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The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

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Re: The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

#691

Quoted post unavailable.

The only thing to apologize is to ourselves. We should haver never went there and left you in the stone age.

All the infrastructure we left you weren't able to maintain, as it happened with 99% of the African countries.

Total mystery why.

Re: The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

#692
post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where does this end? A planet full of empty "luxury apartments" and most of us homeless?

If history tells us anything it's rich people's heads on pikes and shit ton of strife.

Killer drones and airborne attack lasers for hire will counter that, partially, same as mounted cavalry put down starving peasant rebellions in the middle ages.

Re: The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

#693

Yes, the situation is dire. I live in Lisbon as a foreigner for more than 12 years now. We pay a rent for a small flat that used to be very expensive and now is on the cheap side in our quarter of the city. Luckily, we have an older contract that cannot be changed as easily as newer ones. I'm not thrilled by the possibility that our landlord might cancel it some day, however, e.g. for relatives to move in. Rents in t…

Come on, it's nowhere near dire - it's expensive yes, like just about every other capital city - Lisbon is still way cheaper than Paris or London. This poorly written rambling rant of an article has some valid points but no insight. I moved to Cascais near Lisbon 5 years ago because of Brexit and yes property has boomed, like in many other countries but money printing QE is not just a Portuguese phenomena. 10 Years ago Portugal was a basket case economy (following the financial crisis) with many talented people moving abroad - now it's the opposite it's the fastest growing economy in Europe and Talent is moving here in droves. Of course the Tax and Golden Visa incentives to attract people have pushed up property prices but they have also provided many benefits. Portugal is not densely populated Like England or Holland, even here in Cascais you see lots of unbuilt land or derelict properties. A major problem is supply side because of their slow and burdensome bureaucracy - it took us 3 years to get planning permission on a derelict property we bought for investment and we had to involve 2 architects and 5 engineers to get all the necessary paperwork in order, it's insane. Their job protection mentality needs to change towards a more dynamic job creation mentality - they need to reform their labour laws urgently to unleash amazing potential here. This would quickly solve the problem of low local wages. Many companies would invest here because of the incredible quality of life: great infrastructure, low crime, lovely climate, beautiful sandy beaches, quality food, the list goes on.

Re: The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

#694

Unsustainable. If you're a wealthy individual living in an expensive residence surrounded by other wealthy individuals living in expensive residences, you still need garbagemen to collect your garbage. You still need food. Whether you order from local restaurants staffed by employees, or buy your groceries at the supermarket, staffed by employees, janitorial personnel, security guards, and managers, you're still rely…

San Francisco solved it with homeless camps and effectively decriminalizing theft under $950.

And now robbing stores is becoming rampant as we can all testify by the loads of videos of "youngsters" entering stores and taking what they want without anyone doing anything.

Re: The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

#695
Change the law to 1 home per person, disallow ownership of multiple properties, whether for investment or holiday home, it doesn't matter. Until the housing crisis is solved. I've said this before and been responded to with anger from Americans who love holiday homes; thanks for the FYIGM.

The UK could desperately do with this, too.

Re: The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

#696

Yes, the situation is dire. I live in Lisbon as a foreigner for more than 12 years now. We pay a rent for a small flat that used to be very expensive and now is on the cheap side in our quarter of the city. Luckily, we have an older contract that cannot be changed as easily as newer ones. I'm not thrilled by the possibility that our landlord might cancel it some day, however, e.g. for relatives to move in. Rents in t…

Come on, it's nowhere near dire - it's expensive yes, like just about every other capital city - Lisbon is still way cheaper than Paris or London. This poorly written rambling rant of an article has some valid points but no insight. I moved to Cascais near Lisbon 5 years ago because of Brexit and yes property has boomed, like in many other countries but money printing QE is not just a Portuguese phenomena. 10 Years a…

The average salary is quite low and those people are struggling a lot with their expenses and are completely unable to set money aside for a rainy day.

>even here in Cascais you see lots of unbuilt land

We have no intention of becoming a concrete jungle.

>Their job protection mentality needs to change towards a more dynamic job creation mentality

No thank you, please just keep your opinions to yourself, and honestly find somewhere else to go.

>low crime

Wrong, there's more and more crime, specially in Lisbon, Cascais, Sintra, and it's increasing in Porto and Braga too.

Specially on neighboorhoods with lots of "youngsters".

Re: The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

#698

5 years resident here (as a Brexit refugee). Central city locations in Lisbon and Porto have exploded in price, but this is due to AirBnB rather than rich expats. Portugal's tourism industry has boomed, which has put money in a lot of people's pockets, but has distorted local economies somewhat. Better management is required, for example cracking down on AirBnB and NOT building that new cruise liner terminal. Unfortu…

(Calling yourself a "refugee" as a rich immigrant is a bit off-puting, imho) Why do you say that the rise in housing prices has been due to AirBnB but not to rich immigrants? It seems a bit odd. Both can outbid the average native and just push prices high. Many rich immigrants also buy up loads of property for speculative/investment purposes, not just to live in. >has a large amount of cultural baggage from quite fra…

There is such a thing as a rich refugee. People in the mining business, when a country goes supercritical (more than Brexit, like Cuba) their bright career prospects decouple from their prospects politically, so confiscation is on the table even if "they were cool" because eg the Cuban Revolution needed money and now everyone is meant to have the same amount of sustenance anyway. New definition of what's fair. They operate under more recent definition, I would say every single person has a different definition of fairness.

