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I'm surprised to hear that it is impolite to not have a housekeeper if you are an expat. To which places are you referring?

grandinj 5y ago
That's a fairly common attitude in poorer countries - there is an expectation that if you are wealthy, you have (at the very least) an obligation to provide employment.
- jiggunjer 5y ago
  But expat doesn't automatically mean wealthy.
  - medion 5y ago
    Wealth is a relative term. It's pretty unlikely for an expat to be living in the third world, on third world wages with third world opportunities...
  - stavros 5y ago
    It does, otherwise they're called immigrants.
    - BurningFrog 5y ago
      My interpretation has always been that an expat is abroad temporarily, while an immigrant intends to stay permanently. I came to the US as an expat, but became an immigrant. If you tend to see racism behind every raised eyebrow, you can of course also see this terminology as racist.
    - fxtentacle 5y ago
      Or "backpackers" - which seems to be secret code for: stay away, these people (usually guys) cause more trouble than they are worth.
      - darkwater 5y ago
        No, backpackers in SE Asia are still mostly on the expat side. Even if they are broken students on a sabbatical year, they mostly have families home that can back them up in case of need. (Exceptions apply, YMMV etc etc.)
        fxtentacle 5y ago
        I agree with you that most westerners who travel to SE Asia will still be considered as "expats" by the locals. What I meant to say is that those people who the locals consider not "expat" anymore, but "backpacker" instead, must really have fallen low.
    - soapdog 5y ago
      That is not how it was taught to me. Expat is when your job moves you to a new country, as in "you're an expatriate employee". Immigrant is when you move for your own reasons. Expats are expected to come back to their original country, or move to a third one at some time. Immigrants are establishing themselves in the new country.
      - ben_w 5y ago
        I have always understood it to be an example of English irregular language: “I am an expat, you are an immigrant, they are economic migrants.” —https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotive_conjugation https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotive_conjugation
    - seanmcdirmid 5y ago
      Expats usually don’t have immigrant visas. They also receive packages from their companies for their temporary assignments. If you go to the country on your own to fund a job, you usually won’t be referred to as an expat by those with packages who refer to themselves as expats. But you won’t be referred to as a migrant worker either unless you are poor and doing construction or farm work. We used the term half-pats to describe ourselves, but mostly it was just foreigners. The USA is exceptional because almost every visa that allows for work is considered an immigration visa (eg H1 leads to a greencard, eventually). But in other countries that is most definitely not true.
      - bluishgreen 5y ago
        H1 does not lead to a green card. Infact H1 approval receipt will show Temporary Non Immigrant Worker visa. You have to apply to get a green card, entirely separate.
- thombat 5y ago
  From Hilaire Belloc, of pre-war (1911) Britain: Lord Finchley tried to mend the Electric Light Himself. It struck him dead: And serve him right! It is the business of the wealthy man To give employment to the artisan.
- Little_Fish 5y ago
  I think this has a lot of truth. My brother was based in the Philippines for a while for work and was expected to have at least a housekeeper and a chauffeur. I think having a driver was a very reasonable safety measure given the traffic there too. At the time it seemed very ostentatious to us at home, but it was totally the norm.
  - frenchy 5y ago
    Car ownership, especially in Manila, is also not the norm there. There's over 110 million people on a handful of small islands. Also, public transit is way more efficient there than anywhere in North America.
    - Little_Fish 5y ago
      True - it was better to hire a chauffeur who had his own car than to buy a car (also traffic was crazy). He is from the UK - Public transport is pretty good in the UK and across much of Europe. As I recall, there were issues with terrorist bombing shopping centres and public transport in Manila at the time, so I think he avoided both.
Snoddas 5y ago
Anecdata : My wife's parents worked in Kenya for a few years in the 70s and they where advised that having a maid and a nanny was expected. (we are Swedish)
- miniwark 5y ago
  I have heard of the same in Ethiopia around the 90's. For white worker it was expected to: - rent a house - hire a house guardian - hire at last one maid - hire a chauffeur if you own a car It was also recommended than they come form the local neighborhood. It was a social norm, and if you do not do it you can expect the local policemen to "fine you" every time you take the car, the food cost to be x5 the price (or more), and many other additional costs and life inconvenience than just made more easy and cheaper to just hire the people. That said the work was real. A good chauffeur, will negotiate prices and bribes for you, and recommend you the good places. The house guardian was also your speaker with the neighborhood committee (with was in fact a government organization). (I will avoid the more complicated subject of the maid...) This was OK if you where a man, a couple or a family. If you where a young woman... good luck with this. There was a way to avoid all this: living in a flat in the city center and use taxis. (For Addis Ababa this may not be true anymore because the city was changed a lot from the big shantytown it was then)
  - mmmmmbop 5y ago
    > (I will avoid the more complicated subject of the maid...) I'm really curious now. Why is the maid a more complicated subject?
    - hnlmorg 5y ago
      Given our history, I was assuming there was some expectation that duties might also include requests of a sexual nature. I really hope that's not the case. But we (rich white people) don't exactly have a good track record in these types of situation. :(
      - tagoregrtst 5y ago
fxtentacle 5y ago
50 years ago, Germany also still had a popular saying "Eigentum verpflichtet" which I would translate as "ownership creates a duty". In short, people who owned companies, large plots of land, or other infrastructure were expected to spread their wealth by creating jobs. Nowadays, the spirit still lives on somewhat in the fact that we have free public scenic hiking trails through what looks like very expensive private property. When the land was privatized, the government made it a condition that the hiking trail would remain for the general public to enjoy, and so it did. I believe Vietnam still has a similar system, too, in that the government will calculate how much jobs a foreign company needs to create, based on their annual revenue. It's one of the reasons why Korean milk tea shops tend to be crammed full with 10-20 schoolgirl employees.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- igorkraw 5y ago
  "private property is subordinate to the common good" is even in our "Constitution" (grundgesetz, literally foundational law), although it has been neutered by precedent and other laws. The right of way is a concept which is still strong in a bunch of countries, including England and famously Norway where "Allemansretten" allows "all men" the right to camp in public spaces. I personally find these habitual rights an interesting expression of positive freedom, laws and customs limiting the power of those that have a lot of it (i.e., property owners) to monopolise and exploit, thus creating a public good. I think we should have more of it, especially in the physical but also the digital realm. Particularly, the concept of adversarial interoperability https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/06/adversarial-interoperability-reviving-elegant-weapon-more-civilized-age-slay https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/06/adversarial-interopera... is connected, it would be a different world of Google, Facebook and any other platform were obligated to make their internal APIs and documentation available at cost+a legislated profit margin do anyone can be compatible with them.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - 5y ago
walrus01 5y ago
I can't speak to the social expectations to have a housekeeper or cook as a domestic employee, but in many developing nation environments with high income disparities between the working class and those who hire domestic staff, there's another thing to consider. In some places that don't have supermarkets the process of buying groceries for a whole family is much more time consuming and labor intensive. For example, you get vegetables from one market, you go to another place if you want chicken and wait while they literally kill it in front of you, chop it up and put it in a plastic bag. Everything comes from its own decentralized market and requires a lot more time/effort to buy on an ongoing basis. Shopping and the process of buying all the supplies for a household is not nearly as convenient as going to Costco or similar in north america. Often the role of cook is combined with general duties of procuring household supplies, handling things like the local electrical bill, hiring laborers for household repair and maintenance, etc.
- apohn 5y ago
  Your post is spot on. I'm an immigrant (to the US) from one of these countries. It's easier to get domestic help because people are desperate for money and there is no social safety net. A lot of the domestic help typically has no/little education (maybe only elementary school), so they are trapped in that situation. Grocery shopping is a huge effort compared to the US. Also, with smaller homes, kitchens, and smaller fridges, you have to go grocery shopping multiple times a week. Cars and Gasoline are also heavily taxed. Even "rich" families will typically only have one basic car, so you need a driver to drop someone off at work, come home to take somebody to the various grocery stores, etc. Over the last 10-15 years as job and educational opportunities have improved, more and and more of the people I know complain that it's harder to find "good" domestic help. Lots of people who would typically go into basic construction jobs or domestic help jobs are finding other opportunities. Basically, what is going on in the US right now.
Blahah 5y ago
Very true currently in Kenya, if you integrate at all. People don't usually live in isolation, they are part of a local community and it's natural and expected that they share opportunities and risks with their community. If you can afford to, you are expected to hire other people to do things that save you time and energy, distributing your wealth in the local economy. Having a housekeeper, one or more people responsible for childcare, a gardener (if you have a garden), etc, are all very normal and it lifts everyone up.
- Loughla 5y ago
  That's genuinely interesting. Here in my part of the states, you're expected to do it all yourself, and in my area (exceedingly rural and exceedingly low income) having anyone do some of those things would be seen as being stuck-up or snobbish or something to that effect. For example, I still catch grief for being a "rich bitch" from my neighbors because I hired someone to put a roof on my covered porch on the back of my house 6 or 7 years ago. This may sound naive, but I had legitimately never considered that it's a valid and useful way to spread my opportunities through the community.
  - lotsofpulp 5y ago
    > This may sound naive, but I had legitimately never considered that it's a valid and useful way to spread my opportunities through the community. Because the better way to spread opportunity is to use that money to pay for poorer people to get an education so they do not have to do menial tasks for richer people.
    - throwhauser 5y ago
      > Because the better way to spread opportunity is to use that money to pay for poorer people to get an education so they do not have to do menial tasks for richer people. ...and then a data scientist with an advanced degree spends the day hand-crafting SQL to root-cause a customer complaint after Bezos sends a one-byte email, "?"... (EDIT: I may have focused on one aspect of the parent's point at the expense of the other, clarified below).

grandinj 5y ago

That's a fairly common attitude in poorer countries - there is an expectation that if you are wealthy, you have (at the very least) an obligation to provide employment.

jiggunjer 5y ago
But expat doesn't automatically mean wealthy.
- medion 5y ago
  Wealth is a relative term. It's pretty unlikely for an expat to be living in the third world, on third world wages with third world opportunities...
- stavros 5y ago
  It does, otherwise they're called immigrants.
  - BurningFrog 5y ago
    My interpretation has always been that an expat is abroad temporarily, while an immigrant intends to stay permanently. I came to the US as an expat, but became an immigrant. If you tend to see racism behind every raised eyebrow, you can of course also see this terminology as racist.
  - fxtentacle 5y ago
    Or "backpackers" - which seems to be secret code for: stay away, these people (usually guys) cause more trouble than they are worth.
    - darkwater 5y ago
      No, backpackers in SE Asia are still mostly on the expat side. Even if they are broken students on a sabbatical year, they mostly have families home that can back them up in case of need. (Exceptions apply, YMMV etc etc.)
      - fxtentacle 5y ago
        I agree with you that most westerners who travel to SE Asia will still be considered as "expats" by the locals. What I meant to say is that those people who the locals consider not "expat" anymore, but "backpacker" instead, must really have fallen low.
  - soapdog 5y ago
    That is not how it was taught to me. Expat is when your job moves you to a new country, as in "you're an expatriate employee". Immigrant is when you move for your own reasons. Expats are expected to come back to their original country, or move to a third one at some time. Immigrants are establishing themselves in the new country.
    - ben_w 5y ago
      I have always understood it to be an example of English irregular language: “I am an expat, you are an immigrant, they are economic migrants.” —https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotive_conjugation https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotive_conjugation
  - seanmcdirmid 5y ago
    Expats usually don’t have immigrant visas. They also receive packages from their companies for their temporary assignments. If you go to the country on your own to fund a job, you usually won’t be referred to as an expat by those with packages who refer to themselves as expats. But you won’t be referred to as a migrant worker either unless you are poor and doing construction or farm work. We used the term half-pats to describe ourselves, but mostly it was just foreigners. The USA is exceptional because almost every visa that allows for work is considered an immigration visa (eg H1 leads to a greencard, eventually). But in other countries that is most definitely not true.
    - bluishgreen 5y ago
      H1 does not lead to a green card. Infact H1 approval receipt will show Temporary Non Immigrant Worker visa. You have to apply to get a green card, entirely separate.
thombat 5y ago
From Hilaire Belloc, of pre-war (1911) Britain: Lord Finchley tried to mend the Electric Light Himself. It struck him dead: And serve him right! It is the business of the wealthy man To give employment to the artisan.
Little_Fish 5y ago
I think this has a lot of truth. My brother was based in the Philippines for a while for work and was expected to have at least a housekeeper and a chauffeur. I think having a driver was a very reasonable safety measure given the traffic there too. At the time it seemed very ostentatious to us at home, but it was totally the norm.
- frenchy 5y ago
  Car ownership, especially in Manila, is also not the norm there. There's over 110 million people on a handful of small islands. Also, public transit is way more efficient there than anywhere in North America.
  - Little_Fish 5y ago
    True - it was better to hire a chauffeur who had his own car than to buy a car (also traffic was crazy). He is from the UK - Public transport is pretty good in the UK and across much of Europe. As I recall, there were issues with terrorist bombing shopping centres and public transport in Manila at the time, so I think he avoided both.

Snoddas 5y ago

Anecdata : My wife's parents worked in Kenya for a few years in the 70s and they where advised that having a maid and a nanny was expected. (we are Swedish)

miniwark 5y ago
I have heard of the same in Ethiopia around the 90's. For white worker it was expected to: - rent a house - hire a house guardian - hire at last one maid - hire a chauffeur if you own a car It was also recommended than they come form the local neighborhood. It was a social norm, and if you do not do it you can expect the local policemen to "fine you" every time you take the car, the food cost to be x5 the price (or more), and many other additional costs and life inconvenience than just made more easy and cheaper to just hire the people. That said the work was real. A good chauffeur, will negotiate prices and bribes for you, and recommend you the good places. The house guardian was also your speaker with the neighborhood committee (with was in fact a government organization). (I will avoid the more complicated subject of the maid...) This was OK if you where a man, a couple or a family. If you where a young woman... good luck with this. There was a way to avoid all this: living in a flat in the city center and use taxis. (For Addis Ababa this may not be true anymore because the city was changed a lot from the big shantytown it was then)
- mmmmmbop 5y ago
  > (I will avoid the more complicated subject of the maid...) I'm really curious now. Why is the maid a more complicated subject?
  - hnlmorg 5y ago
    Given our history, I was assuming there was some expectation that duties might also include requests of a sexual nature. I really hope that's not the case. But we (rich white people) don't exactly have a good track record in these types of situation. :(
    - tagoregrtst 5y ago

fxtentacle 5y ago

50 years ago, Germany also still had a popular saying "Eigentum verpflichtet" which I would translate as "ownership creates a duty". In short, people who owned companies, large plots of land, or other infrastructure were expected to spread their wealth by creating jobs. Nowadays, the spirit still lives on somewhat in the fact that we have free public scenic hiking trails through what looks like very expensive private property. When the land was privatized, the government made it a condition that the hiking trail would remain for the general public to enjoy, and so it did. I believe Vietnam still has a similar system, too, in that the government will calculate how much jobs a foreign company needs to create, based on their annual revenue. It's one of the reasons why Korean milk tea shops tend to be crammed full with 10-20 schoolgirl employees.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
igorkraw 5y ago
"private property is subordinate to the common good" is even in our "Constitution" (grundgesetz, literally foundational law), although it has been neutered by precedent and other laws. The right of way is a concept which is still strong in a bunch of countries, including England and famously Norway where "Allemansretten" allows "all men" the right to camp in public spaces. I personally find these habitual rights an interesting expression of positive freedom, laws and customs limiting the power of those that have a lot of it (i.e., property owners) to monopolise and exploit, thus creating a public good. I think we should have more of it, especially in the physical but also the digital realm. Particularly, the concept of adversarial interoperability https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/06/adversarial-interoperability-reviving-elegant-weapon-more-civilized-age-slay https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/06/adversarial-interopera... is connected, it would be a different world of Google, Facebook and any other platform were obligated to make their internal APIs and documentation available at cost+a legislated profit margin do anyone can be compatible with them.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- 5y ago

walrus01 5y ago

I can't speak to the social expectations to have a housekeeper or cook as a domestic employee, but in many developing nation environments with high income disparities between the working class and those who hire domestic staff, there's another thing to consider. In some places that don't have supermarkets the process of buying groceries for a whole family is much more time consuming and labor intensive. For example, you get vegetables from one market, you go to another place if you want chicken and wait while they literally kill it in front of you, chop it up and put it in a plastic bag. Everything comes from its own decentralized market and requires a lot more time/effort to buy on an ongoing basis. Shopping and the process of buying all the supplies for a household is not nearly as convenient as going to Costco or similar in north america. Often the role of cook is combined with general duties of procuring household supplies, handling things like the local electrical bill, hiring laborers for household repair and maintenance, etc.

apohn 5y ago
Your post is spot on. I'm an immigrant (to the US) from one of these countries. It's easier to get domestic help because people are desperate for money and there is no social safety net. A lot of the domestic help typically has no/little education (maybe only elementary school), so they are trapped in that situation. Grocery shopping is a huge effort compared to the US. Also, with smaller homes, kitchens, and smaller fridges, you have to go grocery shopping multiple times a week. Cars and Gasoline are also heavily taxed. Even "rich" families will typically only have one basic car, so you need a driver to drop someone off at work, come home to take somebody to the various grocery stores, etc. Over the last 10-15 years as job and educational opportunities have improved, more and and more of the people I know complain that it's harder to find "good" domestic help. Lots of people who would typically go into basic construction jobs or domestic help jobs are finding other opportunities. Basically, what is going on in the US right now.

Blahah 5y ago

Very true currently in Kenya, if you integrate at all. People don't usually live in isolation, they are part of a local community and it's natural and expected that they share opportunities and risks with their community. If you can afford to, you are expected to hire other people to do things that save you time and energy, distributing your wealth in the local economy. Having a housekeeper, one or more people responsible for childcare, a gardener (if you have a garden), etc, are all very normal and it lifts everyone up.

Loughla 5y ago
That's genuinely interesting. Here in my part of the states, you're expected to do it all yourself, and in my area (exceedingly rural and exceedingly low income) having anyone do some of those things would be seen as being stuck-up or snobbish or something to that effect. For example, I still catch grief for being a "rich bitch" from my neighbors because I hired someone to put a roof on my covered porch on the back of my house 6 or 7 years ago. This may sound naive, but I had legitimately never considered that it's a valid and useful way to spread my opportunities through the community.
- lotsofpulp 5y ago
  > This may sound naive, but I had legitimately never considered that it's a valid and useful way to spread my opportunities through the community. Because the better way to spread opportunity is to use that money to pay for poorer people to get an education so they do not have to do menial tasks for richer people.
  - throwhauser 5y ago
    > Because the better way to spread opportunity is to use that money to pay for poorer people to get an education so they do not have to do menial tasks for richer people. ...and then a data scientist with an advanced degree spends the day hand-crafting SQL to root-cause a customer complaint after Bezos sends a one-byte email, "?"... (EDIT: I may have focused on one aspect of the parent's point at the expense of the other, clarified below).