Category Archives: Issues regarding US persons abroad

Getting over my initial trepidation of making my first post here I want to bring up the subject of the Access to Basic Banking Services regulations and what specifically are Canadians rights in this regard. First the rules are implemented by the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada which is part of the Department of Finance but has its own independent commissioner a woman named Ursula Menke. The Financial Consumer Agency was created in back in 2001 and mainly handles consumer protection issues related to the federally Chartered Banks and to a limited degree those of federally incorporated insurance companies and federally incorporate trust companies (Note in the US Obama’s Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is effictively based on the FCA as on its models). Its jurisdiction DOES NOT apply to the provincially regulated stock brokerages owned by the all major chartered banks(Canada unlike every other country in the world does not have federal securiites regulator like the US SEC, UK FSA, Australia ASIC etc.)

Back to the subject of Basic Banking regulations here in my mind are some important quotes from the FCA website:

Continue reading →

Hi folks. I created a shiny, new Facebook page for the blog and it should automatically pull new posts from here. The one thing I’m scratching my head over is how to get a Like button on the blog to link back to Facebook. Apparently WordPress only allows certain features to be linked on personal FB profiles rather than organization or community pages.

In any case, tell all your friends about the new page and Like us over at FB! Click on “Our Facebook Page” link at the right-hand menu.

Or simply search Isaac Brock Society through your account. “Like” us and feel free to share posts on your personal pages. Let me know if anyone has suggestions on how to make this integration better.

Yes, it’s hard to believe. For a link to the U.N. resolution confirming this check out:

https://twitter.com/#!/FBAR_Compliant/status/164084862381334528

The above tweet has a link to the actual U.N. resolution. Here is some commentary that I received on this issue:

Continue reading →

Well, the primary issue they have is that they don’t live in the United States. This makes them particularly deserving of punishment. And of course, they have no say in the political process. Easy game and low hanging fruit.

https://twitter.com/#!/renounceus/status/164032677903745024

A recent article in the Boston Globe (a response to the Romney tax disclosures) notes that:

“In fact, nearly half of  US taxpayers will probably pay no taxes at all for 2011, including 24,000 in the top 1 percent of incomes, according to the Tax Policy Center, a think tank in Washington. Some low-income families even get back more than they pay because of the Earned Income Tax Credit and other programs.” Continue reading →

 
On this last Sunday of January 2012, here at Isaac Brock Society, multiple threads seem to have converged on at least faint hopes that the US behemoth might turn to the sanity of residence-based taxation. Or not.

Some appear to hope that such a sea change might still solve problems they currently founder in, while others look toward (or have already realized) the certain freedom of consigning US citizenship to jettison. What is realistic?

Two academic articles offer a long view of where the United States has come from.

Continue reading →