PingRoundTheWorld

Still clear as mud. Reading the DTA legalese it's still unclear to me which country you're actually supposed to be taxed in if you're a tax resident in Thailand but receive income that is taxed in your home country because it is derived there.

Has your lifestyle and/or location changed though? (less expenses?) As far as I remember from other posts you live a rather relaxed lifestyle with a live-in rental gf. Naturally expenses are low with such a lifestyle. Try to go out to clubs in Bangkok/Pattaya/Phuket a few times a week with take outs and 60k will barely last you a week. What really has gone up in price in Bangkok since I moved here (2016) is booze, food, and....girls. Pattaya price increases for all of the above seems to be more moderate, but even there there's definitely been changes since.

I like to drink with friends and play around with girls much younger than me. How can I leverage this into a workhobby? (I guess the obvious answer would be open my own venue - except the kind of places I like to hang out would be expensive, and require a lot of connections/tea money/etc which I wouldn't want to deal with) (though I sometimes do wonder- with the amount of money I and my friends spend on alcohol alone we could easily finance a bar.. maybe when we're older, lol)

You lifestyle may vary, but even today 100k/mo is bare minimum I'd recommend to someone to live in Thailand. It allows for a good living with modest entertainment. But what happens in 10 years when inflation pushes prices up and your 100k don't buy quite as much anymore? what happens in 20 years? 30 years? at age 40 you have to worry about these things if you retire that early. Even older retirees are struggling with inflation and currency fluctuations (strong baht/weak retirement currency). At 200k/mo you can have a great lifestyle, and are much more future proof in case of currency fluctuations or inflation. I'd personally choose to work a few more years and retire with a clear mind than retire early with an uncertain future (imagine having to go back to work when you're 60!). But it doesn't have to be now or in 10 years. You can work 5 years or however many more years you feel like - 150k/mo should be pretty solid too, it doesn't have to be double or nothing.

Judging by the video he's falling down drunk. Did he actually drive away after finishing his "business"?? if yes then there's a much bigger problem here than his disgusting behavior - nobody that drunk should be driving.

Actually in my home country I'd be just as worried as I have very little trust of the government there. But yes- this is Thailand, and governments here are known to come up with all sorts of ideas - feasible or not - and sort out how to implement them later. The problem isn't that they made a policy announcement - the problem is that they made a policy announcement with zero clarity how exactly it will be implemented and what will the actual requirements be. These aren't things to figure out mid-2024 - people need to plan their tax situation BEFORE the year begins with such drastic change.

That's another point- we're less than a month away from 2024, and still nobody knows how exactly this will be enforced or what the actual rules will look like. Just because you think they won't try to dual tax, or that there won't be additional burden, does not mean they won't. TiT.

1. Because we (some of us) already paid taxes in our home country on the money we bring here. Double-taxation is wrong. 2. Because we already contribute far more to Thailand's economy than the average taxpayer. The money we inject into the Thai economy directly and indirectly keeps Thais employed. Not to mention we do pay sales taxes and other taxes directly or indirectly. 3. Because this may put a burden on expats who don't owe taxes yet will have to file and explain sources of income anyway. We don't know if, and how, any of this will be enforced. Depending on how bad it is will determine how much further whining we do, as well as more drastic measures like leaving Thailand for at least 6 months a year if that's the only way to avoid double-taxation. And the stupidest part is that this isn't even going to help Thailand - on the contrary, if actually enforced it will halt the majority of overseas money flowing into the country and devastate the economy.

By me. I like to start my night late and want to end it late. Plenty of other people do too. You're right that I don't actually want to stay out longer - I just want to be able to do it on my schedule and not some weirdly mandated government schedule that does not fit nightlife reality. (reality is that most nightclubs don't even begin to fill up before midnight, and are most busy after 2-3am)

There is no country where freedom of speech is absolute. Even in western democracies you can and will get in trouble for saying certain things (threats, defamation, etc). Fact here is this "influencer" paid a lot of money to live in Thailand - yet she is here deliberately trying to tarnish the image of the country (or at least Bangkok/Nana). She went to a red light area dressed in a way that would confuse men to assume she is a freelancer, knowing exactly what would happen (she'll get approached), and made a video about it - this isn't some naive girl that's just speaking her opinion - this is a woman who's trying to get more followers by attempting to create "shocking" content. Throw the book at her. We need less "influencers" in Thailand (and everywhere), especially selfish ones that try to manipulate to gain traction. She's clearly working in Thailand: while I hate calling "influencer" working - she is getting paid, therefore legally it is work.

