There are an estimated 7.6 million Americans living in foreign countries, give or take. They come in all shapes and sizes, but there are some broad types—young people in their 20s flinging themselves into the world to teach English, work for nonprofits, start businesses and/or seek adventure; peak-age professionals working for international companies or institutions; U.S. military personnel and their families; dual passport-holders more tethered to their second nationality; graying bohemians who never figured out how to go back; and even the occasional retiree making their Social Security checks go farther.
Generally absent from the expat cohort are the Mitt Romney-style super-rich who were the target of the Foreign Account Tax Compliant Act of 2010 (FATCA), a terrible law that forces all Americans (and their spouses) with foreign-based financial holdings of more than $10,000 to engage in absurdly detailed IRS reporting or face punitively steep penalties, while also forcing foreign financial institutions to rat on their American clients and even perform collections on behalf of Uncle Sam. All for the prize of collecting a very small sum in extra tax receipts—an estimated $1 billion or so per year, or enough to fund the federal government for about two-and-a-half hours.
The super-rich have reacted like the super-rich do: either by complying (why not, they're rich!), or by parking their money into what few countries and institutions that still refuse to do the bidding of the Internal Revenue Service.
But what about our initial groups of expats? They're screwed, as a new Wall Street Journal report makes infuriatingly clear. Excerpt:
