Chiang Mai Expat Demographics

[silverhawk_usa]

There seem to be 3 sub-groups of 30 to 50s here. The biggest being those with a passion for motorcycles, then those who profess to be teechers and then a small group of professionals who like to hang on the coat tails of a visa service chap.

I'm sure there are others, but I don't get out enough.

don't forget the trust fund babies, or grown men who live off their parents. there are thousands of them living all over Thailand. they're easy to spot, haven't ever had a real job, living in Thailand forever without a worry in the world. there are many who are in their 50's and get a monthly allowance from their parent(s).

Those must be the people doing the 300 THB flat beers. And don't forget the able-bodied people the State of California gives SSDI to, mostly without regular check-ins or residency requirements. Back in the 80s, when they decided to give it to them with only a PO Box; it really opened the flood gates.

You obviously have no idea how SSDI works. It is a federal program you pay into when you work. There is no residency requirement and 100% legal to collect and live in Thailand.

I believe KKK is referring to Social Security Disability Insurance and SnowBird is thinking Social Security retirement benefits.

Back on topic; I retired to Chiang Mai in 2002 at age 52. Pretty much ended up in what has been described as the motorcycle group. Traveled all over SE Asia. Older now maybe living more quietly but have friends in most of the described demographics. No prejudice. I haven't experienced the social divides some posters seem to infer.

Edited May 23, 2016 by silverhawk_usa

[SooKee]

yes, the abundant street food is sorely lacking in Cambodia, although some of the bar-stool experts vehemently denied that fact. Imitation western food might be a little cheaper (than CM), but I think a can of tuna was about 90 tmb in S'ville. Reaper also made a good point about the "Nomads." The older people who manage large sums of money with their computers don't call themselves Nomads, and don't have visa trouble, but the people who are Amazon resellers or have blogs telling you about Tiger Kingdom, and make 32 Dollars per month, do have visa trouble and do call themselves "Digital Nomads." Just a bit of irony.

Why so full of hate against digital nomads. The fact that you think they make money from writing blogs about Tiger kingdom shows you have no clue about what they do. I detect a touch of jealousy in your post. Maybe you are upset that they have a found a way to make money that is beyond comprehension. Anyway stop with all the hate Bangmai. It makes you look like a very bitter sad lonely person, which I suspect is the truth.

Indeed, CM: Also the land of the self-opinionated miserable b*****d with a never ending chip on their shoulder about whatever might be their flavour of the month at any given time and who's only purpose in life seems to be relentlessly slagging others off at EVERY SINGLE opportunity. People are just people, getting along doing what they do, I leave the 'grouping' to the prejudiced who also seem to have a fixation with stereotyping people according to their own warped view of the world. Jeez, get a life, live and let live and all that. Or of course, maybe it's just TV.

Edited May 24, 2016 by SooKee

[KhonKaenKowboy]

yes, the abundant street food is sorely lacking in Cambodia, although some of the bar-stool experts vehemently denied that fact. Imitation western food might be a little cheaper (than CM), but I think a can of tuna was about 90 tmb in S'ville. Reaper also made a good point about the "Nomads." The older people who manage large sums of money with their computers don't call themselves Nomads, and don't have visa trouble, but the people who are Amazon resellers or have blogs telling you about Tiger Kingdom, and make 32 Dollars per month, do have visa trouble and do call themselves "Digital Nomads." Just a bit of irony.

Sounds like a bit of jealousy to me. I've met some of these kids (about 25 of them stayed in our moobaan for a few days last year during the nomad convention), and they were sharp kids making a heck of a lot more than "32 Dollars per month".

Yes, successful business people always rent rooms in LoSo suburbs, when traveling to conventions. Are you sure you didn't mistake them for biler room workers or Jehova;s Witnesses?

[TheSiemReaper]

It's a funny thing - the digital nomads here are the detritus of the digital nomad world; they blog endlessly on subjects such as "100 free things to do in Chiang Mai" or "How to live like a boss on $2.99 a day in Chiang Mai" - it doesn't take a genius to work out that they write these pieces because poverty limits their experiences. The digital nomad movement as a whole is turning into a pseudonym for "impoverished Western vagrants on an extended holiday" and nothing more. Those who are making a good living and have been doing this for a while are embarrassed by the term "digital nomad". I met with a client in Malaysia recently - they run a multi-million dollar education business and have been "digital nomads" for more than a decade. They were absolutely distraught about the fact they felt stupid calling themselves "digital nomads" - they felt they'd found a term which described them to a T and then had it turned upside down by children and they singled out Chiang Mai as the source of that too.

All those travel bloggers based out of Chiang Mai and not one has visited all the museums in town (an effort which would take a day maximum if you tackled it seriously - most of the museums here are lovely but tiny) or visited anything but the "Big 5 Temples" in town. And so on...

They're devoid of ideas and imagination. They simply don't care about the "working" part of digital nomadism - they're in for the parties and the cheap beer - in essence they're backpackers taking their time nothing more. A huge chunk of this city's digital nomad population is barely making $500 a month. They took the idea of "geo-arbitrage" and got it wrong. Instead of taking a first world living to the developing world (giving a massive boost in quality of life); they headed to the developing world to make developing world wages and want to boast about it too.

