New anti-extraterritorial taxation expat organization forms; launches survey

"All current and former U.S. citizens and Green Card holders living outside of the United States, and their family members, are strongly encouraged to participate. This includes Accidental Americans," the organization said, in a statement released this week.

The survey will be open until Nov. 30, with the findings expected to be published in February next year.

In addition to Snyder, pictured left, the other founding members include Paris-based Keith Redmond, who advocates on behalf of Americans overseas through his own 7,000-plus social media group, American Expatriates, who will be the organization's treasurer; Dr. Karen Alpert, the Australia-based founder of the Fix the Australia/US Tax Treaty website (https://fixthetaxtreaty.org/), and a finance lecturer at the University of Queensland; Suzanne Herman, both an American and Canadian citizen from birth who is resident in Canada, and an independent advocate for Americans overseas; Paris-based former investment banker and U.S. citizen David Johnstone; and Toronto-based lawyer John Richardson, who advocates on behalf of the causes of Americans living overseas when he's not helping clients with their U.S. citizenship issues, or posting content on expat subjects on his website, www.CitizenshipSolutions.ca.

Alpert said she'd urge everyone who is eligible to participate in the survey. “There is strength in numbers – the value of this survey will reside in large part in a large number of people participating.”

Added Herman: “The survey is comprehensive, [which] is important in order to obtain as complete a picture as possible of how Americans living overseas are affected by the extraterritorial application of US taxation and banking policies.”

Snyder stressed that responses to the survey will be confidential, and that no identifying information pertaining to any participant will be retained, unless the survey participants choose to provide an email address at the end, which is optional, for follow-up contact.

SEAT’s founders discuss the survey in detail in a podcast at this link.

  To participate in the survey, click here. 

Why a new expat
organization?

Snyder admits that some people have asked why she and her fellow SEAT colleagues believe that a new expat American organization is needed, but adds that she doesn't doubt for a minute that SEAT will be filling a role that no one else is – at least at the moment, and that it's one that is urgently needed. 

Its purpose, she says, is, simply, as its name implies, to "end the taxation by the United States of the worldwide income of persons who are tax residents of another country".

"These policies affect many different kinds of residents of other countries: American expatriates, American emigrants, accidental Americans, Green Card holders, and, for each of these, their families," she says.

"The policies also affect the countries where they live, and, of course, they're also causing many people to give up their U.S. citizenship." 

Snyder stresses that SEAT will be "non-partisan", meaning that it will not be "for" or "against" any political party, even if, it some point, it may support certain policies that a party also supports.

It also will have no connections to any individuals or companies in the tax compliance industry.

The organization has a website, at http://seatnow.org/, a Twitter user name, @SEATNow_org, and a Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/seat.now.tax.