Incompatible definitions of fairness. They have in practice a much higher metabolism requiring more pure ingredients, from better sources, it's medically harmful to cut them off like instantly. Although at the same time they contribute to both the problem and solution, like it depends. Turns out very rough to adapt to on short notice, flat-out can't in many cases, and for sure you can't send your kid to any random Cuban school with kids on the other side of a former class divide, from one day to the next? Like how are you going to tell that kid? Just gotta be "really cool", in the "they was cool", sense, and some kids make it and others can't, wretched childhood. Although at the same time Fidel Castro, biographically, grew up among blacks because his father didn't recognize him fully, not even a second son, so he knew it could be done and there was the will that it happen.

And people will price discriminate against that kid forever, never accept he's no longer rich unless he's filthy in rags...that's a rough sketch of it. Misery all of a sudden, and metabolically difficult, like it's not just 2000 calories here's some water with fluoride for your teeth boom done. It wouldn't take your body 24 hours a day if it took a single sentence to summarize like I just did. Water alone, Americans aren't supposed to drink Chilean water or they get diarrhea like automatically, it could be anything, selenium plus manganese in the water table, natural salts (as opposed to NaF) that are systematically removed in America. It's along the same lines as toothpastes in Chile having over 6x the sodium flouride of American toothpastes. Like literally you couldn't buy those same toothpastes in America without a dentist's prescription, I innocently told them 5000 ppm pharmacist looked at me said "No that you need a prescription" like it was opioid that kind of reaction. I was actually prescribed toothpaste weaker than the only strength toothpaste Walmart sells in Chile, it's all 1650, like eating the color white, kids hate it because it's good to hate it because it's bad for you. Counterproductive, makes people become busted and scream at their kids, everyone in the family going to the Walmart to buy cookies. Makes you crave. Gives you ADD, I actually--it turns out--don't have any symptoms of ADD--and I generally have literally every single one and nothing else--when I cut fluoride out of my life. Drank from a well. I actually paid attention, as a verb, for once in my life. Like a colorblind guy seeing blue for the first time. So weird, now I know what people are talking about.

So if you don't want F poisoning, which is exactly what the fuck that's all about for political reasons, there it is again, didn't want this country to turn into another Cuba, Socialist Sandwich as Nixon put it, you flourinate really hard. Breakfast lunch and dinner, inescapable, it's a super expensive subsidy but it's not for your teeth, it's for your brain, it is incapacitating so you don't eg sue or protest. If you know the way around here in Santiago, you'll figure out you have to pay triple at a homeopathic store, the pharmacies don't carry any toothpaste that doesn't F you 1650 ppm. Either you go way out of your way or go without toothpaste, which is a thing for instance in Cuba. Everyone has a hard time adapting to that.

So that's an example of adapting, and it can take decades. And it's expensive to adapt, hard-learned lessons like flunking courses at Stanford in my case because I was consenting to absurd doses of fluorine, not knowing the harm. Not one ADD doctor brought it up, like they have them on a gag order, it's the most obvious shit nobody had ADD in the 50's and then you F'ed up the water and now everyone has to see a shrink, 2 + 2 equals what?

So the wealth and political status decouple, and they benefited when times were good, and then...well they get a new citizenship somewhere else and adapt to that, not Cuba but maybe 60's Brazil, learn the language which is work, learn the laws under which they must now live, and relearn the balance of power what the traps are what the actual opportunities are...and be a survivor, there are people left behind that couldn't get out, not savvy enough, bad airport game missed the last flight, and yeah they have money but they get charged much more for everything. Like the parent poster. Price discrimination evens things out in the end. That's what you replied to.

Dude a raft is not what determines refugee status, it doesn't have to be a giant pornographic Hollywoodesque stereotype of all the tropes of taking refuge--which is what the word means--to qualify in my book. Being hated is enough.

Re: The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

#699

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many dislike the idea, but this is why people turn to "nationalism". If you want to decrease unemployment, you add tariffs for imports enabling more businesses to open domestically (i.e. tariffs effectively increase import costs). Similarly, you can loosen building codes to increase production of homes, limit visa duration, require citizenship for home ownership, etc. Those are some obvious fixes, why is the governme…

Check this out, this is fresh out of the oven Portugal eases visa rules to tackle labour shortage https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/portugal-eases-visa-rules-to-ta... > "Portugal's unemployment rate is at 5.7%, near a record low. Employers' confederations have been asking for the immigration rules to be streamlined, pointing to an economic situation close to full employment" The narrative of unemployment in Portugal drivi…

>Employers' confederations have been asking for the immigration rules to be streamlined, pointing to an economic situation close to full employment"

They just to lower the wages. Hence why they are so in favor of opening the borders and human traffic situations like we had in Odemira with people from Nepal and neighboring countries living like literal slaves.

Even with visa deals for Portuguese speaking countries like Brasil, Angola and Mozambique just have that goal in mind, because it's not like we are getting scientists, doctors and engineers from those places...

Re: The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

#700

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I am not aware of any metropolis/capital where this isn't true, regardless of regime. Tokyo. It is hoovering up all the Japanese youth, but manages to stay affordable for other factors. - Permissive zoning - Immigration restrictions - Closed culture - Declining population

Also Bangkok, total renters market. New buildings going up every day. Lots of rents are lower than before covid.

Indeed, as far as I can tell (I’m in Bangkok but I’m not a local) there is a lot of choice and a super wide range of prices.

Public transit is constantly being expanded and there is so much stock of modern buildings, I can’t see it changing any time soon.

Last week I went to the fish market by Sky Train, first time I’d been out that way, and I was surprised to see a ton of modern condo towers clustered around Erawan. And why not? It’s 30-45 minutes on the train to the center of town.

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