Karen Alpert (Australia), John Richardson (Canada), Larry Stern (Israel) and Leonard Tuber (Israel) will discuss “territorial vs. citizenship-based taxation, their many advantages and disadvantages, and the myriad of challenges and questions posed by the US’s use of this type of tax system,” Monday 3 June 12:00 BST (11:00 UTC / 07:00 EDT).
You can submit questions at the TaxLinked site. For more information and/or to submit a question, click here.
A debate/discussion on Citizenship And Worldwide Taxation: Is It Morally Justified Or Unjustified? between John Richardson and Edward Zelinsky will take place Friday May 17, 2019, 14:00 EDT (18:00 UTC), hosted by TaxConnections, live on YouTube. It will run for an hour-and-a-half.
CBT is morally unjustified: John Richardson (Lawyer, Citizenship Solutions, Toronto, Canada)
CBT is morally justified: Edward Zelinsky (Law Professor, Cardozo School of Law, New York, USA)
Click here for full information, to see the questions which have been submitted, to pre-register, and/or to submit questions (P.S.: Note at the bottom of this page videos of people who we know.)
The United States Imposes A Separate And Much More Punitive Tax On U.S. Citizens Who Are Residents Of Other Countries, John Richardson, TaxConnections.
TaxConnections and CitizenshipSolutions Posts by John Richardson, Laura Snyder and Edward Zelinski written after this event was announced: Continue reading
The US Government Accountability Office has released an 83 page Report to Congressional Committees, “Foreign Asset Reporting: Actions Needed to Enhance Compliance Efforts, Eliminate Overlapping Requirements, and Mitigate Burdens on U.S. Persons Abroad”. Thanks to JC for posting this link on the Media page.
Related Brock post: April 2019 Report From GAO is evidence of how #FATCA and Foreign Asset Reporting is viewed in the Homeland by USCitizenAbroad.
Jordan Peterson accuses the government of preying on the weak, those who can easily become addicted to gambling and thus provide revenue for government coffers. In the meantime, gambling exacts an untold price upon the health of society. The government in Canada thus plays the role of organized crime in administering a vice that makes victims of the weak. We see from this that we should not look upon the government as a benevolent entity, but as a threat to our well-being.
Similarly, the IRS and compliance condors prey on the weak. On Dec 15, 2012, at the FATCA Forum organized by John Richardson, I argued that the Canadian government’s stance, that it would not collect FBAR fines, meant that those of us affected by the threat of the IRS draconian FBAR fines would have to stand up for ourselves–we had to be Clint Eastwoods–and that left the IRS to prey upon the weak and vulnerable residents of Canada who feared what the IRS could do to them if they failed to enter the OVDP/OVDI, i.e., the last, best chance for people to get right with God. When innocent benign actors (the non-Clint Eastwoods) entered the ODVP, the IRS exacted many LCU (“life credit units”) and made their lives hell.
Remember to gamble responsibly. That’s the government’s message. And when it comes to the IRS, you are on your own.
It is now 2019, and it’s been eight full years since I was a USA citizen. My date of relinquishment was 28 February 2011, but the IRS thinks erroneously that my date of relinqhishment was 7 April 2011. That means its been over six years since I last filed taxes and the statute of limitations for the IRS challenge my tax returns has expired, at least according to criminal law. However, if the IRS wished to claim that there is fraud on my tax returns and to attack me according to civil law, there is no statute of limitations.
In the case that one of the three exceptions does apply, the IRS has an unlimited amount of time to audit and charge penalties and interest.
Specifically, the IRS’s civil division can pursue taxes, penalties and interest indefinitely, and without any time limitation, if any one of the following three situations has occurred:
1. The Taxpayer Filed a false tax return,
2. The Taxpayer willfully attempted to illegally evade paying taxes, or
3. The Taxpayer Failed to file a tax return.
Of course if you are a Democrat candidate for President of the USA, fraud is not really a problem. Consider Elizabeth Warren’s attempt to pass herself off as American Indian minority, which circumstantial evidence shows that it helped to land a well-paying academic post at Harvard Law School. She had no more proof of her minority status than family anecdote and high cheek bones. Academic cheating is a serious enough problem that armed Federal Agents went to the home of Felicity Huffman, hand-cuffed her and took her into custody. So if you use the mail system (mail fraud) to bribe your child into Harvard or Yale, you get roughshod treatment from the FBI, but if you use fraud (and the mail system) to get a position at Harvard, you can become a Democrat candidate for POTUS.
