Hey Joe:Tropical Island Dreaming

Information about preparing to retire in the Philippines. Some views on places in the Philippines where I have traveled.

Tags: Travel, Financial prep for retirement, Photos of the Philippines

The author

tom_shor

I served in the US Navy and worked for technology companys that had me on the road a lot.I currently live in the US. I will be relocating to the Philippines in about 18 months. Possibly sooner. I am ready to slow down and enjoy my life.

Comments

How in all honesty can anybody live there with a clear conscience. At every step some official has their hand out looking for a bribe or gift.The legal process is a joke with paperwork requirements no more than keeping Attorneys in work and the population even poorer by running aboutlike directionless chooks ferrying paperwork from one location to several others. The corruption and the busines,financial,and political system in this backward economic wasteland isa disgrace to living standards. The Catholic church has a stranglehold on the population and does very little in terms of real pastoral care. Offering an education to a particular level only the Catholic heirachy is only interested in their wealth position.Chils abuse ,neglect prostitution,employment manipulation sees wealth elites extremely rich while others barely exist. It is an evil country which exploits its citizens,hides behind nationalism and cares nothing for the welfare of its own people. It is dangerous with judicial killings happening, and the military have no transparency or accountability to anybody. They are a power sharer with the government. The sad part is the filipino people are friendly, stoic and good family folks. The WTO needs to work more closely with the government to clean itsact up and get foreign investment flowing in. This would increase GDP, but only if the rules are fair and the sameas international best practice.They are not ,will not be soon and therefore there will be continuing poverty,corruption and decay in infrastructure going forward....
by joe brixton on 22/06/2009 at 15:44:41

Glad to see you found Expat Blog . Some good links here .
by retired on 27/06/2009 at 00:41:29

Joe I will say since I am not the cause of any of the problems you list that my conscience is clear. You have very real concerns about the problems in the Philippines. The Philippines does suffer from a number of the problems that are present in some form throughout the third world. Things have improved for many people through the years but many still live in poverty. There are some foreigners who reside there who are happy to exploit the local population for their own benefit. There are many more however who try to make a difference in the lives of the people. There are numerous charities which operate through donations of time and money from the foreign population there. None of these problems will be solved unless people work together to make a difference. If you would like to discuss this further you can post in the General Questions Section of my blog and I will be happy to go into it with you.
by Tom on 30/06/2009 at 16:46:58