Above is a photo of the letter I received from the IRS today. It is the third or fourth identical letter. They all say that my 2015 tax return cannot be processed because their records indicate that I am dead, based on information received from the Social Security Administration.
In fact the SSA shows me to be alive, and able to collect starting in a couple years. Much other evidence supports the “living” conjecture, though, philosophically, I cannot be sure I am not in some sort of amazingly real-seeming afterlife existence. That would probably be the best case, since them Trump might not be real and the rest of you still on the planet are safer.
In any case I find it amusing that the US Government, faced with an apparently dead taxpayer, proceeds to send him several letters about how taxes cannot be processed. Why would I care? How is the second or fourth letter going to accomplish anything? Our tax dollars at work?
I have appealed to the Taxpayer Advocate Service, and got a letter from them today as well. They are assuring me they are still working on my case. Update again next month. At least that letter is hand-addressed. I was told this was a non-unique problem, it had happened to some set of taxpayers last year.
As a US citizen living in Canada (and Mexico), I am obligated to file tax forms with Canada and the IRS, though I haven’t owed any actual tax money to the USA for several years and don’t expect to ever again. So, assuming I’m still alive, this might be the best possible situation, relieving me from the rather onerous IRS paperwork requirements that fall on expats.