Do former Americans regret renouncing their citizenship of a country where they are constantly threatened with jail time while their politicians get away with fraud? John Richardson says, “They almost all “regret” that U.S. laws have forced them to renounce U.S. citizenship (they wish they could have remained citizens of the country of their birth); but [t]hey NEVER feel that they made the wrong decision.” I think that Mr. Richardson must have spoken with me and a few other Brockers before he wrote that.
Brock Pub is where you can ask your questions or make somewhat off-topic comments.
US Supreme Court Rules Unanimously Against Excessive Fines
The excessive fines clause doesn’t prevent the federal government from actually threatening to fine you in multiples of your actual financial worth (in the case of FBAR, over 383% of your financial accounts). I’ve not seen FBAR fines applied at the rate of 300% but that doesn’t stop the IRS from threatening it. I called it a bluff. They would scare the crap out of you so that you would enter a voluntary disclosure program where you voluntarily handed over 25+% of your wealth.
A lot of Americans are apparently unaware that you shouldn’t put guns or ammo in your luggage if you are travelling to other countries.
California gas station clerk fired after ranting against woman speaking Spanish
An American gas station attendant loses her job after being rude to a bilingual woman speaking Spanish and asks her to prove that she was born in the USA. Apparently she is unaware that California used to be part of Mexico. I.e., Spanish speakers were there slightly before Trump supporters.
And a Canadian bonus:
Jody Wilson-Raybould and Jane Philpott kicked out of Liberal Party caucus
King Justin has kicked out JWR from caucas, hoping that Canadians actually believe it is less unethical to lie than it is to expose lies with an undisclosed voice recording.
Republicans Overseas is hosting an event, with House bill co-sponsor Congressman George Holding, Solomon Yue and John Richardson on the Taxation Fairness for Americans Abroad Act bill, London, England, 24 April 2019.
“There is a bill to fix citizenship-based taxation for Americans! Come learn all about it from its sponsor, Representative George Holding!
Representative George Holding (R-NC) will be walking us through his bi-partisan bill that introduces residence-based taxation for all American expatriates, titled Tax Fairness for Americans Abroad Act. This could mean the end of filing income taxes for non-US residents. He will discuss the ins and outs of his legislation, and how together we can get it across the finishline!
Solomon Yue, Global CEO of Republicans Overseas, will be here again to discuss the global grassroots efforts and necessary action items for the expatriate community.
John Richardson, Canadian tax lawyer of Citizenship Solutions, will be joining us again to explain why he endorses this legislative solution from a professional perspective.
. . . . “
Full details and registration at the EventBrite site.
Hot off the press from GAO – important because it illustrates how this issue is viewed in the Homeland: "Foreign Asset Reporting: Actions Needed to Enhance Compliance Efforts, Eliminate Overlapping Requirements, and Mitigate Burdens on U.S. Persons Abroad" https://t.co/T0k4HKll0j
— U.S. Citizen Abroad (@USCitizenAbroad) April 1, 2019
Question:
The above tweet links to the a report from the Government Accountability office. It is extensive but generally interesting. A quick perusal reveals no evidence that the Government views FATCA and foreign asset reporting as tools to enforce worldwide taxation on people who live outside the United States. Yet, that is the purpose of FATCA and foreign asset reporting in general.
The “Fast Facts” page includes:
How does the government prevent tax dodgers from hiding income in offshore accounts?
A 2010 law requires Americans and foreign banks to report more information to IRS about Americans’ foreign assets. Implementing the law, however, has raised some concerns.
For example, close to 75% of taxpayers reporting foreign assets to IRS also reported them separately to Treasury—indicating potential unnecessary duplication.
Also, some Americans living abroad can’t get services from foreign banks that find the law too burdensome.
Our recommendations to Congress, Treasury, and other agencies address challenges related to foreign asset reporting.
