At some income and tax levels, you do actually save US taxes by not taking the housing and/or the expat income deductions. You have to run the numbers to see where you are at, though it’s a pain to do so. It’s hard enough to figure out what you owe once (and be sure you did it right), much less under different scenarios.
On the US abuse of its position at the center of the world’s financial system: China is big enough to ignore FATCA, most other countries can’t. Yet.
Stupid laws like FATCA will cause China and other countries to get together and create payment systems that avoid the US. That will make it harder for the US to finance its debt overload, and harder to twist people’s arms to comply with things like the Iran embargo. In other words, in order to collect a few dollars now, the US is setting itself up for much higher costs and lower influence in the future.
My only disagreement is on motives…he ascribes it to hatred, I think it is due to a mix of stupidity and bureaucratic inertia. The end result is the same.
