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The Dubai Debt Trap

economist.com

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Re: The Dubai Debt Trap

#211

Post by financetechbro »

apohn wrote: post #60
retube wrote: post #5

All I ever hear is horror stories about this place: environmental destruction, structural racism, serious abuse of human rights, culturally hyper conservative, corrupt legal system, plus it's absurdly hot. I can't believe anyone would voluntarily go there, seems like hell on earth.

I say this as somebody who lived in one of those Middle Eastern countries for a good period of my life. I'm not a white person and at that time I didn't have a US/European passport, so I didn't lead an extra privalaged life there. Here's what you can hear about the USA. 1)Endless suburban sprawl, resulting in massive environmental destruction. Illegal immigrants heavily involved in the construction industry, leading…

I find it pretty hilarious that point #7 is even a thing. Coming from (assuming UAE) an area that experiences +100 °F weather for half of the year lol…

Re: The Dubai Debt Trap

#212

Post by [deleted] »

rastignack wrote: post #197
feupan wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, SA isn’t touted as a dream destination for tourists, but quite the opposite: Tourists can’t enter. Dubai sells this luxury destination dream literally built by slaves.

That’s not true. Saudi Arabia wants to become a major touristic place.

[deleted]

Re: The Dubai Debt Trap

#213

Post by BeetleB »

Workaccount2 wrote: post #104
apohn wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I say this as somebody who lived in one of those Middle Eastern countries for a good period of my life. I'm not a white person and at that time I didn't have a US/European passport, so I didn't lead an extra privalaged life there. Here's what you can hear about the USA. 1)Endless suburban sprawl, resulting in massive environmental destruction. Illegal immigrants heavily involved in the construction industry, leading…

I guess the issue for me is that there are places where people greatly exaggerate their claims, and there are places where those seemingly exaggerated claims are legitimate. Given that, I don't think I have ever read anything good about the UAE, either editorial or comments from expats. Maybe from insta influencers who wanted to pad their hollow "luxury life" existance.

This whole thread is ridiculous. The "I've never heard..." statements are merely statements about the diversity (or lack thereof) sources people get their information from.

I've lived in the Middle East. I know plenty of people who live there, or lived there, and love it. Even those who were forced to leave. I know plenty of others who work very hard to get a good white collar job there, and most who succeed did not regret it.

And this is with full acknowledgment of all the bad things people talk about.

Let it just be a signal that there's more to it than you see. Even more, people don't seem to understand how crappy much of the rest of the world is that Dubai is such a desirable place to live. I know lots of people who would have been stuck in extremely low social mobility situations in their home countries, and who only managed to go up in social class by moving to one of these Middle Eastern countries, and earning good money and by doing honest work - the last of which wasn't an option in their own countries.

Re: The Dubai Debt Trap

#214

Post by 1024core »

Halfway down the article you find:

> Cornelius undoubtedly committed fraud. ... He did, however, admit that he used money for riskier endeavours than those for which it was lent. The bank provided credit for short-term needs, but it was instead used to fund unauthorised longer-term projects such as the Pakistan refinery and investments relating to the Plantation.

I am sorry, but play stupid games, win stupid prizes.

Re: The Dubai Debt Trap

#215

Post by BeetleB »

feupan wrote: post #190
thematrixturtle wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Saudi Arabia is considerably worse on every aspect, it just gets even less press.

To be fair, SA isn’t touted as a dream destination for tourists, but quite the opposite: Tourists can’t enter. Dubai sells this luxury destination dream literally built by slaves.

They can now.

https://www.saudiembassy.net/tourist-visa

Re: The Dubai Debt Trap

#216

Post by feupan »

mrwnmonm wrote: post #210
feupan wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What a weird comment full of assumptions and hatred. Nothing in the parent comment warrants what you said. What happens in practice is that being white in poorer countries makes you stand out and sometimes this comes with negative feelings of being unwanted there. This is just a fact being told and it doesn’t justify a “you guys and your politics” comment. It’s just to point out, perhaps, that some places are more we…

Arabs are mixed-race my friend, some of them are white. Your comment reflects your lack of knowledge about us. I don't hate western people for being western or white. I respect a lot of them and would love to learn from them. Some places are more welcoming because people have more knowledge about dealing with foreigners and know more about their culture. So it comes back to education and being open to other cultures…

Hilarious. You continue making assumptions about everyone here. You don’t know my media and you don’t know what I know. You assume I’m talking about Arab countries while I just mentioned “poorer countries”, as if you’re the only one around.

I’m talking out of my own experience in Africa, Asia and South America. I don’t go flashing out money around and I know exactly how I’m seen and how I’m treated in every place I’ve lived in. And no, I‘ve never been in a resort and I live in local housing trying to learn the language. So kindly go f yourself.

Re: The Dubai Debt Trap

#217

Post by mrwnmonm »

rastignack wrote: post #192
mrwnmonm wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you western? I get really bored hearing someone talking about us like this. While your knowledge about Arab countries comes from an all-inclusive trip to Tunisia or something. The west always plays a big role in keeping dictators all over the place, who don't care about education or anything other than their chair. People are ignorant and if you look fancy or different, even if you are native, they will look at y…

Or one could see what happened in Tahrir, Koln, Milan. Or the fact that some imams in my country call out unveiled women as prostitutes. There are issues with women rights in many country. Blaming the west is a way to ignore them.

I didn't blame the west, I said they play a role. I realize there were a lot of issues before the US become a world leader and even before the British/French colonization.

I will say it in a different way, WE ARE NOT YOUR ENEMY, but you are too blind not to realize that by yourself.

Re: The Dubai Debt Trap

#218

Post by xyzzyz »

dr_dshiv wrote: post #164
friedturkey wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Man people really see some blog post about Japanese law by a person who doesn’t speak the language and think it’s some 1984 style country. In all honesty you can basically apologize out of a lot of crimes and police generally don’t bother with anything else unless there’s video evidence, they catch you in the act, or you’re a high profile person involved in a high profile act. Just never get caught with drugs in your…

What do the Japanese have against drugs?

Maybe they observed what widespread drug use did to China in 19th century, and what it is doing to US now, and are trying to nip that in the bud.

Re: The Dubai Debt Trap

#219

Post by stevie11111 »

victor106 wrote: post #199

India has a similar law. You will be detained from leaving the country even if you are not the principal borrower and you've just stood as a guarantor for someone else's loan the bank can issue a lookout circular without even approaching a court. One of my offshore resources was arrested at the airport[1] even though he was not the pricipal borrower of the loan. The funny thing about these incidents is that, all thes…

The problem is this guy raised money for a project in Dubai and used it for a project in Pakistan. If you fundraised for a startup building robots in the US and instead used the money to buy real estate in Canada, you would be convicted of fraud as well wherever you are.

Re: The Dubai Debt Trap

#220

Post by JohnGB »

dahdum wrote: post #204
Teracotage wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For those who did not bother to read the article, it is about fraud during the financial crisis. I feel sad for Cornelius and wish he is set free. As a resident of Dubai for 30 years, I am always curious to learn things that I may have missed about 'my city', yet this article is misleading in many ways, its few first paragraph where it states that Ryan Cornelius 'thought the authorities had simply made a mistake;' Re…

Yeah, they really buried the admission of fraud pretty deep in the article. They forged invoices and spent 342m on unauthorized riskier projects. Sounds like the sentence may be excessive, but not the conviction.

To me at least, the issue is less about his guilt, and more about the lack of due process. In this case he was guilty, but in many others the lack of due process provides a way of punishing someone without any oversight or fair treatment and trial.
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