The 2010 Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, known as FATCA, created new reporting requirements for taxpayers with specified foreign asset
There has been a lot of dissatisfaction expressed in recent months, on the site and in e-mails to the moderators, regarding irrelevant/off-topic comments. It’s also important that Brock provides a place for people to express their thoughts. To strike a balance, we have installed a “move comment” function, with which we can move a comment to a different thread.
This should help keep things more focused while, at the same time, the person’s comment still appears on the site and discussion can ensue without overwhelming the original, unrelated, thread.
Moving a comment from one thread to another keeps both threads more useful to persons seeking help or information or simply having a coherent discussion on a topic.
We do not intend to eliminate thread drift from the site, just to keep certain threads focused, such as a post that deals with a project or a post focused on a specific type of information but someone posts a comment way off-topic; say, consulate problems on the FATCA thread.
Many topics overlap a lot, so don’t expect perfection — and every one of us undoubtedly has a different sense of just where “on-topic” ends and “off-topic” begins (can’t please everyone all of the time), so you may still see some comments you feel are out of place but to a lesser degree.
Thread drift is inevitable on a site that values sharing of ideas and opinions. It can be pesky and annoying, but sometimes it’s a good thing which expands discussion; and exchanging thoughts is important part of the Brock community. We don’t want to quench that! But this should keep parts of the site on target.
Swedish media, in a 5 day prime-time series, and the Swedish population explodes when finding out that their Swedish company operating in Europe did not respond to U.S. local law enforcement inquiries. Article from:
– https://www.svt.se/nyheter/granskning/ug/american-financial-authority-investigates-swedbank-in-money-laundering-case
– https://www.svt.se/special/swedbank/english/investigators/
“The New York State Department of Financial Services has initiated an investigation into Swedbank, according to a document presented to Swedish Television, SVT. The suspicions relate to misleading information in connection with the DFS demanding an answer from Swedbank about the notorious law firm Mossack Fonseca.
SVT has revealed that the Swedish banking giant Swedbank’s top management withheld information on suspect customers and transactions from US investigators.
On several occasions, in 2016 and 2018, Swedbank was urged by the financial authority DFS to disclose all contacts their customers had with the notorious law firm Mossack Fonseca, whose customers are linked to many criminal activities, including money laundering.”
… “DFS demands that Swedbank submit extensive documentation regarding business relations with Danske Bank. This involves transactions, customer information and notifications made to authorities, as well as all possible external and internal investigations that in some way may affect Danske Bank.
Swedbank has also been requested to provide equally extensive information on their business relations with three other banks that all have been involved in large-scale money laundering scandals: Ukio Bankas, ABLV and FBME.
The DFS has requested information on several persons and businesses that SVT previously have reported on. Among them Iskander Makhmudov and former Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych. The letter is signed by the head of the DFS, who writes:”
The New York authorities delivered the “request” to the New York local branch, and asked for a global answer.
The Swedish public is aghast that the Swedish bank operating in Europe would not have provided full criminal evidence to the U.S. legal agency.
The whole affair is related to the now-closed Mueller investigation, previously-prosecuted Manafort FBAR conviction, and the long-ago Soros/US-Aid funded Panama Papers affair.
It seems that the bank was “caught” handling Manafort-related bank transfers…….this despite the fact that Manafort was not convicted of money laundering–He got caught with FBAR violations, bank fraud, and tax cheating.
It also alleges that payments were sent by Swedbank to companies (including Manafort’s in the Caribbean. Never mind that many Swedish companies’ parent and daughter companies and ships are also registered there, and that global transactions go back and forth all the time. In these stories, the bank transfers are summarized as “money laundering” although there is no crime to launder.
So, when a U.S. legal agency “requests” information about any European transactions of anybody including any American, the Swedish media, authorities, bank officers, and public will all spank themselves if they don’t hand it over.
So much for those European constitutions and all that innocent-til-proven guilty stuff they’ve got written in there. Sweden had once held a spark of FATCA resistance, reversed itself, til it finally celebrated its FATCA surrender. Crying is now long over.
As a result of it all, Swedbank stock tanked (did Soros short Swedbank stocks too?) and depositors are jittery.
