Expat Life, or Immigrant Life?

[MrTee]

Interesting article in the Grauniad ..


http://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionals-network/2015/mar/13/white-people-expats-immigrants-migration?CMP=fb_gu

Do others here feel they are expats or immigrants?

What are you?

[nikmar]

i guess we are ex pats from your native country's point of view but an immigrant from a Thai point of view.

[Bobotie]

i guess we are ex pats from your native country's point of view but an immigrant from a Thai point of view.

From a thai point of view most are non-immigrants...fact

Given a lot of refugees in Europe are classifed as "ecomonic refugees" using the same rational, one could deem the vast majority of "expats" coming to Thailand as "sexual refugees"

Edited March 15, 2016 by Bobotie

[stander]

When we are hiring someone other than a Thai national, we describe it as a expatriate role.

[BuaBS]

Refugee....that is: tax refugee ! ( but the passport says non-immigrant).

[yellowboat]

Thailand is full of retirees mostly. Few work in Thailand as it is not allowed or overly complicated. Thailand is to be avoided if you have drive and ambition.

[houlicha]

You're an immigrant if you do yard work for rich locals to survive.

[Bobotie]

Thailand is full of retirees mostly. Few work in Thailand as it is not allowed or overly complicated. Thailand is to be avoided if you have drive and ambition.

If retirees worked in Thailand they wouldnt be retirees would they ?

Have you ever been to Thailand other than being a 2 week millionaire ?

[SoiBiker]

I'm am expat in that I'm outside my country of origin. I think to be classed as an immigrant I'd have to have plans to relocate here permanently, which is not the case.

[Bobotie]

You're an immigrant if you do yard work for rich locals to survive.

That would be an illegal alien

[HikeFromLA]

The article got it right despite its huffy, angry tone. Expat always refers to a White person or to anyone coming from a White-majority country.

Kind of like how an "exotic beauty" will always be Asian or brown-skinned, even if she has never traveled, and is called that in her very own hometown newspaper.

[gandalf12]

We are not immigrants as we would ultimately get citizenship and voting rights if we were so we are definitely expats

[Dewey]

Thailand is full of retirees mostly. Few work in Thailand as it is not allowed or overly complicated. Thailand is to be avoided if you have drive and ambition.

You couldn't be more wrong...

[SoiBiker]

Thailand is full of retirees mostly. Few work in Thailand as it is not allowed or overly complicated. Thailand is to be avoided if you have drive and ambition.

I know dozens of people that work here. It probably just seems like it's full of retirees if you spend your time in places where people with nothing much to do hang out.

[LivinLOS]

The article got it right despite its huffy, angry tone. Expat always refers to a White person or to anyone coming from a White-majority country.

Plenty of non white expats..

An immigrant is one who moves country for greater economic advantages, often low skilled and from a poorer country. They derive economic benefits from the move greater than were available to them. They often utilize the greater social safety net of the host nation they move to.

An expat is one who moves to another country and is self supporting, who imports money into the economy he has moved to, pays his own social and medical costs etc. An expat is also one who is recruited who has high skills which the host country lacks.

A refugee is someone who has left a collapsing economy or social system due to its failure leaving them without an ability to survive effectively there.

Certainly theres a little bit of overlap in each of the cases, from refugee to immigrant, from immigrant to expat, there are debateable points. Westerners coming to Thailand who have to import their living costs and take total care of their own social safety net, hospital bills, pension costs, elderly care, etc clearly fall into the expat side, westerners coming here trying to work lower skilled jobs, far more grey and closer to immigrants.

[laislica]

I'm a visitor with annual temporary permission to stay as a retiree and I live with my wife in her house when I'm here in Thailand.

My pensions are our sole provider.

When we go to Spain for a half year, my wife accompanies me and she is a visitor there, as am I, I am British.

Because she is not from the EU, her Spanish ID has Foreigner written on it.

I have always regarded the term Expat as referring to a bunch of chaps, sometimes with wives and families,

temporally working and living in another country than their own.

They meet up to socialise and help each other with understanding the laws and rules of their temporary location.

They are not immigrants/migrants because they have not made a permanent relocation.

I guess that this makes many of us members here Expats then?

[SoiBiker]

I'm a visitor with annual temporary permission to stay as a retiree and I live with my wife in her house when I'm here in Thailand.

My pensions are our sole provider.

When we go to Spain for a half year, my wife accompanies me and she is a visitor there, as am I, I am British.

Because she is not from the EU, her Spanish ID has Foreigner written on it.

I have always regarded the term Expat as referring to a bunch of chaps, sometimes with wives and families,

temporally working and living in another country than their own.

They meet up to socialise and help each other with understanding the laws and rules of their temporary location.

They are not immigrants/migrants because they have not made a permanent relocation.

I guess that this makes many of us members here Expats then?

Expat is short for expatriate. It simply means someone who resides outside their native country, be it permanently or temporarily. It's Latin, innit?

[yellowboat]

Thailand is full of retirees mostly. Few work in Thailand as it is not allowed or overly complicated. Thailand is to be avoided if you have drive and ambition.

You couldn't be more wrong...

I truly wish I was.

[Bernard Flint]

Thailand is full of retirees mostly. Few work in Thailand as it is not allowed or overly complicated. Thailand is to be avoided if you have drive and ambition.

What a silly post.Many have had the drive for all their working life and reap the rewards of big pensions to live here

[yellowboat]

Thailand is full of retirees mostly. Few work in Thailand as it is not allowed or overly complicated. Thailand is to be avoided if you have drive and ambition.

