the U.S. Person earns no income and has no assets in the United States.

You might consider yourself a responsible tax-paying citizen of another country but the United States sees it differently. If they think you are a U.S. Person then they feel they have the right to add you to the American tax base.

There are others ways they could use that information.  If enough countries are bullied into complying then the United States government will have a master list in their databases of all the people (and their assets)  in the world who have any connection however innocent to the United States of America.   That sounds a lot like the recent NSA scandals where the United States spied on citizens of other countries.

FATCA is spying by other means.

But I thought FATCA and all those reporting rules only applied to the rich?

Not true.  FATCA impacts ALL U.S. Persons:  rich, middle, or low income .

The filing threshold for one form, the  FBAR (Foreign Bank Account Report), is only 10,000 USD.  This threshold is the total of all that person’s accounts (checking, savings, and retirement) combined – not the value of any one account.  This means that even very low-income U.S. Persons must file and face stiff penalties – up to 500,000 USD and 5 years in jail – if they fail to do so.  The American IRS can impose these fines even if the U.S. Person is too poor to file a tax return and doesn’t owe any tax.

I’m not a U.S. Person and I don’t have any connection to the United States. What does FATCA have to do with me?

FATCA impacts ALL citizens in ALL countries in three ways:

1.  All  financial institutions worldwide are affected by FATCA.  The billions they will spend in compliance costs will be passed along to customers in all countries through higher FEES.

2.  Local governments and local taxpayers will bear the cost of the staff and information systems required to implement FATCA in that country.

3. Existing privacy and anti-discrimination laws will have to be downgraded in every country in order to facilitate FATCA.  This means that citizens everywhere can expect less protection of their privacy from their local government.

Part IV (What they can do about it)

Some ideas for this section:

Here I would point them to Isaac Brock first as a resource.  As them to join us or pass the link around to people they know who are affected by FATCA.

Then we can list the other sites we think they would find useful:  Maple Sandbox, ACA, AARO and so on.

US government handed over intercepted communications likely to contain phone calls and emails of American citizens. The agreement places no legally binding limits on the use of the data.

American citizen, the US government is eager to donate your privacy to any nation in the world, so that they may use it as they please.  Welcome to FATCA!

The disclosure that the NSA agreed to provide raw intelligence data to a foreign country contrasts with assurances from the Obama administration that there are rigorous safeguards to protect the privacy of US citizens caught in the dragnet

Source: NSA shares raw intelligence including Americans’ data

HONG KONG, CHINA (Catholic Online) – As Americans live and work overseas, they find themselves facing onerous tax reporting requirements designed to crack down on tax evaders. However, the paperwork and reporting requirements are exhausting.

For a few Americans, it is easier to renounce their citizenship and escape the burden.
Catholic Online

Also, from Jamaica:

Growing number of Americans giving up US citizenship

…US embassy in Kingston said it could not provide such figures as it wasn’t the Department of State that maintains statistics on renunciations and relinquishment of citizenship.

It said, too, that it couldn’t comment on the reasons people choose to renounce their citizenship as these were “individual and personal decisions”.

“A person who renounces US citizenship may, but is not required to, disclose his/her motivation for doing so,” the embassy told the Jamaica Observer by e-mail.

It explained that the Federal Register lists included persons who made renunciations in the presence of a consular officer, as well as those who lost citizenship by “performing another potentially expatriating act voluntarily and with the intent to relinquish US citizenship”.

“For example, if a US citizen voluntarily naturalises in another country and affirmatively represents to a consular officer that this was his/her intent to relinquish US citizenship at the time he/she naturalised, he/she would lose his/her US nationality and would be listed in the Federal Register”…

Jamaica Observer