Taobao and Temu are great. The quality is not always amazing, but the prices are low and many sellers even offer customisation.
In Australia, the product selection is often limited, and a lot of local stores are just reselling Chinese-made products with huge markups anyway. At that point, you may as well order directly from China and save money.
> If you are a non-resident business and you sell goods into Australia with a customs value of A$1,000 or less, GST applies and you will have to collect this from your customer and send the GST to us.
Logitech K480 is my favorite. Its best feature is a slot. Put your iPad in it and it stays put. Even on a lap or bed or other unstable surfaces. And it's only $30. Meaning there's no worry if it breaks or is stolen on a trip.
Another thing I like about it is how wide the slot is. I can fit my iPad and iPhone into it simultaneously. Which is quite convenient at times
My iPad travel setups, from least-portable/most-functional to most-portable/least-functional:
1. iPad Air with iPad Magic Keyboard.
2. iPad Air with Smart Keyboard Folio.
3. iPad Mini (usually in portrait mode) with Magic Keyboard. (The mac bluetooth keyboard, no numpad. I use an sfbags sleeve for it.)
I've got one of these, which has the slot above the "F" keys to support your phone and/or tablet at a good viewing angle. For better or worse the 2 lb. keyboard is heavily weighted so it will support the devices in the slot without tipping over.
And you can switch between 3 devices from the keyboard, which can also include a Bluetooth desktop.
Too heavy to carry around so it stays in the office.
There are plenty of lightweight options for much cheaper prices which can be better for travel, which are also just as big as a tablet but at least not nearly as heavy.
Wait until you get a Bluetooth mouse which can put your touchscreen to shame :)
These mice are also much more abundant for cheaper prices now, when they were not that common just a year or two ago.
Also good for your laptop when you want to save USB slots for other things.
The tax is already bad here, even without it. I paid $89,000 taxes just for the last financial year because stock gains are added up on top of the income and my partner doesn’t work and there’s no family support allowance here.
I can apply Australian citizenship next year but I will leave ASAP after becoming a citizen for Singapore, Dubai or Hong Kong where the tax is < 20%
To pay $89,000 in taxes you'd have to be earning in the range of $350k. Do you think you're hard done by? I'd be rather annoyed if you were eligible for family support allowance in that earning range? (partially because I'd be missing out on a decent chunk of government support myself)
What am I missing about your situation that makes it remotely sympathetic?
If you live in inner Sydney, the rent alone is $1350 pw and tax is ridiculous. I basically sold my stocks to have a down payment but then that got added on top of income. If i’d have stayed in HK, i’d have paid 0% for that.
I just treat it as paying for Australian citizenship to
make me feel better and it still comes out cheaper than buying a Saint Kitts and Nevis passport. Australian passport also opens up the E3 visa to go to the USA
Oz needs the immigrants or it would be screwed. It isn't a fecking privilege.
In NZ ~30% of the population was born overseas. We do it because NZ requires more people of working age - because our demographics are shit and they're becoming deeper shit (aside AU is part of our problem). We need young workers and we bribe them here with lifestyle, money from jobs, and houses for the fortunate.
It's a compounding bad debt solution - since those immigrants also get older and will become unaffordable retirees for our country.
I think Aus has similar dynamics - but not as badly because Oz is much wealthier than NZ.
I'm some years away from retirement age - but the demographics mean that I'm screwed. Everyone will be screwed. If you're fortunate enough to have been able to save for retirement, say goodbye to those savings over time.
I expect NZ will start to increase immigration because there's too many undesirable jobs (jobs that NZers don't want to do, or that there simply isn't enough NZers for the jobs).
Immigrants work. It is a only a stop-gap solution.
Our politicians lack the ability to encourage enough business growth: therefore taxation income can't keep up with NZ government expenses.
As an Australian with a family and 2 high-paying salaries paying a LOT of tax, none of those countries are remotely comparable to Australia.
If you hate taxes and fees, Singapore has a 60% Additional Buyer's Stamp Duty on residential property applied to foreign buyers, on top of an already insane property market. There's huge fines and government intervention into _everything_ and a massive high-stress culture.
Hong Kong is equally absurd for property and has a sword hanging over its head, that falls if China ever makes a move on Taiwan; the inevitable US and global sanctions would decimate HK.
I can get PR in Singapore through my partner, so no 60%. Company paid medical and everything so expat life and no responsibilities. And if I were ever have to have kids, you can’t hire a maid here sleeping at your apartment and you have to clean yourself which is ridiculous. In Hk, SG, Dubai you can get domestic helpers cheaply and they take care of everything
Mate, 3 months ago you admitted on HN that you never get Singapore PR, just admit you want to moan how west is bad. I pay more taxes than you, and that's ok, Australia worth it.
