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Working Remotely From A Tropical Island In Thailand

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Re: Working Remotely From A Tropical Island In Thailand

#171

Post by gbog »

socialist_coder wrote: post #149
gbog wrote: post #145

I can't stop thinking that this seemingly nice story is in fact the story of a failure. How many employees did learn Thai? How many did decide there was no better place for them and stayed there? How many did find their so in this island? Why didn't the whole team stay there indefinitely? I say that as a French who decided ten years ago that China was my place, learnt the language, married a Chinese woman and have ki…

Your goal was completely different. They like living in Spain / wherever else they live. They also like travelling to other countries. They're taking a vacation and working from a new place, for a short time. They don't want to live there.

I didn't have the goal to be swallowed by China the first time I went there, I just was.

Re: Working Remotely From A Tropical Island In Thailand

#172

Post by airmondii »

johnm1019 wrote: post #158
lifeisstillgood wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can I just clarify - you work remotely for NY finance industry, at presumably near NY rates, paying 4% coproation tax and no tax on dividends from that income? With tropical weather. What's the schooling like?

If you're a US citizen it's not so easy. You are taxed on your worldwide income no matter what. There is a deduction for living abroad on the first $100,800 (2015) of income or you can also take a credit for income taxes paid to another country. You also need to pay into SS and Medicare either in the US or in another country which we have a treaty with. Don't get me wrong, getting the first $101k @ 4% tax sounds pret…

Puerto Rico is not a foreign country so these rules you cited don't apply. If you are a bone-fide PR resident, you don't owe federal tax (FICA still applies). However Act 20 (and Act 22) are recent changes to try to bring more job creator-types to the island.

Re: Working Remotely From A Tropical Island In Thailand

#173

Post by quilgor »

cleaver wrote: post #159
ben_pr wrote: post #8

I'm in Puerto Rico, moved here from the states two years ago. There are a number of tax incentives for people wanting to start tech companies here. Google Puerto Rico Act 20. Short version: "Act 20 offers a four (4)% corporate tax rate for Puerto Rican businesses providing services for exportation, 100% tax-exempt dividends from earnings and profits derived from the export services income of eligible businesses, and…

Also, you don't have to deal with a disruptive timezone difference. Same story in Mexico, where I spent the winter and did a little remote work.

I would love to do the same someday. Where did you stay? Was it easy to find a reasonably priced, decent quality place?

Re: Working Remotely From A Tropical Island In Thailand

#174

Post by nonuby »

nonuby wrote: post #73
znq wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Taking aside the current legal situation and trying to look at it from a purely financial aspect, wouldn't it be beneficial for countries like Thailand to allow those kind of people in for a limited amount of time and have them spend their money there? Assuming Thailand will crack down on those temporary remote workers, they will just go some other place. EDIT: fixed typo.

Agreed, but TIT. Google it..

To clarify TIT = This is Thailand

Re: Working Remotely From A Tropical Island In Thailand

#175

Post by javert »

franrull wrote: post #119
javert wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think he was just talking about the people doing wordpress/joomla development, not locals in general.

Probably so, still you're not a retard simply because you work developing Wordpress or Joomla sites. The condescendent and aggressive tone of the reply makes me read nothing but "boo-hoo" from the typical hater that finds joys in arguing over everything. Instead of focusing in the learning experiences and interesting facts of the blog post, starting with a "yawn" doesn't make very constructive does it?

True, people developing Joomla sites are not the retards, their customers are.

Just kidding. And I agree with you.

Re: Working Remotely From A Tropical Island In Thailand

#176

Post by jhome »

turbojerry wrote: post #23
bart42_0 wrote: post #2

It sounds and looks very nice. I have two questions: 1) Why did't they move to one of the Canary Islands? Part of Spain, Barcelona is a part of it. Less hassle because you stay in Europe, same language, same culture as in Barcelona. I rent a flat (70m2, furnished, 500m from the palmtree-beach, €500 /month), in the center of the capital on one of the islands, the internet connection is reasonable. Sounds comparable to…

The DSL service we have had over the last year in Los Gigantes in Tenerife has been atrocious, down from 3Mbps to under 1Mbps, we are better off with a 3G connection and if you go with UKs 3 network you can roam there and use up to 250GB a month on the all you can eat plan.

