This is a multi-part message in MIME format.
---------------------- multipart/alternative attachment
Sent: Friday, May 02, 2003 2:21 PM
To: [email protected]
Hey David ...My wife is a US citizen but has lived in Canada since 1961, borne 1947. She was 13 at the time. Does she have to file a US tax return? She never has, as she has been living in this country since she was a young girl. Reading all your information has got her worried? Thanks, BXXXXXX .see you for lunch soon!!
---------------------------------------------------------
david ingram replies:
Just goes to show how little we know sometimes. The following question came from someone I have known for 30 years and I did not know he had an American wife.
It really depends. If she took out Canadian citizenship before February 1977, she and her family would have thought that they had lost their US citizenship because that was the official rule even though it was oveturned by the US Supreme Court. In that case, she was not expected to file a US return.
On the other hand, if she took out Canadian citizenship AFTER 1980, no one should have thought that they had lost their US citizenship, because Canada stopped telling people that they could not be a dual citizen on Feb 14, 1977 and the US Supreme Court told its citizens that they did not automatically lose their US citizenship by taking out another country's citizenship unless they really intended to give up their citizenship.
The official policy now is that the US citizen has to attend at a US consulate or embassy and declare their intention to give up their citizenship before a US consular officer.
So, if your wife did not do that, she is still a US citizen.
AND, If she used her citizenship to get your son into the US, she is a US citizen and if she has a US passport, she is absolutely a US citizen.
If she is a US citizen, she has to file US tax returns and in particular has to report any Canadian RRSP accounts, etc., etc.,
And, if she is in the position that so many people are, and is still a landed immigrant to Canada, "without" being a Canadian citizen, she is subject to even more US penalties because she has no reason to think she is exempt from anything.
david
David Ingram of the CEN-TA Group
US / Canada / Mexico tax and working Visa Specialists
108-100 Park Royal South
West Vancouver, BC, CANADA, V7T 1A2
(604) 913-9133 - Fax 913-9123 [email protected]
www.centa.com www.david-ingram.com
---------------------- multipart/alternative attachment
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.centa.com/mailman/private/centapede/attachments/e1abc222/attachment.htm
---------------------- multipart/alternative attachment--
What's Related