6 ms·

Singapore is an interesting place for sure. I've been a half dozen times for work and fun. The biggest hindrance to Singapore startups is the Singapore governme

by scurvy 11y ago

Singapore is an interesting place for sure. I've been a half dozen times for work and fun. The biggest hindrance to Singapore startups is the Singapore government. Their iron-fisted approach to things from chewing gum, drugs, and even dancing on tables (for example) is antithetical to the dual veins of libertarian and liberal US political thought which is so firmly entrenched in Silicon Valley. Many believe that these competing, but sometimes sympathetically overlapping political schools are what made (and currently make) Silicon Valley so great. Hard to convince a programmer to move from SF to SG if they're going to be hanged for smoking a spliff. While the drug use is just an example, it just illustrates the difference of Laissez Faire in the US vs What's Best for the Country in SG.

digitalzombie 11y ago
I'm just curious but doesn't US citizen have to pay tax regardless of where they work? People from SF moving to SG to work would be double tax no? That would also be a big hindrance imo. Plus there are more than enough decent tech job in USA than risk working in another country with laws you don't know or understand. SG seems like a country with very harsh laws, not entirely sure I want to risk accidentally break something law (like chewing gum?).
- anthony_franco 11y ago
  Any income taxes paid to SG would quality for a Foreign Tax Credit so you wouldn't be double taxed.
- mcrae 11y ago
  On taxes, I'm sure somebody on HN knows better than me, but you are rarely 'double-taxed' under 200k as you say. The first 90k or so is exempt, plus any foreign tax you pay you can claim as a non-refundable deduction on your US return. Singapore is an amazing country that is really geared towards making things easy for expats. The chewing gum thing is a bit of a red-herring. Ending up in jail for a minor offence is not something you generally have to worry about.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- jonbishop 11y ago
  Yes, US citizens have to pay tax no matter where they live. You may be eligible for the Foreign Tax Credit[1] or, even better, the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion[2], though. For 2015, you can exclude up to $100,800 of your earnings with the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion, which will cover most if not all of your salary (for the majority of people). [1] http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/International-Taxpayers/Foreign-Tax-Credit http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/International-Taxpayers/Forei... [2] http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/International-Taxpayers/Foreign-Earned-Income-Exclusion http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/International-Taxpayers/Forei...
crdb 11y ago
Seriously, you guys are getting tiring. If it's so important, Thailand's a 1 hour flight away, Malaysia a short bus ride, Indonesia a short ferry. By the way, when's the last time someone was hung for smoking a spliff? It's like tourists in Sydney being scared of being bitten by a funnel web... Singapore has high quality of life, very low living costs compared to large US cities, efficient government (but not overbearing), and is a hub for one of the most exciting and growing regions of the world. It's an international city where a large proportion of residents come from all over the world and dozens of languages are spoken. The air is clean, there are no traffic jams, the metro is extremely cheap and spotless. And there's giant toucans living in the mango tree of my garden, right next to the centre of town - beat that SF. Most importantly, government is not corrupt and has over the last 40 years gotten a pretty good track record of doing what is right. Both Lees have been exceptional leaders under any measure; amongst other things, the father influenced the direction of the world by directly influencing DXP towards the Chinese "glasnost" that is responsible for how the world looks today. I used to be pretty libertarian (think Swiss "don't have a Federal government"), but realized living here that a clean, non-corrupt government can also work incredibly well. Another thing that flies under the radar of most critics is that Singapore has successfully set up a system to allow migrant manual labour legally; it is one of the very few places in the world where your Bengali construction worker on $500/month can go to the police, complain he hasn't been paid on time, and see his employer fined within two weeks. Try that in Qatar. Try that as an illegal in the US (over 80% of minimum wage labourers!).
- sheepmullet 11y ago
  "Seriously, you guys are getting tiring." I think he points out a very real issue. There is a massive cultural difference between SF and Singapore. Most of the developers I know in the Bay Area would never even consider moving to a red state.
  - crdb 11y ago
    I take issue to his stereotypes, which are trotted out regularly upon the merest mention of the word Singapore. I mean, "hung for smoking a spliff", really? The chewing gum ban was an attempt at restricting the supply after kids got into a fashion of blocking the subway's doors using it, particularly painful in a country where millions use it every day. The solution was the least obtrusive way round the problem (you can't go arrest kids systematically...); it's perfectly legal to chew it, you just have to import your own stock. Then you realize that you don't care enough to bother, and you stop chewing, and you wonder why every bloody article ever written about Singapore on any unrelated topic has to include the "factoid". Sometimes I think it was a very clever press troll by LKY. Or take the caning of that American kid: caning for damaging a few cars? Sure, but a car in the US costs a few grand; in Singapore, it can cost more than a house and take half a lifetime to pay for (this, incidentally, is about passing on the cost of thrashing the commons to those who do the thrashing - a "liberal" policy never even discussed in the US). If somebody went and torched 10 houses in a street, what magnitude punishment would the US justice system reserve him? As for dancing on tables, my first week in Singapore, not only did the bar I visited for what I thought would be a quiet beer - in Somerset, not Geylang - have paid models to dance on tables, they invited customers to take shots off their body. Not my thing but it's there if you want it. I guess I'm not yet used to the constant stereotyping, so feel the need to speak for the other side. People don't go around generalizing Texans as Christian extremists who eat 5 big macs a meal whilst hunting deer with a machine gun from the back of their Ford pickup (FWIW I know Texans who are/did all of these things); somehow the same level of stereotyping with Singapore is acceptable, and people think a few hours stopover once in a while is enough to qualify their opinion.
jfoster 11y ago
Does a place need to be a mirror-image of Silicon Valley in order to have some successful startups based there? I see no reason why the proportion of programmers who are inclined toward drugs wouldn't be comparable to the proportion of programmers who are inclined to avoid drugs. The latter group may prefer a country like Singapore. I don't think Silicon Valley culture is the only culture that can facilitate startups.
- scurvy 11y ago
  It's not, but most successful startup regions are left or libertarian leaning (Portland, NYC, Austin). Conservative states tend to produce conservative economies.
coldtea 11y ago
>Their iron-fisted approach to things from chewing gum, drugs, and even dancing on tables (for example) is antithetical to the dual veins of libertarian and liberal US political thought which is so firmly entrenched in Silicon Valley. Yeah, because Silicon Valley is a hoot and all about dancing on tables... I've stayed in both places, Singapore is by far livelier than SV.
- scurvy 11y ago
  Singabore is Asian Las Vegas. Very sterile, controlled "wild partying" dictated by large corporations. SV had a wild counter-culture drug scene in the 70's and 80's. Things got tame in the 90's, but there's always SF nearby. For example, take gambling in Singapore as a resident. You can only lose so much money per day, and it's tracked. While some might argue the merits of this, Americans would have a problem with not being able to risk it all or win their money back. Again, just an example of the SG thought process and not a certain dealbreaker.

