This is a common myth. If you don't intend to return to the USA there are no benefits to US citizenship, only downsides. The US may or may not rescue you if there's a civil war (see the fate of people in Yemen), but if they do, they will charge you for it at military rates you almost certainly cannot afford:

https://travel.state.gov/content/passports/en/emergencies/cr...

See "Will the US government pay for my travel? What will it cost?" which says, essentially, that no, it won't. This is unlike other countries which DO evacuate citizens for free and DO NOT charge taxes on non-residents.

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/16061379-post8.html

This would be irony overload.

For someone who still remembers the cold war this is almost unthinkable.

It brings up my Rocky 4 warm fuzzy

But the link you posted said "We charge you the equivalent of a full coach commercial fare on a comparable mode of transportation at the time that commercial travel ceases to be a viable option."

Where'd you get the "military rates" part?

Your link says "We charge you the equivalent of a full coach commercial fare on a comparable mode of transportation at the time that commercial travel ceases to be a viable option."

The 45 minute flight from Port Au Prince, Haiti (after the earthquake) to Santo Domingo, DR cost $841.11.

I think this is because 'full coach commercial fare' is the most expensive coach option. Very few ever purchase it, excepting those who want full flexibility to change the schedule without extra fees, or request a class upgrade if available.

Still, the original argument wasn't about total cost, it said that being evacuated was a service you get just for being a US citizen. Not the case.

Seriously? US citizenship means you can travel with a US passport, which allows visa-free travel to many, many countries: https://www.passportindex.org/byRank.php

Even if that were true, what proportion of US citizens living outside the US (the class to which my comment and the immediate parent referred) have a 'Euro passport'?

No, I spoke to counter this claim: "If you don't intend to return to the USA there are no benefits to US citizenship, only downsides."

I did not comment on the downsides. I spoke only of the benefits, which the parent comment said did not exist.

I got a 6 month visa in the UK while laid over at Heathrow in under 10 minutes. Under "Reason for your stay in the UK" I wrote "a cigarette."

I wonder where the dead set certainty that the army will save them comes from?

Do you really think that every one of the millions of American citizens who travel or live overseas each year is supposed to tell the US about their current location?

I didn't presume there was such a requirement, but I also wouldn't have been surprised if the fine print somewhere made it a selectively enforced requirement. It doesn't strike me as more or less onerous than some other actions that are currently required.

There is no "supposed to."

I think you are correct, but when an official government agency "encourages" a certain behavior, it's not too much of a stretch to presume that one is "supposed to" do it:

  We encourage all U.S. citizens travelling or residing 
  overseas to notify the closest U.S. Embassy or Consulate of 
  their contact information so that, in an emergency, we can 
  contact them to provide important safety and security 
  information, or support during a crisis.

What would your guess be as to the chances that some sort of registration will be made requirement in the future?

Such a requirement is very unlikely for travelers. It's just not practical given how often plans can change. (I visited a salt mine in Austria. To my surprise we crossed into Germany during the tour. Would I need to tell the US about those 20 minutes in Germany, and when?) How much would it cost to run such a system? What happens if the system breaks - and we know the foreign tourist tracking system breaks? What are the advantages to the US?

It's more possible for permanent residency. But the US doesn't even require that of domestic citizens, despite the clear advantages there would be to know where people live. So I don't think it's going to happen any time soon. And what would be the penalty of getting it wrong?

And yes they were expecting a Saving Private Ryan moment.

generally US citizenship meant much more in the past than it means now since there are more interesting places to live (albeit in long term US might still prove as best spot... or not).

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/apr/01/american-civili...

The US evacuated government staff and contractors, but abandoned anyone else.

Also the Americans I knew seemed to expect helicopters to come pick them up and all that. Saying to your citizens they need to get out and we've got a navy ship in port that you can get on if you want isn't really evacuating your citizens.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1990_airlift_of_Indians_from_K...

Also, a naval vessel absolutely qualifies as evacuating your citizens.

No it's not. Especially so with the civil wars in the Arab world, they didn't spring up virtually overnight and almost across the board started well away from the capital cities where most expats and embassies/consulates are.

> Give me an example of a developed military that's gone into an armed conflict to rescue citizens. The closest I can think of is the rescuing of hostages. That's not quite the same thing though and very rare.

There are a variety of examples of this by practically every developed country. In the last two decades it's been relatively common in Africa and the Middle East. The US in particular has a number of such cases which can be found in this list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_United_States_mili...

Hostage rescues are very rare, I agree. That's an extreme measure.