Exactly. Stricter penalties and enforcement might actually make a difference, not having venues policing patrons which has zero chances of working. This is just a ridiculous attempt at appeasing the wet blanket anti-alcohol crowd who claim the closing times will cause more drunk driving - which is idiotic as people who drink and drive will do so at 2am or 4am either way. Anyway, whatever their excuses are, longer hours are very welcome.

Those masses are his support base. It's really ironic that Thailand is essentially financing a billionaire's hospital stay, simply to pretend that he's locked up. Might as well just set him free and save the taxpayers a bunch.

Why should anyone pay taxes on money that's already been taxed in their home country? That is neither fair nor makes any financial sense. It remains to be seen how this will actually be enforced - if at all - but unlikely that they'll force everybody to file tax returns.

Despite the silly responses you've been getting, depending on your lifestyle and party style 186k a month may not be enough if you spend 70k on rent. Booze and girls add up fast if you do it daily. I'd recommend deciding what's more important to you- girls and party or renting a 70k house, because you'll have to compromise on one of them. 70k rent plus utilities, food, and other expenses would leave you with just over 100k free spending money, or in other words about 3000 baht a night - enough for booze OR girls but not really both. There are ways to budget and save, but if your starting point is already low (100k/mo spending money is low IMHO) then you'll always be looking at your wallet worried if you're not overdoing it.

Complete nonsense. While the US shouldn't provoke a war with Iran, it's actually Iran that's been testing the waters with more provocations from Iran-backed militias, exactly because Iran fears an all-out war with the US. I don't think the US should directly attack Iran at this point, but more actions need to be taken against those militia and the Houthis in particular need to go. Either way comparing US military might to Iran's is ridiculous because they are orders of magnitude apart. It's kind of like comparing Hamas and their RPGs and inaccurate rockets to Israel's coordinated land, air, and sea forces - it's not a question of if they lose, it's just a question of how long it takes. Hopefully it won't come to that (a war with Iran), but if it does the US needs to promptly and decidely crush the Islamists and install a new government. The will of the people is already there - it's just a matter of helping them make it happen.

Completely irrelevant. This happened in a Thai nightlife area that will not be part of the 4am extended closing times, not to mention this happened long before 4am. Young Thais brawling has nothing to do with extending closing times in tourist areas.

What a terrible idea. Will have to consider Phlippines or somewhere else for the month of April if this happens. Not willing to tolerate dodging brainless zombies with water guns for a whole month.

Weed aside, I'll never understand why online ordering of booze is illegal here. It's not like people are going to drink any less just because they have to physically go get the bottle - it's just less convenient and achieves nothing. But the Thai alcohol Karens can pretend they've done something...

Stop there. That's all we needed to know.

I know a few club managers and owners in Bangkok. They're absolutely thrilled and can't wait for this. For some no name pub you may be right - keeping it open for 3 people another 2 hours is not great, but for a club with hundreds of people there's absolutely a lot more business coming their way.

Sounds like you're the one who needs to get a life. Why do you care what other people do with theirs? None of your business if we want to party late. Let the market (patrons and venue owners) decide how late they want to go. As long as they're not hurting or disturbing anyone - there is no problem. Nonsense about more drunks or more drunk drivers is just that - people who drink and drive will do it anyway, and tourists don't drink and drive anyway, at least not the ones with a brain.

Assuming you believe the maid that he said he would commit suicide at some point - she could've been persuaded to say that for money or by threats. I don't know the guy, but it sounds odd to me that someone would confide in anyone - let along a maid - that they're about to off themselves. There are some missing details like what language the suicide letter was in, whether the room was locked from the inside, and what was the nature of his alleged financial trouble - or to be specific if someone would have a motive to kill him. Simply shutting the valve off does not in itself rule out suicide, although it does raise questions - if he was conscious and shut it off because he changed his mind, why not take the bag off his head? Also- was he found close enough to the valve that it would make sense that he was the one who shut it off? etc...

That'a not the issue here. The guy financed her investment in a grocery store, afterwards she disappeared as she didn't need him anymore. Just another case of a fool and his money parting ways. To begin with expecting to find actual love in Pattaya is naive. (possible maybe in a minority of cases - but not most)

Gambling and drugs usually come packaged in with violent tendencies too here, but yes, depending on the level of addiction it can be a problem.

My first gf in Thailand taught me an improtant lesson: at the first sign of violence - ditch her. If she's talking about "boxing you" then she will eventually, and if she's already hitting you when angry then eventually she'll move on to objects (sharp or not). You can't fix crazy, but you can toss it out of your life.