by scurvy 11y ago

digitalzombie 11y ago

I'm just curious but doesn't US citizen have to pay tax regardless of where they work? People from SF moving to SG to work would be double tax no? That would also be a big hindrance imo. Plus there are more than enough decent tech job in USA than risk working in another country with laws you don't know or understand. SG seems like a country with very harsh laws, not entirely sure I want to risk accidentally break something law (like chewing gum?).

anthony_franco 11y ago
Any income taxes paid to SG would quality for a Foreign Tax Credit so you wouldn't be double taxed.
mcrae 11y ago
On taxes, I'm sure somebody on HN knows better than me, but you are rarely 'double-taxed' under 200k as you say. The first 90k or so is exempt, plus any foreign tax you pay you can claim as a non-refundable deduction on your US return. Singapore is an amazing country that is really geared towards making things easy for expats. The chewing gum thing is a bit of a red-herring. Ending up in jail for a minor offence is not something you generally have to worry about.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
jonbishop 11y ago
Yes, US citizens have to pay tax no matter where they live. You may be eligible for the Foreign Tax Credit[1] or, even better, the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion[2], though. For 2015, you can exclude up to $100,800 of your earnings with the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion, which will cover most if not all of your salary (for the majority of people). [1] http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/International-Taxpayers/Foreign-Tax-Credit http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/International-Taxpayers/Forei... [2] http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/International-Taxpayers/Foreign-Earned-Income-Exclusion http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/International-Taxpayers/Forei...