I expect the reporting requirements are a burden for small banks, especially ones competing heavily on price rather than offering a full service. I'm not American, but am a similar burden to a bank, and was strongly advised to open an account only with the country's largest bank.

Is it a failure to report income taxes at all? Or do you make so much more than $100k/year that the double taxation is killing you?

I'm just trying to figure out what, other than their already-reported income being audited, has got all of your expat friends so spooked...

Later the rules changed, and they had to file taxes. Those who didn't know about the change ended up having to pay a big fine.

Lately, a new requirement was the need to file FBAR forms for every foreign bank accound and security: https://www.irs.gov/Businesses/Small-Businesses-&-Self-Emplo...

Many people didn't know about the new requirement, and they had to pay big fines.

What will be the next new requirement that startles people who don't have any contact with the country? No one knows. That is the risk, the uncertainty that there might be a requirement that you don't even know about...

When I found out about the new rules and then remembered the bank account (10 years later!) I realized I was probably not in compliance. That's one thing that spooks people: $2000 in a bank account you forgot about can lead to disproportionate fines. I had to do a lot of paperwork to get into compliance, and because I had to transfer the money I actually lost a lot in a poor exchange rate (due to various constraints).

Although since that seems to be what a lot of EU governments are calling "austerity", perhaps we have had it.

Tell that to the departments that are getting $1.1T less over an 8 year period.

Between the sequestration and the lack of budget increases, the US has been going through a period of federal austerity.

Of course, expecting fiscal responsibility from a government is a fool's errand. Screaming like a stuck pig and running around yelling "AUSTERITY! AUSTERITY!" if one even breathes a threat to feed them less, and then blaming everything bad that ever happens again on the AUSTERITY is exactly what I'd expect from them. What on Earth will they actually do when something bad happens?

See also: Every departmental budget ever, public or private (non-unioned employees expect a small annual raise as well)

We always had a surplus at the end of the year and the boss would tell us to spend it on anything and everything because if we didn't, there would be less money in funding the next year.

The amount of waste was incredible and it made me angry. It's why I went into the private sector/started my own company.

You also almost could never get fired. We had so many bad employees that basically sat to get a paycheck and take up space. If you are really lazy, it's great.

Because of this game that is played, it's very difficult to tell if a department 'ran out of money' or just spent it to meet next year's budget.

There's tons of waste in any large organization. In my experience, private companies have more waste (resources and personnel) then public organizations as they have much less oversight.

The point being, it's scare tactics. I filed a complaint with the https://www.irs.gov/Advocate and they are well aware of the issue. They have brought it up repeatedly in their report to Congress. The IRS's response is an FU and it shows how toothless the Advocate's office is. You can see their report on international issues here https://www.irs.gov/pub/tas/2011_arc_internationalmsps.pdf, The reporting requirements section is close to the bottom.

I work for the IRS and we'd love to get this squared away. Please contact me at [email protected] and we can resolve this immediately.

Best

Every time a US Customs agent asks me if I will ever be interested in becoming a citizen I laugh and tell them about situations like this.

When I was young I dreamed of moving to the US, now it is a huge joke because of all the paperwork and FACTA's "Hotel California" implications. Now I will never apply to be a US citizen. Especially because I would have addditional paperwork until I die.

BTW, this even affects Canadians and Canadian legal entities as we're all forced to declare we are not US Persons even if it is obvious we are not.

FACTA is an overreach of power and the IRS should do a better job pushing back against laws like this. The US was once known as "the place to do business" (at least in the Americas) but now it appears to be just a gigantic bureaucracy.

I think it is good people are renouncing their citizenship... Perhaps it is the only way to let the government know how bad the system is.

The OECD is adopting CRS which is a wider-reaching version of FACTA. 51 countries are adopting it in September 2017. Another 34 (including Hong Kong, Switzerland, Singapore, and the United Arab Emirates) will adopt it a year later, in 2018.

I have (some) hope that what we're seeing now is the teething pains and they'll go away in a few years. But (as a fellow expat) I agree it is not a great time right now :(

I thought you only had to file FATCA for bank accounts that had more than $10,000 USD in them at some point in the past year. Not a few hundred. Are you sure about that? (if so, oh sh*t)

FBAR is more insidious for the individual because any US taxpayer (not just citizens) is required to file an FBAR and $10,000 is a stupidly low number. Worse even if the money overseas isn't yours (in the case you have say signature authority over an account because of power of attorney) you still have to file. Even worse once one account tops $10,000 you have to report all of them even if they have zero balance. It's also not clear what constitutes an account. Example does a PayPal account count ?

