New trade laws were recently enacted after President Obama signed them into law recently.

One of the provisions is affecting child tax credit claimed by certain expatriates. Under the provisions of new law, expatriates claiming foreign earned income exclusion under IRC 911 will no longer be entitled to claim refundable child tax credit. The change is effective from the tax years beginning after December 31, 2014.

Pertinent to note here that IRC 911 exclusion limit for 2015 tax year is $100,800.

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Recently in Rogers case, the DC court affirmed the Tax Court’s decision that a flight attendant who performed some duties in and over the U.S. and international waters could not exclude all of her wages under IRC 911 as foreign earned income.

The taxpayer worked as an international flight attendant based in Hong Kong. She performed in-flight duties and some pre-departure and post-arrival work and was generally paid according to her flight time. She received vacation time and benefits, and could receive guarantee pay for work that she would have performed on flights that were canceled. When she received guarantee pay, she was required to remain in Hong Kong awaiting reassignment to another flight. The airline provided the taxpayer with an apportionment of her estimated duty time between minutes spent in or over foreign Read More