THREE EASY STEPS 

TOWARD GREATER

AMERICAN PROSPERITY 

STEP 2 

CONGRESS DOESN’T HAVE THE RIGHT INSTITUTIONAL MECHANISMS TODAY TO FULLY MONITOR

THE MYRIAD CHALLENGES ASSOCIATED WITH 

“A LEVEL PLAYING FIELD”

IN WORLD MARKETS 

Here is an Appropriate Solution 

Let’s Create New Committees in the U.S. Senate and

the U.S. House of Representatives to be Entitled 

“THE COMMITTEES ON

OVERSEAS AMERICAN AFFAIRS” 

A Proposal by

The Overseas American Academy

Geneva, Switzerland 
 

STEP 2 

LET’S CREATE NEW COMMITTEES IN

THE U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

AND THE U.S. SENATE 

TO BE ENTITLED: 

“THE COMMITTEES

ON OVERSEAS AMERICAN AFFAIRS” 

BACKGROUND 

Even a cursory look at the current status of U.S. participation in world markets suggests that something is profoundly amiss. Here are just a few of these myriad problems: 

• The United States has the world’s largest and most chronic trade deficit that currently exceeds half a trillion dollars per year and which just keeps on growing.

• The number of U.S. citizens employed by U.S. corporations in their foreign subsidiaries has fallen by 50% during the last three decades, while total employment by these same U.S. corporations abroad has been growing steadily.

• U.S. and foreign employers are offered a very powerful financial incentive to not hire any more U.S citizens for work abroad, and to replace those currently on their payrolls with citizens of other countries.

• Despite many noble statements about the sanctity of the family and the importance of human rights for everyone, children born abroad to U.S. children parents often still find themselves stateless at birth.

• While many other countries provide their overseas citizens with subsidized schools, generous health and social security benefits and many other advantages, the United States just seems to want to collect billions of dollars in taxes each year from overseas Americans and give almost nothing in return.

THE INSTITUTIONAL GAP 

One of the main causes of inertia in redressing these and other stunning inadequacies of current U.S. policies and practices that affect the competitive positioning of U.S. citizens in world markets, is that no single committee of the U.S. Congress, either in the House of Representatives, or in the Senate, is currently charged with addressing all of these issues together, at one time, and in one place, in a truly comprehensive and coherent manner. Without such data and the accompanying analyses that are needed, Congress essentially is flying blind in trying to appreciate the true nature of a constantly re-morphing level playing field in world markets. Bereft of such data and analyses, it is essentially impossible to get individual Americans and their companies back onto a playing field where everyone has a fair and equal chance to succeed. Billions of dollars of U.S. exports and hundreds of thousands of U.S. jobs are lost because of this institutional infirmity. 

AN APPROPRIATE SOLUTION 

The solution is surprisingly simple.  Both the U.S. Senate and the U.S. Houses of Representatives should create new standing committees to bring together the oversight and legislative initiatives for all matters that concern the Overseas American Community. This would include, but not be limited to: issues such as Taxation, Citizenship, Human Rights, Social Security, Education, Labor, Entrepreneurship, and a rigorous and on-going analysis of a Level Playing Field in World Markets. There are also, of course, myriad other areas that need to be monitored too for Congress to be fully congnizant of what day to day life is really like for the estimated 4 million U.S. citizens currently living abroad in the private sector. Ideally, Overseas American Delegates should be assigned to serve on this committee, and its sub-committees should match the sub-divisions of the proposed new Cabinet Department of Overseas American Affairs.  
 

For further information please contact 

Andy Sundberg, Secretary and Director 

The Overseas American Academy

157 Route du Grand Lancy,

1213 Onex, Geneva, Switzerland.

Tel: 41-22-792 1659. 

Email: andy@sundberg.com