The only conclusion I can come up with is that FBAR is basically there to make it easy for the Feds to do a Martha Stewart and get you for lying, because proving tax evasion is a bit hard.

(Disclaimer: Not an accountant. Consult an accountant for tax related advice)

Edit:

Oh, and the worth is calculated as the maximum value during the year. So if you get a contract filled for $10 000 and someone wires you the money, even if you imediately pay the rent and therefore have no money in the account, you still have to report the account.

Taxpayers with a total value of specified foreign financial assets below a certain threshold do not have to file Form 8938

From https://www.irs.gov/Businesses/Corporations/Do-I-need-to-fil...

You must file Form 8938 if: 1. You are a specified individual. tick! 2. You have an interest in specified foreign financial assets required to be reported. tick! 3. The aggregate value of your specified foreign financial assets is more than the reporting thresholds that applies to you: If you are a taxpayer living abroad you must file if: You are filing a return other than a joint return and the total value of your specified foreign assets is more than $200,000 on the last day of the tax year or more than $300,000 at any time during the year

For once, the IRS pages on this topic seems pretty clear.

The IRS rules concerning FBAR are here: https://www.irs.gov/Businesses/Small-Businesses-&-Self-Emplo...

And the pertinent text from that page: "Who Must File an FBAR United States persons are required to file an FBAR if: 1. the United States person had a financial interest in or signature authority over at least one financial account located outside of the United States; and 2. the aggregate value of all foreign financial accounts exceeded $10,000 at any time during the calendar year reported."

FATCA is a new burden on foreign financial institutions that requires them to report to the US government on US citizens who have accounts at their institutions. It's meant banks in several countries have refused services to US citizens and closed their accounts.

A United States person is defined as:

"United States person includes U.S. citizens; U.S. residents; entities, including but not limited to, corporations, partnerships, or limited liability companies, created or organized in the United States or under the laws of the United States; and trusts or estates formed under the laws of the United States."

(There are exemptions for very specific circumstances)

A lot of United States persons living overseas are unaware that they need to file, and a lot of permanent residents or H-1Bs in the US are unaware that they also need to file if they still have assets held overseas. They have ramped enforcement up over the last few years so a lot of people are out of compliance and don't realize it. Thankfully at least at the

See:

http://business.financialpost.com/personal-finance/taxes/unc...

(Disclaimer: Not an accountant. Consult an accountant for tax related advice)

It means that your fate is not decided by the law, but by arbitrary decisions of random officials. It is the opposite of rule of law.

Before then, http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-taxes-foreign-idUSTRE7... reports that after 26 months of work, and at one time with a likely penalty of $172,000, the final penalty was $25,000 total. Does that count as "come across"?

Even without paying the fine, http://www.thelocal.se/20120306/39522 reports "while Pamela may no longer be facing a seven-figure penalty, she's already racked up a bill of $40,000 in accountants' and lawyers' fees." Most of the cases I've heard of (the Reuters piece includes more) are of people who paid penalties under the voluntary disclosure program or had to spend a lot on accountant fees to get things straightened out.

And there's still the stress of worrying if a minor mistake out of ignorance when I send the information to my accountant might still end up with huge penalties in the future.

What happens if someone with no plans to visit the US and no income from the US that could be garnished says "So - come and get it if you want it"?

But notice how they've been working on new rules like FATCA that go after the citizen's bank, assuming the bank does any sort of business in the US?

For all I know, in 10 years the IRS will force the bank to extract penalties directly from someone's account.

the irs got the french gov to freeze all his assets claiming he was giving up citizenship to evade taxes.

But it makes the problem even bigger, because there is a push to go cashless (like fines if you pay cash over a certain amount - starting around 10k euro) and it's working - Sweden has 40% less currency in circulation than 10 years ago.

So, yeah, there are qualified tax advisors who can help but it's painful.

I've had to fix my taxes every year that i had paid Ernest & young to prepare them for me. had i trusted them blindly as most people do, I'd be subject to a couple $20k fines. of course, those depends on you being big/of interest enough to be bothered by the irs. but i like to have clean books and not count on luck.

As an american who has lived overseas, I totally agree with you about FBARs, it's beyond unreasonable.

But where is the austerity?

The reason the fines are so high is to catch criminals & tax evaders.

If you have a couple of hundred in the bank you don't have a filing requirement anyway.

http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-04-22/americans-t...

