Why have U.S. Citizenship Renunciation Numbers Plateaued?
The number of U.S. citizens who have renounced has plateaued starting in 2016. That was the peak year with 5,409 renunciations followed by a similar number of 5,132 in
2017. See an older 2014 post that highlighted the then record of 2,999 for the entire year.
The 2014 Third Quarter Renunciations Is probably the New Norm –
The data used for these running compilations, with the individuals names published can be reviewed on the federal government’s website. The complete set of lists going back to the mid-1990s can be reviewed here. Quarterly Publications. Quarterly Publication of Individuals, Who Have Chosen to Expatriate
The total number of renunciations for the first two quarters of 2018 was 2,185.
None of this answers why these numbers have stopped increasing in a ski slope fashion?
September 8, 2018 at 2:56 am
I’ll guess a reason. If a person holds citizenship in the country where they hold assets (and often residence as well), they might have discovered they can give Uncle Sam a finger instead of tax forms. If they have no plans to visit the US, they won’t be affected by revocation of a US passport (which they might not even have).
Those of us who used to try to comply learned the hard way that compliance brings penalties. The IRS’s Taxpayer Advocate reported to Congress in 2011 that thousands of honest taxpayers were forced to renounce US citizenship. Maybe we’re all gone now. As non-compliers are the majority, maybe they don’t even have to renounce, they can just continue non-complying.
September 14, 2018 at 7:42 pm
The increase of the renunciation fee to US$2350 and the rationing of appointments at major US consulates could also be factors in slowing the increase in renunciations.
September 9, 2018 at 4:14 pm
Probably becuae people are hanging on hoping that Repr. Holding’s proposed bill to replace citizen-based taxation with residence-based taxation will pass – if it doesn’t, expect a big spike in renunciations.
May 22, 2020 at 5:04 pm
The bill proposed by Representative Holding – “Tax Fairness For Americans Abroad Act of 2018 (H.R. 7358)” – A Residency-Based Taxation Bill was not adopted into the federal tax law.