Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

As Digital Nomads Flock to Lisbon, Portugal's Youth Are Leaving in Droves

bloomberg.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 105 posts

Re: As Digital Nomads Flock to Lisbon, Portugal's Youth Are Leaving in Droves

#41

Post by cactusplant7374 »

quonn wrote: post #27
reaperman wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

88% being the marginal rate? I’m assuming if you’re paid €80,000 in a year you take home more than €9,600 The way you wrote this makes it sound like people only take home €9600 on €80000 and thats rather misleading.

It‘s not misleading. You take home 9600 in my opinion. What you call the marginal rate is applied to the full salary as far as I know. And the social security is also applied to the full amount unless the person is employed by a Portuguese company that would pay half. Even the most optimistic tax accountants say around 70% minimum is to be paid with various options applied. That would leave 24.000. Portugal has many…

Even with the double taxation treaty, wouldn't an American pay the difference in Portugal? That would be significantly more?

Re: As Digital Nomads Flock to Lisbon, Portugal's Youth Are Leaving in Droves

#42

Post by quonn »

quonn wrote: post #27
reaperman wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

88% being the marginal rate? I’m assuming if you’re paid €80,000 in a year you take home more than €9,600 The way you wrote this makes it sound like people only take home €9600 on €80000 and thats rather misleading.

It‘s not misleading. You take home 9600 in my opinion. What you call the marginal rate is applied to the full salary as far as I know. And the social security is also applied to the full amount unless the person is employed by a Portuguese company that would pay half. Even the most optimistic tax accountants say around 70% minimum is to be paid with various options applied. That would leave 24.000. Portugal has many…

@cactusplant: Correct. With a double taxation agreement you always pay the higher tax of both countries. Usually you pay the lower one to one country and the remaining part to the other one. But it depends on the countries and details.

So yes, it would be more but it would be doable. While the non-tax issues largely lack these agreements causing more problems.

Re: As Digital Nomads Flock to Lisbon, Portugal's Youth Are Leaving in Droves

#43

Post by Podgajski »

mcntsh wrote: post #15

What a hilariously short-sighted policy from Portugal. Offer visas for rich remote workers and also exempt them from contributing to health system, and give them huge tax discounts. It's like the Portuguese government actually hates its citizens.

You make this sound like it’s any different than in the United States.

Re: As Digital Nomads Flock to Lisbon, Portugal's Youth Are Leaving in Droves

#44

Post by lastdong »

quonn wrote: post #27
reaperman wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

88% being the marginal rate? I’m assuming if you’re paid €80,000 in a year you take home more than €9,600 The way you wrote this makes it sound like people only take home €9600 on €80000 and thats rather misleading.

It‘s not misleading. You take home 9600 in my opinion. What you call the marginal rate is applied to the full salary as far as I know. And the social security is also applied to the full amount unless the person is employed by a Portuguese company that would pay half. Even the most optimistic tax accountants say around 70% minimum is to be paid with various options applied. That would leave 24.000. Portugal has many…

Employed by a portuguese company 80000€ / year is taxed average 42.8%, take home after tax: 45728€

This gives you a monthly pay after tax of 3811€ (way above average in the country, which unfortunately is really low)

Re: As Digital Nomads Flock to Lisbon, Portugal's Youth Are Leaving in Droves

#45

Post by Podgajski »

seydor wrote: post #17
lm28469 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Digital nomads (working remotely, almost by definition, and not getting paid that much in the grand scheme of things, again almost by definition) a I don't think you know what you're talking about. Living in Portugal while remotely working for any semi decent tech company puts you in the top 10% earners easily

"digital nomads" are normally looking for location arbitrage, so they are not high earners, normally cheap-skates. Remote workers might be more likely to create inequality, but seriously how many are they? If they create price pressure then it means there s very little housing stock in the first place.

Have you ever met a truly wealthy person that wasn’t a cheapskate? How do you think they got rich in the first place?