Have a look at this evacuation application:

http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/211837.pdf

Here's the key wording:

"3. I understand that: (a) I will be billed for the cost of my/our transportation no greater than the amount of a full-fare economy flight, or comparable alternate transportation, to the designated destination(s) that would have been charged immediately prior to the events giving rise to the evacuation. (b) My obligation to repay my loan will not be considered paid in full until it clears through the account of the Treasurer of the United States. (c) Until I have paid my loan in full, I and all listed U.S. citizen family members will only be eligible for a limited validity U.S. passport. (d) If my loan is in default, I and all listed U.S. citizen family members will not be eligible for a limited validity U.S. passports. (e) My loan will be subject to interest, penalties, and other charges for late payment as directed by law and regulation. (f) I will be liable to pay any costs for collection."

If you're interested in reading the State Department Budget:

http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/100033.pdf

You'll notice that US Citizens Services is self-funded from fees collected from Americans using their services. I'm not saying that's wrong or right, but by comparison, the Social Security Administration doesn't charge fees for services.

The US is the ONLY country besides Eritrea that taxes non-resident Americans. Interestingly, Eritrea's tax warrants "investigation" by Swiss authorities: http://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/controversial-levy_swiss-prosecu...

And from the British: http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2015/jun/09/er...

Yet, the US does the exact same thing.

Here's an economist article discussing the situation in more detail: http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21605907-americas-new-...

In the Facebook group Citizenship Taxation, FATCA and Citizenship Based taxation are the key topics. There are countless stories of double taxation (despite normalization agreements, as those agreements don't cover certain taxes like French Social Charges.)

My primary complaint about Citizenship Based Taxation is that Americans abroad have no representation. You register to vote in your "state of residence" -- so while you can just pick a state at random if you want, the fact is that we do not have representation because the representatives from a state represent residents of that state. It is illegal to register to vote in a state in which you aren't resident. To register to vote as an overseas American, you effectively have to commit fraud.

There's also the related issue of "Accidental Americans" -- these are Americans who became Americans by virtue of birth to American parents even if they have never set foot in the US. Many of them don't even realize that they are Americans -- however, they have FULL tax liability to the United States on all their income for their entire life. When they open overseas bank accounts, banks often discover they are a "US Person" and thus their accounts are subject to either not being opened or subject to seizure by the US treasury department for failing to report the account per FATCA. Violations start at $10,000 per incident. Here's an article about those penalties: http://money.cnn.com/2015/04/01/pf/taxes/irs-penalties/

My opposition to Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders is based exclusively on their support for FATCA (Bernie voted for it) and Citizenship Based Taxation. Clinton was the one who introduced the $450 citizenship renunciation fee (now raised to $2300.) Democrats Abroad is on record opposing Rand Paul's repeated bills to repeal FATCA. They also oppose the lawsuit challenging both FATCA and the constitutionality of citizenship based taxation.

I know this was a long rant, but this issue is one I face continually and it has harmed a large number of people for minimal benefit.

The myth that American citizenship has "value" to an overseas American is just that.. a myth.

Things like this and the Flint water scandal make me want to never work in the US, even if it's just a year. Dealing with your tax authorities? No thank you.

I get letters like that, too, also addressed to Japan but bearing a conspicuous bald eagle. An American citizen is a resident of the last state one had legal residence in for voting purposes even if one has no particular intent to return to it. One's friendly local State Department employee will happily confirm this:

http://travel.state.gov/content/passports/en/abroad/legal-ma...

For voting purposes, your state of legal residence is generally the state wherein you resided immediately before leaving the United States, even if you no longer own or rent property or intend to return there in the future. Twenty-four states and the District of Columbia specifically allow U.S. citizens who have never resided in the United States to register where a parent would be eligible to vote.

In reference to briandear's comment "It is illegal to register to vote in a state in which you aren't resident", that simply isn't correct.

However, I don't know what happens with Americans who were born overseas and are citizens because their parents were citizens, but who have never been resident in the US. Ahh, https://www.fvap.gov/citizen-voter/reside gives details.

But, once registered, you can vote as an absentee indefinitely from wherever you came from.

I'm not sure how it works in other situations, but I know that a few of my friends who joined the military moved to Texas and New Hampshire, as the military treats you as a resident of the state in which you enter service for tax purposes.

None of that is right. You cannot pick a state at random. The representatives are also there to support the overseas voters and citizens. And you do not need to be a physical resident in the state in order to register to vote overseas in the state. Moveover, registering as an overseas voter is not effectively committing fraud.

So I disagree with you. briandear was wrong on all points relevant to the snippet I quoted. Otherwise, I think your first two lines make the same points I made.

