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Are You Sure You Want to Renounce US Citizenship?

Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing renunciation of United States Citizenship. I am not really making this video to try to condescend or try to tell anyone what to do but there is just a lot of really cavalier talk about renunciation of US Citizenship and discussion of it; a lot of times in a second citizenship context or in the context of taxation.

It has been my opinion, not in all cases, in some cases there are videos out there that discuss this very seriously but in some cases you know people are just talking about this like it is just something that it is like it is handed off and it is no big deal. I would urge people that are really seriously thinking about this you really need to seriously look at the negative consequences of renouncing your US Citizenship. A lot of people, especially folks who are looking at it from a tax angle and again especially so called accidental Americans, people who were just born in the United States by happenstance, never really had any connection with the US, those folks, if you have been living in your home country, essentially your home country, all your life and you just don't really want to deal with certain aspects of the American tax system, I kind of get it but those who have real deep connections with the United States who think that they can renounce their US Citizenship with relative impunity, not impunity but with no consequences on a practical level, if you are looking to see family back in the United States for example, it is not a foregone conclusion that you are going to be given a Tourist Visa on your new passport after you have renounced your old one. I am not saying it is impossible but again you are coming at it as a foreign national applying for a Visa as a foreign national to be able to go into the US. Again, these things have pretty tremendous ramifications.

Also, you know need to be very, very, very well aware of the tax implications of renouncing your US Citizenship when contemplating doing this because the exit tax, this freeze or snapshot of your net worth and then basically taxing what amounts to an unrealized capital gain in the sense that that is what they are doing, they are taxing on your net worth as it exists at the time that you leave, depending on again the way your circumstances are when you renounce, this can have tremendous ramifications. 

So folks that are seriously considering this I really, really urge you to look at it not just from all the legal aspects side, taxation, but also there are a lot of personal issues that can come into play when not necessarily having unfettered access to the United States. If you have got family and things there you need to really take that into consideration. Again this is not a video to necessarily discourage anyone. It is just a video being made to just tell people to take a breath and think and not engage in something cavalierly based on something you just read or saw on the internet.