by Andy Sundberg

Andy Sundberg is a committee member of American Citizens Abroad (ACA), which is based in Geneva, Switzerland

Background: “US, Switzerland ‘initial’ revised double taxation agreement”, 19 June 2009, GenevaLunch

There is, alas, much more to this story than what has appeared in print so far.

When ACA first learned about these negotiations, a few weeks ago, we asked the U.S. Embassy staff in Bern to help us arrange a meeting with the U.S. Delegation from Washington that would be coming to negotiate with the Swiss Government in Bern.  All of their attempts were rebuffed.

We then asked members of the U.S. Embassy staff in Bern to please transmit our written requests to the team. What we hoped to see happen was for this revised agreement with Switzerland to include provisions that were already contained in some other recently revised double taxation agreements with other countries. We had learned that such provisions were supposed to become standard components of all future double taxation treaty revisions.

Most notable in our request was for the United States and Switzerland agree to stop taxing the social security pensions that each country gives to citizens of the other country.  This provision was recently incorporated in the revised treaty between the United States and the UK, and also in the revised treaty with France.

We also asked for several other changes because, as you know, the Swiss Government does not tax Swiss citizens living in the United States, and so what we were seeking was a treaty that would come closer to parity in both directions.

All of our requests were ignored by the visiting delegation from Washington.

We never had a chance to meet or even talk with the U.S. negotiators.  They apparently had only one objective in mind which was to get an agreement to enhance the sharing of information on bank accounts as soon as possible.

This attitude of the U.S. negotiating team stunned us.  Why?

President Obama had made several promises to overseas Americans during his campaign last year, and we believed him.  He said then that:

• he wanted us to be able to get back to a more level worldwide playing field,
• he wanted to establish an on-going dialog with us, and
• he would work to ensure that we could become more active participants as partners with our home country.

All of that fine talk is going nowhere right now.

We are deeply disappointed that we were so rudely ignored on this important and symbolically unique occasion. It would have been very easy for the U.S. negotiating team to have at least granted us a few moments to talk to them in Bern and to share some of our suggestions with them.

But the answer was simply No.

Their total refusal to have any contact with us is not a good harbinger of things to come.  And with all of the dire threats that are now being voiced by the head of the IRS, and even by the President himself, it looks very likely that things could become much more grim and ugly for overseas Americans in the weeks and months to come.

Why do we deserve this?  And more importantly, how is this helping the United States?

If you think this is unacceptable, please send a letter to President Obama right away and share your concerns with him.  There seems to be no other way of communicating with this new Administration right now.

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