Sadly 3 stopped all-you-can-eat tethering in December. People were using insane amounts - significantly more than 250GB.

Re: Working Remotely From A Tropical Island In Thailand

#177

Post by bliti »

ben_pr wrote: post #8

I'm in Puerto Rico, moved here from the states two years ago. There are a number of tax incentives for people wanting to start tech companies here. Google Puerto Rico Act 20. Short version: "Act 20 offers a four (4)% corporate tax rate for Puerto Rican businesses providing services for exportation, 100% tax-exempt dividends from earnings and profits derived from the export services income of eligible businesses, and…

I'm also in PR at the moment. I'd be great if you got in touch. Email in profile. :)

Re: Working Remotely From A Tropical Island In Thailand

#178

Post by igonvalue »

eyeareque wrote: post #16

I worked remotely from Tahiti for a few months. It was an amazing experience that I'll always cherish. Now I just need to convince my new boss to let me do this again somewhere else. For those of you in the pacific time zone (sf bay). If you're interested in doing this, I recommend Tahiti or Hawaii. It's three hours off from pacific time during the summer months but only 2 hours off during winter. You can easily work…

This sounds great! Would you mind writing up some of the logistics of working in Tahiti? (For example, visas, accommodation, internet access, meeting people?)

Re: Working Remotely From A Tropical Island In Thailand

#179

Post by hughstephens »

needaremotegig wrote: post #134
borgia wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A company in most states across the US and throughout the entirety of Europe could pay a full time staff member with the same skills and experience you have the same amount you want per week ($3k) to work full time for them with significantly less hassle involved. I think it's obvious why you're finding demand to be so low when you've set your price so high. The amount you want for 60 hours a week ($9k) could get two…

I understand where you're coming from. I've been working with my current client for the last 3 months. He brought me on at $150 per hour after he had to fire his previous contractors, and I've been cleaning up their mess ever since. I've heard of quite a few situations like this, but I'm sure that there are cheaper developers out there who are doing great work. Demand for part-time + remote jobs seems to be pretty lo…

As someone hiring some people* remote, your rate is at the way way top end of the scale. Even for people with core experience in Node (where I'm hiring).

I get what you're saying, but as an employer, the "non negotiable" and inflexible attitude is a point-blank no for me. Your OS contributions (caveat: spent 2 minutes looking) are hardly much (lists on github are not 'valuable programming', to me it's just content marketing that may as well be on a blog) compared to people asking for 1/2 to 2/3 of your proposed salary, who have core contribs, manage production-deployed packages/code that are in frequent use etc.

Your mileage may vary, so best of luck. But that's my perspective, as an employer, looking for remote devs. The competition is actually pretty high, and you can get awesome candidates that might earn $120-160k a year when working in the valley for $80-120k due to the lower costs they can incur ('valley tax') and the flexibility you offer as a remote employer.

Don't get me wrong, I know the value of a high-priced consultant (am/was one) to fix an emergency. But you're not asking people to deliver you an emergency, you're asking for a job. And to deliver in an emergency, you need a hell of a lot more credibility and slickness, which your post suggest you don't have.

* might be one, might be more. Depends on who applies and what it looks like.

Re: Working Remotely From A Tropical Island In Thailand

#180

Post by rockyleal »

franrull wrote: post #119
javert wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think he was just talking about the people doing wordpress/joomla development, not locals in general.

Probably so, still you're not a retard simply because you work developing Wordpress or Joomla sites. The condescendent and aggressive tone of the reply makes me read nothing but "boo-hoo" from the typical hater that finds joys in arguing over everything. Instead of focusing in the learning experiences and interesting facts of the blog post, starting with a "yawn" doesn't make very constructive does it?

The tone is admittedly aggressive, but his feet are way more in the ground than those of the authors of the article. What those guys are doing is essentially illegal.
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