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A record number of Americans have renounced their citizenship so far this year, according to data from the Internal Revenue Service. According to IRS data published in the Federal Register on Monday, 1,426 Americans expatriated in the third quarter of 2015, bringing this year's total to 3,221 so far. The figure is 25 percent higher than the same period last year, when 2,585 renounced their citizenship.

Every year we have a session at FreedomFest on “Tax Free Living and Investing Abroad.” The attendees want to know all about the benefits of renouncing their U.S. citizenship and living a “tax free” lifestyle abroad.Last year, nearly 3,500 Americans said good-bye to the states to live in the Caribbean, Latin America, Asia and Europe.Certainly, the U.S. government has imposed draconian rules and confiscatory taxes on Americans living abroad. It’s almost impossible now to open up a bank account in a foreign country because the foreign banks don’t want the hassle of dealing with U.S. tax authorities (it’s a misnomer...

Are you sick and tired of the IRS? Do you owe back taxes? Do you want to be finished with all of the threatening phone calls? The fear, the terrorizing and intimidation? Well we have the answer for you! Just renounce your American citizenship and become an illegal alien! IRS Commissioner John Koskinen — a compassionate and understanding guy if there ever was one — testified last week that illegal aliens working illegally in the U.S. while living here illegally would be allowed extra refunds from the IRS for money they earned while working here. Illegally. These illegal aliens who...

Significant numbers of people are continuing to renounce their U.S. citizenship or end their long-term U.S. residency. ... The Treasury Department is required by law to publish a list of the names of people who renounce quarterly. The list doesn’t indicate when people did so or why. It also doesn’t distinguish between people giving up passports and those turning in green cards, or indicate what other nationality the individuals hold.

That would be a great plan if he wasn’t also making it ten times more expensive to be a US citizen. I’m not sure what comes next. A big concrete wall and barbed wire?Obama is making it easy to come and hard to leave. The only places that do that are prisons and bear traps. It doesn’t say anything good about the American Dream when the country encourages non-taxpayers to come and penalizes taxpayers who want to leave. Americans who are abandoning their citizenship in droves are due to be charged five times more to surrender their passport under government...

Current administration would rather squeeze U.S. citizens for more revenue Just like the recent rise of business inversions — moving business HQ abroad — the United States has seen an uptick (up 221%) in Americans renouncing their citizenship. The elephant in the room in both these cases is taxes: both high taxes and burdensome tax compliance in foreign jurisdictions. Instead of facing the problems directly, the Obama Administration has resorted to punitive measures. The shame and blame tactic of calling out businesses who wish to relocate as “unpatriotic” was undignified. Perhaps realizing that using the same strategy with individuals would...

3,000 Americans around the world renounced their citizenship last year. Meet five U.S. citizens who have given up their passports -- or are thinking about it -- to escape an overly complicated tax code. I threw up after renouncing View photo.Donna-Lane NelsonName: Donna-Lane Nelson, 71Lives in: Geneva, Switzerland I renounced my U.S. citizenship in 2011. After I did it, I was so emotional that I threw up outside the embassy. During my renunciation, I broke down. It was like getting a divorce. America gave me my education, a good career path, and I came from a beautiful part of the...

What Gerard Depardieu is to France, Tina Turner may be to the United States. The "Private Dancer" singer is giving up her US passport, in favor of a Swiss one. "I'm very happy in Switzerland and I feel at home here. ... I cannot imagine a better place to live," Turner told the German newspaper Blick. Turner has lived in the Zurich suburb of Kuesnacht since the mid-1990s. The local Zuerichsee-Zeitung newspaper said on its website the local council announced its decision to grant the 73-year-old Turner citizenship in an official notice published in Friday's edition. The decision still requires...

07/03/12 Laguna Beach, California – In November, millions of Americans will trudge to their local polling places to cast votes in the hope of improving their lives here in the USA. Between now and then, a few hundred Americans will vote with their feet in the hope of improving their lives outside the USA.Last year, nearly 1,800 Americans surrendered their citizenship. In a nation of 300 million folks, 1,800 émigrés is hardly a rush for the exits. But the recent trend is, nevertheless, intriguing.As recently as four years ago, only 200 people checked out of America for good. Back...

Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin, under fire over the tax consequences of renouncing his U.S. citizenship, said on Thursday he is obligated to and will pay 'hundreds of millions of dollars in taxes to the United States government.' The social media entrepreneur and investor said in a statement, emailed to Reuters by a spokesman, that his decision to move to Singapore was 'based solely on my interest in working and living' there.

Eduardo Saverin can escape the United States, but he cannot slip Facebook. “Everything I do in my personal life, in my professional life, it’s completely there,” said Mr. Saverin, a Facebook co-founder, in his first major interview. “A lot of what I do, what everyone does, is influenced by it.” Alone among Facebook’s 900 million users, Mr. Saverin is special: a billionaire with only the vaguest of causes. He co-founded Facebook at age 21, then left two years later with a legal settlement that cut him off from Facebook but left him phenomenally wealthy. His stake will most likely be...

Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin may not be allowed to return to the United States after he renounced his citizenship to save millions in tax. The 30-year-old, who has a $3.64billion stake in the social networking site, migrated to Singapore ahead of the company's massive stock market floatation tomorrow. The timing of the move has raised eyebrows since Singapore does not have a capital gains tax, which could vastly reduce his bill on any payout. According to an immigration law, he could be refused re-entry to the U.S. if he is judged to have relocated for the purposes of avoiding taxes....

It is very sad that America’s tax system is so onerous that some rich people feel they have no choice but to give up U.S. citizenship in order to protect their family finances. I’ve written about this issue before, particularly in the context of Obama’s class-warfare policies leading to an increase in the number of Americans “voting with their feet” for places with less punitive tax regimes. We now have a very high-profile tax expatriate. One of the founders of Facebook is escaping for Singapore. Here are some relevant passages in a Bloomberg article.

Billionaire Facebook cofounder Eduardo Saverin is renouncing his citizenship ahead of the company's IPO at the end of next week. Saverin is the cofounder who got booted from the company WAY back in 2005. They made a movie about it. His 4 percent stake is worth about $4 billion and he's going to save a boatload on taxes with the move. Singapore, where Saverin lives, does not have a capital gains tax. He will have to pay an exit tax on his holdings, but it will be at Facebook's valuation now, not after the IPO. “Eduardo recently found it more...

If you think residing in America is taxing, just talk to one of the many expatriates who is contributing to a shocking statistic recently discovered: across the globe, people are renouncing their US citizenship in record numbers. At least 1,788 Americans officially threw away their US citizenship in 2011, exceeding the totals from 2007, 2008 and 2009 combined. The Internal Revenue Service has been keeping a tally of US citizens driven to renouncing that title since only 1998, but last year’s number has officially raised the bar when it comes to calling America quits. What’s more, experts say, is that...

A year ago, in Action Comics, Superman declared plans to renounce his U.S. citizenship. "'Truth, justice, and the American way' — it's not enough anymore," the comic book superhero said, after both the Iranian and American governments criticized him for joining a peaceful anti-government protest in Tehran. Last year, almost 1,800 people followed Superman's lead, renouncing their U.S. citizenship or handing in their Green Cards. That's a record number since the Internal Revenue Service began publishing a list of those who renounced in 1998. It's also almost eight times more than the number of citizens who renounced in 2008, and...

When Irish rockers U2 took to the main stage at this year's Glastonbury music festival, a small but vocal group of activists raised a large balloon emblazoned with the words "U Pay Tax 2?" Most people in the 60,000-strong crowd barely noticed the stunt on a rain-lashed night, but the world's media latched on to the protest and gave it prominent mention in their reports of the eagerly awaited performance by one of rock and roll's biggest acts. Years ago the band transferred some of its assets from Ireland to the Netherlands, as did members of the Rolling Stones, prompting...

Bush leans toward guest visas for workers GOP caught between business, conservatives on illegal immigrants By RON FOURNIERAssociated Press PHOENIX - Struggling to pacify his party's warring wings, President Bush is moving toward allowing illegal immigrants who came to the U.S. before February 2004 to qualify for guest-worker visas. People smuggled in after then would be deported. State leaders in Arizona and New Mexico have stepped up pressure on the Bush administration and the Republican-led Congress to better police U.S. borders and deal with an estimated 10 million people who are living in the country illegally."They're trying to split the...