Despite much effort on the part of those in Switzerland who were aware of the FATCA threat, the referendum against the Swiss IGA and the unconstitutional Swiss Application Law did not obtain enough signatures Continue reading →

US Tax By Default

Galloway interviews a certain Gwen (no last name to protect the innocent).

When it rains it pours.

CBC News: US FATCA Law Catches Unsuspecting Canadians in Its Crosshairs

Update January 16, 2014: Comments to this CBC News article are now closed.

I have sent a thank you to CBC reporters who interviewed me.

From: caroltapanila
Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2014 9:03 AM
To: Amber Hildebrandt, CBC ; James Fitz-Morris
Cc: Prime Minister Stephen Harper ; Kevin.Shoom@fin.gc.ca ; Michelle.Rempel@parl.gc.ca ; Kevin.Shoom@fin.gc.ca
Subject: Another thank you for the awareness you’ve provided the Canadian public…

Amber and James,

I see that comments are closed for the CBC News article with so many comments. I thank the commenters who supported me and the persons who tried to answer questions and educate on what is happening with US FATCA law coming across our border. I hope that many now realize it is the US’s citizenship-based taxation that makes it possible for the US to leech funds from US Persons in Canada, their Canadian government and each Canadian taxpayer.

More and more will be underlined the absurdity and the unfairness of all of this but that will not be resolution. Some (like my for my son and others whose “foreign” identification will not show a US place of birth, MAY HE FORGIVE ME FOR HAVING SOLD HIM OUT, although his “foreign financial accounts” are identified in the Foreign Bank Account Reports that I’ve “complied with” and sent to the US). It will be that some can be more easily nabbed and put through the wringer of the injustice of FATCA combined with US citizenship-taxation than others. None of this will be equitable and none of it should be as US Person “ignorance” allows criminalization by the US.

With the coverage you have interviewed us for and CBC has provided, I hope that more in Canada have learned of the powerful club the US has with its citizenship-based taxation – and, in my family’s case, that a smaller segment ARE ENTRAPPED, no two ways about that. The US could do something about this. It appears they will not. I’m not holding my breath. And, I am in despair that the other governments of the world can not show some strength and solidarity in saying NO to FATCA that reaps so much collateral damage for their own people.

As has been said by others, and I agree, in regard to the “streamlined compliance”:

But why the hell SHOULD anyone have to? And if they don’t for whatever reason – whether they don’t qualify, or they don’t hear about until its too late, or they don’t want to – then all bets are off, and IRS can penalize them to their hearts content. Finance Minister Flaherty has expressed approval (given blessing to?) the Streamlined program.; this presumes that Canadians with a US status SHOULD make all efforts to become compliant with USA’s immoral citizenship based taxation laws.

I will support all US Persons in whatever choices they have to make for themselves and their families. Yes, we all have to make our own choices. We still hold out some hope that our Canadian government will say no to FATCA. We still want to know from our government if ALL Canadians have the same rights, no matter where they were born, their discrimination by “nationality”.

Even the thought of the US being able to tax gains in our very Canadian personal residence sales that Canada does not makes me want to scream.

So, again, I want to thank Gwen for helping get the CBC coverage better rolling and you two for so respectfully interviewing me. Because of you, there are others in Canada now aware and starting their own research so they can eventually make decisions for themselves and their own families. US Persons in Canada and around the world are so scattered. It is unfortunate that we are not one big US Person group that could go out in solidarity to express the outrage we feel about yet more US collateral damage, this time us!

We have all have a hurt of this betrayal that in no way will ever be erased. It is helping me to have spoken out.

Again, thank you from the bottom of my heart for the opportunity.

Carol Tapanila

PS: I would love the opportunity to reach the person who commented about her, in this instance profoundly disabled son, who will be affected. Above all, I am glad that I reached her in this story but I am unable to tell her that – unless she was able to sift through the many comments to see my tardy reply to her. Continue reading →

According to the latest news, Americans with Israeli bank accounts could face troubling tax season, the Swiss “Program” is now being forced upon Israel.  Citizens of Israel living in Israel are now being pressured or forced into OVDP so that their retirement savings can be cleaned up by attorneys and US money grabs.

Here are some interesting clippings from the article which ring a bell:

• The banks are revealing the data because they are participating in a special program with the U.S. Department of Justice in order to avoid criminal prosecution themselves
• Americans with Israeli bank accounts may be in for a financial nightmare in just several months if they haven’t filed their taxes properly.
• Americans are able to take advantage of the Overseas Voluntary Disclosure Program (OVDP) for people who have violated the law.
• Americans with Israeli bank accounts really need to talk to an attorney
• OVDP is to give individuals who really did not know about the law a chance to make good, and to get people back into compliance and back into the system

National Taxpayer Advocate, Nina Olson, is being ignored.

Remember all those infuriating comments to articles over the last couple years, where we tried to respond and explain to the ‘homelanders’ that ‘US slaves’  (err I mean ‘US persons’) living outside the USA, are not the tax evading, rich expats that the IRS, and the US media, often make make us out to be.

Well, here is another one, and judging by the misinformed comments, it desperately needs some Brockers to set the message straight, once again – yes I know it is getting very old!  And just when we are getting a lot of positive media attention.