Month: November 2019

Foreign Enrolled Agents on the rise

FATCA – the full employment act for the tax compliance industry…

Increase in Foreign EAs

Bloomberg Tax is reporting a nearly 50% increase in the number of Enrolled Agents with foreign addresses. The article is troubling on many levels, starting with the title: “U.S. Tax-Dodging Crackdown Overseas Brings Foreign-Adviser Surge.” Apparently, the editorial team at Bloomberg has different ideas, because today they published “Stop Treating American Expats Like Tax Cheats.”

FATCA is truly the full-employment act for the tax compliance profession. Below the fold, I’ll examine the following issues raised by the increase in US tax compliance professionals outside of the US:

  • Has the IRS really “gone global”?
  • What support does the IRS provide international taxpayers?
  • Who can prepare tax returns?
  • What is an Enrolled Agent?
  • What to look for in a tax preparer
Continue reading “Foreign Enrolled Agents on the rise”

Revenue Neutrality

When the US Congress considers legislation, one of the standard criteria often applied is that the proposed bill should be revenue neutral – that is, any new costs must be offset by new revenue. But, should this be a consideration for proposals to move to a system of residence based taxation?

No other developed country taxes nonresidents solely on the basis of citizenship. Those who left the US as toddlers to return to their parents’ home country are (under US law) US citizens, but most do not identify as Americans and have few, if any, ties to the US. Taxing the residents of other countries who no longer have substantial ties with the United States is clearly over-reach. While there might be many opinions about exactly where to draw the line, a line must be drawn. It is a question of doing the right thing – and the revenue generated does not alter the immorality of taxing those who are clearly domiciled in other countries.

Furthermore, it is not clear how much revenue is actually generated by the taxation of nonresident citizens – or how much revenue might be generated by taxing nonresidents under the provisions currently applied to nonresident aliens. So any calculation of “revenue neutrality” is only a very rough approximation.

Last Friday, I joined John Richardson and Laura Snyder for a discussion of these issues prompted by a post on John’s website. Here is the resulting podcast: