Ex Pat Packages

Are these as much of a thing as they used to be? I’m talking about the well paid (accommodation included) packages for professionals to go and work in underdeveloped countries that are supposedly less livable - Hong Kong and FILTH being the archetypal English expat destination.

i would have thought as these places develop and the local workforce is increasingly educated - and cheaper - that these are starting to disappear?

100% correct m8, ime.  "No" is the answer.

Think I got in at the last.  Local workforce (women being the far superior workers to the socially-entitled men) is less reliant on the great foreign input that was required to help the LDCs become less L.

Endemic corruption will take a couple of generations to sort tho in some of these countries.

Subsidised accommodation, armed driver (although he happens to be armed, not needed, he's just an ex-copper), solid remuneration but still bum-fook enough to require a half-literate native English speaker to oversee stuff.

Get in.

I'm looking to get out.  The appeal is time-limited and miss England.

For the old fashioned ex pat deal you really need to go somewhere which offers a significant risk of injury / death. That still leaves you quite a lot of Africa and some former Soviet states but, unless you work for Megabank and get relocated at a senior level as an existing employee, the days of signing up for a new gig in HK, Singapore or UAE on some all expenses paid deal are slim to non-existent.

the days of signing up for a new gig in HK, Singapore or UAE on some all expenses paid deal are slim to non-existent.

Again, industry specific.

We send tons of people at our company out to Singers and the emirates on full whack packages. The cash allowances aren't as generous as the pwopa norty countries like in Africa, but you still get housing, schooling and various uplifts

and in law firms you still get megamegawedge to go to the sandpit or africa

In Asia, because most of Asia is quite nice to live in, you only really get a cushy expat deal if you are leadership. But the salaries are higher than in London anyway and the tax lower.

Wellington what is special about the oil and gas industry where the local workforce doesn’t have the local talent to recruit from. It just seems this would naturally become less and less of a thing

what is special about the oil and gas industry 

$$$$$$$$$$

Man power costs are a drop in the ocean. They get the locals to do the shit jobs but fly in specialists to supervise / manage the assets. 

But my question Wellington is more like 'Why aren't there local specialists?'

I lived in China for about five years until about five years ago and in the time since I first went there, to now, the market for foreign labour changed totally

I'm being sounded out about a move to HK. The rents seem bonkers though, anywhere suitable for a family of 4 seems to start at £7k a month. I know tax is a lot lower so I can see how it may work if there are 2 of us earning a reasonable wage, but as sole earner I will need a huge uplift to even be able to consider it.

Where the hell do lawyers live out there? Do people get uplifts to go there?

Imo it wont be long before London law firms start tax equalising, in a bad way, packages for the popular expat destinations to some extent (at junior end anyway). The glory days are ending for the mainstream expat-er. Go despot or go home.

Let's just say friend who worked for a bank moved to NY in 2003 and they paid for his accommodation, utilities, rental of furniture, shipping stuff over from England, etc.

Another friend working for the same bank moved to HK in about 2014 and they just paid for accommodation for the first six weeks while he found somewhere to rent at his own expense.

Think it's safe to say the old all inclusive packages were ditched during the financial crisis.

Yes, I think that is the normal approach here though it seems to depend on whether you are asked to go vs putting your hand up for it.

Still can't get my head round the rents.

It is hard to compare like with like.  Mid-levels in Hong Kong is like Mayfair in London - you can walk to your office. 

Forty minutes door-to-door gets you to Shatin compared to say Bromley. 

Its also sensible to compare the combined cost of rent, utilities and tax for your net income. In Hong Kong the maximum salary tax is 16.5% and there is no NI. 

But it is true to say that Hong Kong people eat out much more often, do not expect to entertain people at home, have less personal space and don’t have pocket handkerchief patches of grass to show off their lawn mowing skills

Lawyers do well in Dubai. It's a saturated market (all the major international firms are there) but there is currently massive oversupply of housing (= rental prices down by 30%), so the one thing that used to drain your hard-earned dirhams (after brunch) is now not such an outlay. 

It sours my bile even to type the acronym NGO.

Take home money = dogshit but nannies, accommodation and schooling are all heavily subsidised.

These are the only benefits.  You would work for a bunch of nobs who pass the buck to justify their position, have to deal with cray cray in-house political back-stabbery to the end of getting nothing of worth achieved. 

Much like working in compliance for a mega-bank/pharma/O&G frim, I imagine, save for the $$.