Why is it so hard to leave Taiwan?

It’s not.

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According to whom? You?

I think it is now, BJ. It used to be 49k and I heard a report just a couple of days ago saying it had increased to 51k. According to government figures and including estimated bonuses.

At the moment we’re dealing with the opposite cost of living estimate between London and Taipei, which is a more serious error. As opposed to being 77% or so more expensive to live in London, it’s being argued that it’s 77% or so more expensive to live in Taipei.

That’s numbeo and all their figures are crowdsourced, so their numbers are usually full of shit.

Taipei…not Taiwan. Govt stats are clear on this never even seen one estimate for Taiwan that high.

That’s why Gain is waffling.

http://m.focustaiwan.tw/news/aeco/201811120020.aspx

Then again if anyvody can actually make sense of the stats released by DGBAS …Good luck to them.

That’s regular earnings, real monthly wage is annual/12, and that’s like 51k. It’s on the news every once in a while.

Yeah man it’s pretty bullshitty though, as soon as you step outside of Taipei or Hsinchu income plummets…And most workers get less than 1 month bonus a year.

They should break down the numbers. 70% of under 35s earn less than 40k a month.

I know what average is , it’s pretty bullshitty in Taiwan though where they probably throw in senior manager and shareholders earning massive stock options, bonuses and dividends as regular income.

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It doesn’t matter. It’s mean average, not median. Mean average won’t reflect inequality. It’s how salary is calculated everywhere in the world, why should it be different in Taiwan?

Bonuses and dividends are income. Not only senior managers get them.

Yeah but their bonuses and stocks and dividend options can run into millons of ntd.
I want to see median salary here. I know the median is pretty bad . 70% of under 35s earn less than 40k per month.

Only something like 1% earn more than 200k per month. Also I have seen the stats most workers get less than one month bonus a year.

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Median is 40k so yeah it is bad.

But median is bad everywhere.
http://appsso.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/nui/show.do?dataset=ilc_di03&lang=en

As you can see, that’d be ~1800 (so ~60k NTD, maybe a bit more) for the majority of Western Europe, including Ireland (so your perception that everyone makes 100k there is obviously totally wrong). It’s really not very good. Switzerland is the only country where it’s >3000 euros. It’s astounding how much richer it is than all its neighbours.

It was a nightmare for my wife because she wasn’t earning money right away and we lived in a very blue collar 'burb (read white). Not that she faced anything overt, I think she felt her difference there more so than I do here. The cost of everything was also a downer. My monthly cash in hand there was stretched thin but, would have been a king’s ransom here.

I wanted to move for the air quality, safe biking and job options. Here, I don’t have to bust a nut for 12 hours to eat KD. I can wear a mask, hit the road early in the morning and chose gigs as a compromise. In the long run, for me, I decided to live by the motto, " Happy wife, happy life.".

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Interesting. Mostly agree with your statement. Still happy husband is important too.nm There’s always some Degree of compromise.

What’s eat KD by the way ?

Actually having an unstable substitute job would make it much EASIER to leave. My point is my wife has a very stable, tenured position with eventual pension. She doesn’t want to give it up.

Oh, I see. My mistake as I missread your first reply. I blame the medicine and not my ignorance (this time).

The national dish of Canada.

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One thing about Taiwan that I think bares mentioning (I wonder if anyone else feels this way) is that living here feels like living in the ‘center’ of something. Close proximity to Hong Kong, Singapore, Thailand, the Philippines, Japan etc… is pretty awesome. I’ve lived in Taiwan for nearly 20 years but I always feel like James Bond on his first mission when I fly into other major international airports. The ease with which I can leave and re-enter Taiwan is truly amazing. I guess if you live in London you’ll also feel this way, what with its proximity to Dublin, Amsterdam, Antwerp, Barcelona etc… Living in Canada however, I barely felt connected to anywhere else besides maybe Buffalo, NY. For me, living in Taiwan makes me feel like a citizen of the world.

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Because Taiwan offers a level of material comfort and a lifestyle that cannot possibly be replicated in your home country, and unless you’re making 100k plus you’re living paycheck to paycheck.

Most people that come to Taiwan are here because they want to work few hours and enjoy a comfortable easy lifestyle. The trade off is in reality the place is kind of banal and frustrating, and mostly boring.

You can’t leave because you’re accustomed to the ease of lifestyle and financial comfort and there’s no way to match it or come close unless you really pull something off. And the longer you’re here, the less likely that is.

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public transport is cheap. the only thing with a big cost is a decent apartment with a kitchen. but still, compared to other capital citys taipei is not so bad in that regard.

not sure what you are moaning about with the food. sounds like you want fancy stuff every day and then want to complain about not being able to save. if you want to save and you don’t like the basic stuff locals eat every day such as dumplings, ma jiang mian and wontons then cook your own. its the same everywhere.

are you speaking for yourself aswell?