Before the family life began I spent a month in the Victoria, Melbourne area of Australia and it was paradise for me any. It is expensive as balls. In fact I think if you want to buy a place everything is done by auction. But if my in laws die before the kids get to old I'm trying to brain wash my wife into moving there.
But it was the Singapore government - hardly an unbiased arbiter in the case - that labelled this 'contempt of court'. It's pretty clear that the real crime here was political criticism, and that the contempt charge was a fig leaf for the actual reasons the government used to nail the defendant. The clue is in the sentence handed down. Just like the bankrupting of (native Singaporean) opposition figures was totally disproportionate response to their criticism of the government. It is IMO gullible to rely on a government in a legal case to be wholly truthful about the charges and motives brought against the person they are prosecuting. I am sure that in the same way, the US will charge Bradley Manning or Edward Snowden for 'treason' rather than 'telling the truth'. Now you may disagree with my assessment, but it is moronic to assume that my reasons are simply a bias towards the US over Singapore. Firstly, I've criticised the US system on here plenty of times, and even did so in the post I made just before the one you responded to. Secondly, I'm not American. Third, I criticised only specific issues with Singapore and their system, rather than the country as a whole; just as if someone suggested moving to the USA to trade, I'd point out the very harsh sentences for drug or white collar financial crimes compared to most of the west, the high conviction rate, the use of plea bargaining to bully innocent defendants into doing time for crimes they didn't commit, the high taxes etc. Fourth, I didn't say the imprisonment was wrong because of whether it would have happened in the USA. Finally, at no point did I specify the USA as having a superior legal system - I referred to 'the west' and '1st world' not the USA. Your comments about the USA are just putting words into my mouth. If you don't want people to react with emotion (and very mild emotion - I didn't call you any names, after all) to what you say, then don't claim they say things when they didn't. Don't assume they are making assumptions, when there is no evidence that they are. Don't assume they are nationality X when there is no evidence they are. If you want others to be logical, then don't illogically make incorrect assumptions about them - especially not in a second post where your errors of unsubstantiated assumptions and straw men had already been pointed out, and you had been asked to desist from repeating them. Finally, I notice that you haven't disputed that political criticism can get you jailed and/or bankrupted in Singapore (and that doing nothing wrong - for example, having someone you met abroad slip half a kilo of cannabis into your luggage - can get you executed for drug trafficking, since the system has insufficient checks and balances, along with draconian punishments). That was the main point of my comment on the country - do you accept that the point still stands?
I'm not American, I criticise my own society freely, I haven't done any 'voter suppression' in the US (difficult since I don't live there), and I don't currently own any guns. I hope your crude oil trading is better than your cold reading skills!
Recently spent a month in Capetown and it was much better than I expected. Time zone was great and Internet is moderate good. English speaking and much more developed and safe than I had read about. The biggest surprise was the 1/4th cost of living compared to the USA. Food to drink to going out and rents were very favorable vs the USD. Bottles of wine at restaurants go for 9-13 USD. Bed and breakfast hotels cost 50 per day for a 2. Day to day quality of life seemed very high and the city was well developed. Give it a try even for vacation ill be going back.
Well, I wouldn't dare to say the government of Singapore is freely elected, see link below, but Singapore is arguably a good instance of a system superior to western style democracies. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elections_in_Singapore Definetely first world facilities there. An important point if you move there is if you have male children, they will be required to join the national service to get permanent residence. Jim Rogers has 2 daughters I think. Also immigration regulations are getting stricter as the country is increasingly popular among expats and Singapore can afford to be picky.
Yes mate it's really easy, I think it's basically 6k usd deposit in the bank, and an address in paraguay. I've time in Argentina and really liked it, but I would not consider a full residence there because taxes are nuts. But paraguay is a low/no tax country. For us it's a paradise....no capital gains tax if I recall correctly.
Once again you are all over the place. Really, now we are supposed to discuss the possibility of wrongful conviction for drug smuggling? Plus Manning and Snowden? All because the OP wanted feedback on moving to Singapore or Dubai to trade? Wow!
I traded at prop houses in both Dubai and Singapore after London for a number of years, preferred Dubai so came back to it from Singapore. I really wanted to like Singapore but it's pretty backwards in a lot of ways. Horses for courses but Dubai is pretty sweet, things like supermarkets here put Singapore to shame. 5th year here now.