crdb 11y ago

Seriously, you guys are getting tiring. If it's so important, Thailand's a 1 hour flight away, Malaysia a short bus ride, Indonesia a short ferry. By the way, when's the last time someone was hung for smoking a spliff? It's like tourists in Sydney being scared of being bitten by a funnel web... Singapore has high quality of life, very low living costs compared to large US cities, efficient government (but not overbearing), and is a hub for one of the most exciting and growing regions of the world. It's an international city where a large proportion of residents come from all over the world and dozens of languages are spoken. The air is clean, there are no traffic jams, the metro is extremely cheap and spotless. And there's giant toucans living in the mango tree of my garden, right next to the centre of town - beat that SF. Most importantly, government is not corrupt and has over the last 40 years gotten a pretty good track record of doing what is right. Both Lees have been exceptional leaders under any measure; amongst other things, the father influenced the direction of the world by directly influencing DXP towards the Chinese "glasnost" that is responsible for how the world looks today. I used to be pretty libertarian (think Swiss "don't have a Federal government"), but realized living here that a clean, non-corrupt government can also work incredibly well. Another thing that flies under the radar of most critics is that Singapore has successfully set up a system to allow migrant manual labour legally; it is one of the very few places in the world where your Bengali construction worker on $500/month can go to the police, complain he hasn't been paid on time, and see his employer fined within two weeks. Try that in Qatar. Try that as an illegal in the US (over 80% of minimum wage labourers!).

sheepmullet 11y ago
"Seriously, you guys are getting tiring." I think he points out a very real issue. There is a massive cultural difference between SF and Singapore. Most of the developers I know in the Bay Area would never even consider moving to a red state.
- crdb 11y ago
  I take issue to his stereotypes, which are trotted out regularly upon the merest mention of the word Singapore. I mean, "hung for smoking a spliff", really? The chewing gum ban was an attempt at restricting the supply after kids got into a fashion of blocking the subway's doors using it, particularly painful in a country where millions use it every day. The solution was the least obtrusive way round the problem (you can't go arrest kids systematically...); it's perfectly legal to chew it, you just have to import your own stock. Then you realize that you don't care enough to bother, and you stop chewing, and you wonder why every bloody article ever written about Singapore on any unrelated topic has to include the "factoid". Sometimes I think it was a very clever press troll by LKY. Or take the caning of that American kid: caning for damaging a few cars? Sure, but a car in the US costs a few grand; in Singapore, it can cost more than a house and take half a lifetime to pay for (this, incidentally, is about passing on the cost of thrashing the commons to those who do the thrashing - a "liberal" policy never even discussed in the US). If somebody went and torched 10 houses in a street, what magnitude punishment would the US justice system reserve him? As for dancing on tables, my first week in Singapore, not only did the bar I visited for what I thought would be a quiet beer - in Somerset, not Geylang - have paid models to dance on tables, they invited customers to take shots off their body. Not my thing but it's there if you want it. I guess I'm not yet used to the constant stereotyping, so feel the need to speak for the other side. People don't go around generalizing Texans as Christian extremists who eat 5 big macs a meal whilst hunting deer with a machine gun from the back of their Ford pickup (FWIW I know Texans who are/did all of these things); somehow the same level of stereotyping with Singapore is acceptable, and people think a few hours stopover once in a while is enough to qualify their opinion.

jfoster 11y ago

Does a place need to be a mirror-image of Silicon Valley in order to have some successful startups based there? I see no reason why the proportion of programmers who are inclined toward drugs wouldn't be comparable to the proportion of programmers who are inclined to avoid drugs. The latter group may prefer a country like Singapore. I don't think Silicon Valley culture is the only culture that can facilitate startups.

scurvy 11y ago
It's not, but most successful startup regions are left or libertarian leaning (Portland, NYC, Austin). Conservative states tend to produce conservative economies.

coldtea 11y ago

>Their iron-fisted approach to things from chewing gum, drugs, and even dancing on tables (for example) is antithetical to the dual veins of libertarian and liberal US political thought which is so firmly entrenched in Silicon Valley. Yeah, because Silicon Valley is a hoot and all about dancing on tables... I've stayed in both places, Singapore is by far livelier than SV.

scurvy 11y ago
Singabore is Asian Las Vegas. Very sterile, controlled "wild partying" dictated by large corporations. SV had a wild counter-culture drug scene in the 70's and 80's. Things got tame in the 90's, but there's always SF nearby. For example, take gambling in Singapore as a resident. You can only lose so much money per day, and it's tracked. While some might argue the merits of this, Americans would have a problem with not being able to risk it all or win their money back. Again, just an example of the SG thought process and not a certain dealbreaker.