> Citizens residing outside the U.S. may not arbitrarily choose which State to declare as their legal voting residence without meeting the State's residency requirement. The following are basic guidelines to follow in determining voting residency:

> * Your "legal State of residence" for voting purposes is the address where you last resided immediately prior to your departure from the U.S. This residence remains valid even though the citizen may no longer own property or have other ties to their last State residence and their intent to return to that State may be uncertain.

> * Voting in an election for Federal offices only may not be used as the sole basis to determine residency for the purposes of imposing State and local taxes. If you claim a particular State as your residence and have other ties with that State in addition to voting, then you may be liable for State and local taxation, depending upon that particular State law. Consult your legal counsel for specific questions or situations.

The qualifier "for voting purposes" is why there's no fraud.

In any case, your complaint was about the lack of representation in Congress for overseas citizens, excepting by those who fraudulently declare residency in the state. The Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act says the state must allow overseas voters to vote in federal elections, and therefore do have representation, and without resorting to fraudulent means.

I went digging for more information and it seems that he now is potentially supportive of residence based taxation instead of citizen based taxation.

From reddit.com/r/expats4sanders, http://www.democratsabroad.org/our_candidates

There are many different scenarios which the law as it currently stands do not adequately cover for.

Scenario:

* Parent gains US citizenship through immigration. Parent inherits from grandparents.

* Person gains US citizenship through immigration. Person inherits from parents foreign bank accounts.

* Based on my understanding, US now has a claim on monies which have at no point entered the US, nor have been derived from US related activities.

* This is crazy.

I'm totally fine with paying taxes on income derived from being in the US but to have to pay US taxes on income derived elsewhere is just insane overreach.

In most countries when you inherit it's the estate that is taxed and generally the estate is taxed in country of domicile of the estate rather than citizenship of the recipient.

In your scenario the estate would would be taxed by the country of domicile, and then the remaining money transferred to you. If you were a US person then you would be taxed on any interest or capital gains from that point onwards.

That said this kind of thing is generally fairly complex (determining country of domicile for example is not obvious) so generally you would involve an accountant or tax professional.

The point being that the US has no business trying to tax income generated from funds that has never entered the country. Residence based taxation (like the rest of the world) would address this immediately.

(The non-domiciled rule in the UK being one notable exception)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_taxation

http://www.mvcr.cz/clanek/udeleni-statniho-obcanstvi-ceske-r...

A large part of the process is a motivational interview.

It's different for different countries in the EU.

I am thinking about living in Europe too.. but it has been difficult to decide.

Thanks and cheers.

Further, these tax treaties differ from country to country and don't always offer the same protections. Here, read the 42 page US/France tax treaty (https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-trty/france.pdf) and try to figure out how you'd be impacted if you were living in France.

We expats don't just have to hire accountants to do our taxes, we often have to hire international tax lawyers, EVEN IF WE DON'T EARN ENOUGH TO PAY US TAXES!

Studies have repeatedly shown that the majority of expats are abroad to find a job, to teach, to volunteer, or for love. We're taxi drivers, waiters, English teachers, farmers, computer programmers, and so on. We're normal people who are being massively screwed by rhetoric in the US.

Yup. Same goes for normal people who move the other way. The anti-foreign(er) consensus in the US political system/debate is almost as bad as the "tough on crime" madness.

And of course that's reflected in what people think. I remember being in a discussion after an interesting EE380 session (so not exactly bottom of the pile) and one of the guys started ranting about the evils of H1Bs driving down wages. I mentioned I was on an H1B and that what he said was illegal. He asked me how much I made, I asked him to guess. He mentioned a number. I said "multiply by at least 3". He kind of shut up after that...

The problem is that some companies break the law by playing around with job descriptions and job duties. There are people who aren't against immigration but who are against the H1B visas.

And of course the knee-jerk reaction is to make the laws even more draconian than they already are, when a significant portion of the problems are caused by the very draconian nature of the current laws (and non-enforcement against companies that flout them).

> The United States has entered into agreements, called Totalization Agreements, with several nations for the purpose of avoiding double taxation of income with respect to social security taxes. These agreements must be taken into account when determining whether any alien is subject to the U.S. Social Security/Medicare tax, or whether any U.S. citizen or resident alien is subject to the social security taxes of a foreign country.

You'll notice that's a much smaller list of counties.

(When I went to the local Swedish tax office to request a copy of the declaration that I needed to include in my US tax forms, to say I was covered under the Totalization Agreement, they didn't know at first what I was talking about. Asking for the form also must have triggered something, because a month or so later I got a phone call from the Swedish tax office asking for why I needed that information, and asking for a copy of my most recent US tax forms.)