Before 2013 is over we will probably have comprehensive immigration reform. The political talk is that to become a citizen it will be necessary to file un-filed tax returns and pay any taxes owed. Until we see the final legislation we won’t know what sort of compliance will be required, but I would anticipate 3 possible approaches to the problem:

• Returns should be filed for each year of residency in the United States.

• We would arbitrarily limit the requirement filing to the last 6 years because IRS does not retain wage and income tax data for more than 6 years back, or some other alternative. However the legislation winds up, if you have been living in this country for a long time and have not filed tax returns, it is not too soon to start working on the preparation and filing of delinquent returns to get you in compliance and enhance your chances of removing any tax barriers to citizenship.