Re: As Digital Nomads Flock to Lisbon, Portugal's Youth Are Leaving in Droves

#46

Post by 0xDEAFBEAD »

lm28469 wrote: post #11
jmyeet wrote: post #8

Expats can be helpful to a country like Portugal but it has to be done correctly. And of course it hasn't. What Portugal needs to do is: 1. Ban Airbnb and other short-term housing other than renting out a room in your house ; 2. Provide a huge stock of social housing, meaning housing at an affordable price only available to natives; and 3. Restrict foreign ownership of huge swathes of the country. This could be as si…

Expats and digital nomads aren't the same thing. I'm an expat but I work locally for a local company with local wages like most people around me The problem is working for foreign company which pays a salary that is way above what your peers live with, it creates insane inequalities. One month of a good tech salary is one year of min wage in Portugal

>The problem is working for foreign company which pays a salary that is way above what your peers live with, it creates insane inequalities.

Those inequalities are present regardless. It's just a matter of out of sight, out of mind.

Check out this global inequality calculator, you might be surprised to learn that you're in the global 1%: https://howrichami.givingwhatwecan.org/how-rich-am-i

Re: As Digital Nomads Flock to Lisbon, Portugal's Youth Are Leaving in Droves

#47

Post by Podgajski »

withinboredom wrote: post #23
amadeuspagel wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a limited supply of apartments. If a digital nomad lives in one, then a native portuguese can't live there. This is basic math.

Yep! I was there recently for work and we decided to go on a walking tour given by a local who grew up there, arranged by a coworker who was from there. Our guide took us through one neighborhood and commented that this neighborhood used to be bustling all day and long into the night, but now it is 95% airbnb. During the winter, most of the houses are completely empty. It's effectively a dead neighborhood, but the ar…

Move fast and break culture.

Re: As Digital Nomads Flock to Lisbon, Portugal's Youth Are Leaving in Droves

#48

Post by Podgajski »

rufus_foreman wrote: post #25
amadeuspagel wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a limited supply of apartments. If a digital nomad lives in one, then a native portuguese can't live there. This is basic math.

What limits the supply? Are they not allowed to build new apartments in Portugal?

Why would you think that anyone who is profiting from having a limited supply housing would want more housing built?

Re: As Digital Nomads Flock to Lisbon, Portugal's Youth Are Leaving in Droves

#49

Post by cactusplant7374 »

cultofmetatron wrote: post #40
seydor wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you have to spend significantly more to sustain traveling and the added expenses of short term rentals my understanding is that digital nomads pay LESS than they would in their home country by choosing cheap CoL countries

certain things are cheaper compared to what they were paying at home. but you're still going to be spending more than a local would for the same amenities. Case in point, I can spend $2400 for a basic 1 bedroom apartment in San Francisco or nyc or I can spend $1000 to live in a luxury villa in Bali or a nice furnished apartment in medellin colombia. so yes they are spending less. but they are hardly low income by any…

I live in Ecuador so I can't really say too much about other countries. However, a luxury rental in Ecuador isn't really a luxury rental at all. There is no noise proofing, random holes in the walls, and the house isn't vented properly. The people that built it just had no idea what they were doing.

I don't really think you can compare third world accommodations to first world. It's not comparable. The quality isn't there.

Re: As Digital Nomads Flock to Lisbon, Portugal's Youth Are Leaving in Droves

#50

Post by quonn »

quonn wrote: post #27
reaperman wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

88% being the marginal rate? I’m assuming if you’re paid €80,000 in a year you take home more than €9,600 The way you wrote this makes it sound like people only take home €9600 on €80000 and thats rather misleading.

It‘s not misleading. You take home 9600 in my opinion. What you call the marginal rate is applied to the full salary as far as I know. And the social security is also applied to the full amount unless the person is employed by a Portuguese company that would pay half. Even the most optimistic tax accountants say around 70% minimum is to be paid with various options applied. That would leave 24.000. Portugal has many…

@lastdong

Of course. By a portuguese company, you say it yourself. The company pays half of the social security.

And 42% only sounds low because that‘s that final tax rate in this example after all deductions. Like in most countries that is often 5-7% lower than the nominal tax rate that we think about and compare.

Post reply on HN