Worth reading, in this week’s media:

Why more and more Americans are giving up their citizenship

Helena Bachmann, a contributor to Time Magazine, based in Vaud, has a long report in this week’s magazine about the growing number of Americans who are giving up their citizenship, a trend driven by changes in the tax situation: “According to government records, 502 expatriates renounced U.S. citizenship or permanent residency in the fourth quarter of 2009 – more than double the number of expatriations in all of 2008. And these figures don’t include the hundreds – some experts say thousands – of applications languishing in various US consulates and embassies around the world, waiting to be processed.”

Swiss see how the Swiss like to describe themselves to newcomers

Le Temps today carries a feature on an event organized by social network Glocals.com where local politicians and business people were invited to help newcomers to Geneva become better integrated. The usual caricatures of the Swiss surfaced, as they always do for newcomers, including, says the newspaper, “Punctuality, organization rather than improvisation and consensus are key words for the perfect little Swiss.”

But, the article points out, the heat was turned on when it came to discussing housing, that impossible thing to find in Geneva.

New name for GenevaLunch blog: Living in Geneva

Laila Rodriguez, a journalist and blogger for GenevaLunch, is celebrating the fact that she is no longer a total newbie to Geneva by changing the name of her blog to Geneva Living, to better reflect what it is about. The blog offers a wealth of information to newcomers to the city, as well as to the larger region. Laila also handles our events pages, and she is a wonderful source of news on a community level, for newcomers but also people who have lived here for years.

Helena Bachmann, who lives in the Lake Geneva region, has written a good overview for Time magazine on assisted suicide and Switzerland’s efforts to rein in death tourism. She reminds us that the current law dates back to 1942 and brings us up to 2009, with the Swiss government saying the law is now too lax and must be rewritten. Bachmann includes an interesting interview with maxillofacial surgeon Jerome Sobel in Lausanne, who is the president of French-speaking Switzerland’s Exit office (Dignitas is the other main organization that offers suicide assistance). As with so many issues, this one is not as black and white as we might like it to be and her article explores some of the gray areas. Recommended reading.

The next two weeks will be tense ones for the Swiss government and UBS, with difficult negotiations underway with the US Justice Department over the Swiss bank providing information to IRS tax officials on 52,000 bank clients. The problem dates back to July 2008, and in the early months there appeared to be little US media understanding of, or support for, the Swiss position, but the tide may be turning. The New York Times ran a more balanced editorial last week on the issue after several earlier articles that seemed to show UBS and Switzerland in general as evil-doers. This week the Wall Street Journal and today Time magazine carry articles on the standoff, and show a better understanding of the Swiss argument that the US is playing bully, expecting to ride roughshod over an existing tax treaty.

Nevertheless, the clichés don’t die hard and as is too often the case Time starts out by mentioning chocolate, watches and neutrality, for American readers who would otherwise possibly mix us up with Sweden, that other cold Sw- country. The clock might be ticking for the negotiators but at least Time left out the enduring (Austrian) cuckoo clock myth.