I renounced my US citizenship • Hacker News Board

Re: I renounced my US citizenship

#81

Post by smilingtom » Tue, Jun 28, 2016, 8:51 PM UTC

danudey wrote: post #18

british_india wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really FATCA is one of the most excellent laws that has been passed. Prior to this, you had expats who had milked the US and then they wanted to waltz off with their proceeds. Americans gain huge benefits from the taxes paid by prior generations. The entire US system is the envy of much of the world--and how did it get that way? Americans paying their taxes. Whether or not you have kids--you must pay property taxes t…

As someone who lives outside of the US: your political and economic system is at best illogical, and at worst incomprehensibly clueless. Your government spends billions of dollars on wildly unsuccessful defense projects while at the same time arguing the there's no way to deal with poverty, access to education, homelessness, etc. By cutting back on defence spending, the US could still remain the most powerful militar…

> As someone who lives outside of the US: your political and economic system is at best illogical

What a dumb, dumb, dumb thing to say. Why are you not embarrassed to be saying things like this?

Re: I renounced my US citizenship

#82

Post by rogerbinns » Wed, Jun 29, 2016, 8:14 PM UTC

british_india wrote: post #50

rogerbinns wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also note that if the US does rescue you, then they also send you a bill for it. (It is capped at something like the price of a full fare economy plane ticket, which is still expensive.)

So, the State Department is supposed to maintain a worldwide set of consulates--with no charge to you--just so they can swoop in at your time of need and give you services that you then pay for. Do you think all those State Department resources just come out of pixie dust when you need them? Duh, no. We pay things called taxes to keep that worldwide network of consulates existing and available if you need them. No, l…

Amusing rant. Incidentally the personal attacks are highly amusing because I AM NOT AN AMERICAN.

As for the last paragraph, I am subject to FBAR & FATCA. The burden of them falls disproportionately on those who are not egregious tax evaders. It is extremely expensive and time consuming complying with them when you are doing the right thing. The evaders can afford to hide what they should be declaring by virtue of having more money, and having more to gain. Plus they have more loopholes and other ways of obscuring their money thanks to the same legislatures.

There are many ways things could fairer. For example these little people who are spending lots of time and money on filings could have their costs reimbursed. If living in a country with a mutual tax treaty then the exemption limit could be raised (currently $10k across all accounts). Or perhaps fairest of all is requiring all US tax payers to do the same thing - list all their accounts and all balances everywhere including domestic.

Re: I renounced my US citizenship

#83

Post by british_india » Sat, Jul 02, 2016, 1:55 PM UTC

klunger wrote: post #77

british_india wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazing how every rich expat who hates FATCA attempts to complain that it goes after "middle class Americans". How convenient if FATCA were repealed and the good old days of Tax Evasion could resume. It is precisely rich expats who have themselves to blame for FATCA. If you find the paperwork onerous--why not just renounce your citizenship? Must be that you get some advantages you're not disclosing by keeping your US…

Did you miss the part where I do not have a way to save for retirement? And why on earth do you assume that I am rich? Because I live in Norway? I barely qualify as middle class. Thanks to student loans and zero support from my family, I still have a significant negative net worth, despite the fact that I live as thriftily as possible and have been working as an engineer since 2010. If you are a US resident and mess…

Renounce at once.