I know a lot of "location independent professionals" here who are highly successful - guys in their early 30s running software companies (with multiple Thai employees), tech journalists (in their early 40s), investors (also in their early 40s), etc. but none of them would use "digital nomad" it's a source of shame not aspiration now.

[KhonKaenKowboy]

Just like no Computer Engineer wants to be called "IT Guy," which was a total generic name for anyone who could put their hands on a computer, usually on the government payroll, and part of the national debt. "IT Guy" did a four week certification course that could have been completed by the engineer in four hours. The engineer has a very difficult four year degree+.

[TheSiemReaper]

Just like no Computer Engineer wants to be called "IT Guy," which was a total generic name for anyone who could put their hands on a computer, usually on the government payroll, and part of the national debt. "IT Guy" did a four week certification course that could have been completed by the engineer in four hours. The engineer has a very difficult four year degree+.

Yes, just like that. The reason so many Digital Nomads are really digital clowns is that they want the lifestyle without effort. Drop shipping, Shopify, Amazon Stores, and lousy travel blogs catering to the broke - they're all jobs that can be done by anybody and thus - there's no money in them. Just like the "IT guy" was essentially on hand to change printer cartridges and fetch more paper for the printer. Whereas the engineer did networking, application and os management, etc. and it couldn't be done by anybody. Salaries reflected the difference too.

Those shunning the "digital nomad" label have put in their hard yards and are travelling and working and most importantly - earning too.

[KhonKaenKowboy]

People find some item they can get for a song, and decide to sell it on Amazon....usually it already has 100 sellers, mostly just trying to make some profit out of shipping fees...if not; people will copy cat that store easier than Thais will copycat a successful business here. Technology is a multi-billion Dollar business...but anything involving MLM is a scam...anything involving SO is a scam....reselling is easily duplicable.......and without capital, you aren't going to make shiite..

[TheSiemReaper]

It's not that there wasn't money to be made on Amazon but you know that the bottom has dropped out of the market when a thousand (expensive) "how to make a fortune selling on Amazon" courses appear. These only appear when a market is saturated and its business model becomes easy to duplicate and everyone is doing it. Nobody is making $10s of thousands selling garlic crushers on Amazon any more than they're making thousands drop shipping crap from China. The Amazon party has long since disappeared. If you run a business where you create nothing of value and supply no additional value in the chain at all - you cannot make money. A lesson that the "Digital Nomads" still don't seem to have learned. (You will now see somebody going on about customer care - Amazon's customer care is infinitely better than anything someone can provide over Skype from Thailand - but don't let that stop them from insisting anyway).

[KhonKaenKowboy]

I like that show FLip or Flop on HGTV...she's hot, hot. But it's typical sensationalization of some very hard work, where many have gone bankrupt. The intro is something like "Tarek and Christina" buy houses for cash and are living the dream and making big money." It should be noted that on one episode it was revealed that they do pay cash, after they borrow it from a hard money lender at 32% APR. It would seem odd that a couple selling one house per month+, would still have to resort to such desperate measures to have capital. Very popular show.

[TheSiemReaper]

I think you could do something gladiatorial here for the Digital Nomads and get some great car crash TV. Head to a co-working space in Nimman, offer a $6,000 prize to the winner (a year's cash!) and put them through a series of humiliating contests to push their business idea - losers are required to work as a "pork on a stick" vendor outside a local bar for a month; this may even teach them how a business works. The final involves the last 4 contestants taking part in Muay Thai matches after being fed bad seafood - using the toilet sees you eliminated (in more ways the one).

[KhonKaenKowboy]

[mr chow]

People live in CM because it's CHEAP!

[Konini]

It can be cheap. We pay the same rent as we would for an equally nice, well located place back home, and my shopping bill (I cook farang food every day) is no lower than it would be back home apart from the fact that we don't eat as much (quantity per meal) meat as we used to and a weekly big eye fillet steak is now a modestly, and more appropriately sized monthly one, probably much better for our health as an unintended consequence.

If you live like a Thai and eat like a Thai and clean like a Thai - I reckon I spend more a month on cleaning products than many would spend in a year, but I admit I can get a bit obsessive about it - then yes, it can be cheap. But that isn't what we worked 60-90 hours a week for. And for most people who retire at a more sensible age than 43, that isn't what they worked 40 hours a week for. You can live cheap or you can live comfortably and a few will choose to live like kings. It's all about what you want out of life and what means you have to fund it.

I know a lot of people my age here who are programmers or developers who make a very good living and would be insulted if you called them Digital Nomads because that term is now firmly associated with those buying and selling on Ebay and Amazon and the banal blogs being written. Not forgetting of course the Trustafarians who are 'writing their novel'. Backpackers stretching out their stay as stated above is a perfect description for them. But they aren't all like that. The ones I know are just like I used to be: highly skilled people who have a profession which allows them to work in an office or to work from home. It didn't occur to me all those years ago to do what they are doing now, although the internet connection wasn't so good here in Thailand back then and even in Melbourne I had to take my drives into the office once a week or so (and of course my husband was working too in a job where he had to go in every day). Now they can be anywhere in the world as long as they have a good internet connection and the facility in place for conference calls with the rest of their team if they have one or their client directly if not. There are an awful lot of them out there, and they don't congregate around the Working Spaces - they're usually too busy doing actual work to go and play at pretend work.