I know dozens of people that work here. It probably just seems like it's full of retirees if you spend your time in places where people with nothing much to do hang out.

The wisest use of time is spent with hardworking, productive Thais. The expat community in Bangkok never struck me is large nor dynamic. Given the current situation, it will probably shrink more.

[yellowboat]

Thailand is full of retirees mostly. Few work in Thailand as it is not allowed or overly complicated. Thailand is to be avoided if you have drive and ambition.

What a silly post.Many have had the drive for all their working life and reap the rewards of big pensions to live here

Like I said. It is a place for retirees.

[SoiBiker]

Thailand is full of retirees mostly. Few work in Thailand as it is not allowed or overly complicated. Thailand is to be avoided if you have drive and ambition.

I know dozens of people that work here. It probably just seems like it's full of retirees if you spend your time in places where people with nothing much to do hang out.

The wisest use of time is spent with hardworking, productive Thais. The expat community in Bangkok never struck me is large nor dynamic. Given the current situation, it will probably shrink more.

I think a lot of the retired crowd don't realise how many younger working expats there are in Bangkok - they don't drink in the same bars, they don't post on the same forums, and you probably just assume they're tourists when you do see them around, but they exist in large numbers.

[yellowboat]

Thailand is full of retirees mostly. Few work in Thailand as it is not allowed or overly complicated. Thailand is to be avoided if you have drive and ambition.

I know dozens of people that work here. It probably just seems like it's full of retirees if you spend your time in places where people with nothing much to do hang out.

The wisest use of time is spent with hardworking, productive Thais. The expat community in Bangkok never struck me is large nor dynamic. Given the current situation, it will probably shrink more.

I think a lot of the retired crowd don't realise how many younger working expats there are in Bangkok - they don't drink in the same bars, they don't post on the same forums, and you probably just assume they're tourists when you do see them around, but they exist in large numbers.

Where ? What do they do ?

[SoiBiker]

Thailand is full of retirees mostly. Few work in Thailand as it is not allowed or overly complicated. Thailand is to be avoided if you have drive and ambition.

I know dozens of people that work here. It probably just seems like it's full of retirees if you spend your time in places where people with nothing much to do hang out.

The wisest use of time is spent with hardworking, productive Thais. The expat community in Bangkok never struck me is large nor dynamic. Given the current situation, it will probably shrink more.

I think a lot of the retired crowd don't realise how many younger working expats there are in Bangkok - they don't drink in the same bars, they don't post on the same forums, and you probably just assume they're tourists when you do see them around, but they exist in large numbers.

Where ? What do they do ?

In Bangkok. They work.

It's not just one big retirement community.

[stander]

There is definitely less expats here on the full expat packages, i.e. married status, family, health cover, transportation, schooling and so on, than say 10/15 years ago.

Which is no surprise as many of the multinationals have downsized.

I see more expats with a Thai spouse and family at the various expat society functions, although the only ones I mostly go to now are the golf days.

As for expats being white only, I do not believe that is correct.

In all the years I have lived and worked here, I have seen many different nationalities assigned here on a full expat package.

In addition, we have Thais working overseas and they are on a full expat package.

[Dewey]

The wisest use of time is spent with hardworking, productive Thais. The expat community in Bangkok never struck me is large nor dynamic. Given the current situation, it will probably shrink more.

I think a lot of the retired crowd don't realise how many younger working expats there are in Bangkok - they don't drink in the same bars, they don't post on the same forums, and you probably just assume they're tourists when you do see them around, but they exist in large numbers.

Where ? What do they do ?

For exemple me, arrived a 23. Work in big manufacture company (over 300 persons) as a manager, 4 years already, very good salary. Will change job soon to get more experience (they call me, I wasn't looking). My ambition is to have my own company in the next 10 years.

[cgtours]

i guess we are ex pats from your native country's point of view but an immigrant from a Thai point of view.

From a thai point of view most are non-immigrants...fact

Given a lot of refugees in Europe are classifed as "ecomonic refugees" using the same rational, one could deem the vast majority of "expats" coming to Thailand as "sexual refugees"

Would Desperate walking ATM Sex Refugees fit the bill?

[bazza40]

I'd suggest a third category is needed - economic refugees. As I've said before on other threads, I can live in Australia in very modest circumstances. Here, I can live as I want to. I'd suggest there are a lot of falangs in Thailand who are in that category.

I wonder how many people realise the Thai aged care system is one of the best in the world cost-wise. In most Western countries, you'll be shoved into some tarted-up hovel and any assets you have are in hock to the proprietors. Plus a carer who will be paid minimum wage to administer to the needs of a couple of dozen clients. Here, as long as your money lasts, you can buy devoted one on one care for 10K baht a month.

[MaeJoMTB]

I'm just here for the cheap sex,

That makes me a sexpat.

Cost of living doesn't really matter, I could happily live in the UK or Spain for the same money.

But I would have to manage without the cheap sex.

Don't have a job in Thailand, so can't ever be an immigrant.

Too old for a job, don't need a job either.

Edited March 16, 2016 by MaeJoMTB

[SoiBiker]

I'm just here for the cheap sex,

That makes me a sexpat.

Cost of living doesn't really matter, I could happily live in the UK or Spain for the same money.

But I would have to manage without the cheap sex.

Don't have a job in Thailand, so can't ever be an immigrant.

Too old for a job, don't need a job either.

Nice to see you admit that it's because the women are cheaper than western women, rather than superior to them.