> shell0x 3 months ago | As a white person, I’d probably never get PR too but I think it’s good that they maintain the current percentages, otherwise the country would turn unrecognizable like Germany or France
> And if I were ever have to have kids, you can’t hire a maid here sleeping at your apartment and you have to clean yourself which is ridiculous.
Not sure if serious.
If serious: This is a really weird and almost sociopathic thing to say. I really don't get where you're coming from. It's certainly not the cultural direction I'd like to see Australia moving in.
OK, just seems weird from my cultural experience, and the way I was reading your comment it sounded 'entitled' (likely due to the cultural difference).
Describing it as "pretty good value" bothers me in a number of contexts.
I'm also fine with this never becoming a thing in Australia. Not sure how out-of-touch or in-touch that makes me, but that's how I feel nonetheless.
@Loocid, thanks for saying what I was dancing around.
Its too close to slavery for my liking. Yes they are paid but 2.5k per month is very low for Singapore, they work massive hours, they rely on you for shelter, and are very likely from much poorer neighbouring countries that are trying to support family back home.
The whole power dynamic is extremely exploitable which results in a lot of abuse cases.
If you made income, and enough gain in stocks to pay that much in tax, you should be happy.
I want to know why you are keen to become an Australian citizen if you’re not enthusiastic about contributing your share.
Constructive discussion about appropriate levels of taxation is important, but let’s at least agree that the things we rely on (roads, hospitals, schools, defence, …) cost something.
I lived in Singapore and Hk before, don’t drive, work from home and countries are pretty much interchangeable. I left Germany for high taxes for a reason.
I pay private medical so don’t benefit much from tax anyway. No kids, no car, paid off my apartment. I can get much better value elsewhere right?
If I tell you you can pick 3 dishes
a) singapore: safe, low crime, low tax, efficient, excellent public transportation, better roads
b) hk: safe, low crime, low tax, politically getting worse, excellent public transport, better airport
c) australia: higher crime compared to the other too, high tax but bad services
I basically pay for an overpriced dish with bland taste, so why would I keep doing that?
I preferred living in Hong Kong and Singapore and do not enjoy living here honestly, but if you treat it as payment for my+partner’s backup citizenship, it seems more justifiable.
I'd assume, as an Australian, who works for a HK company and has travelled for work all their life, the long term lifestyle in Australia is probably better than those countries. I love HK and Singo but I am not sure I'd want to live there. But for working, most people here would not work in an iron lung and the socialist government pretty much supports the idea that, if you don't like to work, you shouldn't have to as long as there are a few who will work. And, that number is fewer and fewer.
I'm sorry but you pay more in tax than I make in income! This sounds like your lifestyle creep has chewed up your money stream. Despite my significantly lower income, I manage to own my house in Melbourne. With your income I could have it paid down in a few years at most.
I'm in a similar boat, and can relate to the on-going management and suppression of lifestyle creep in order to reach worthwhile goals. It feels like a never-ending battle, even after 20 years.
Good job paying that off. I’m sure Australia has benefits for some but without kids, not having grown up here, paying my own insurance and not driving I don’t really see it.
That makes sense to me. If you come on a non-immigrant visa, you can’t become a permanent resident easily. it’s a privilege, not a right. Other countries like the UAE also take a lot of foreign workers but do not want them become PRs or citizens and there are tons of people moving there for opportunities. The labor is needed but they don’t want these people permanently. You made your money, now leave
That doesn't make any sense. The US enjoys its position of economic power because it has the reputation and wealth to attract skilled people and keep them here.
This is my thought too. The intent of the law is for it to be temporary, and creating the citizenship loophole has caused a lot of issues. I think the expectation H1B may lead to citizenship causes a lot of disress and forces people into roles that take advantage of them, and closing the loophole seems strictly good.
Shocking. I had an interview for an Australian job with JP Morgan recently and even the interviewers were based in India. Super rude, could barely understand him due the strong accent, he couldn’t ask a single intelligent question and it was kinda clear that the org basically just hires other Indians. They always end up talking a lot while doing almost nothing and only hiring their friends and family while Chinese engineers just get stuff done. I’m sure there are exceptions but in my 15 years in tech I can count with two hands how many good Indian engineers I worked with.
Or maybe you just aren't that good of an engineer (or whatever profession you are into) and find the easiest group to blame on your failures. I found that people who often are quick to judge and group of people in one bucket based on their color/ethnicity/gender/... are often not that bright people and like to focus on directing it on others. Somewhat like MAGA.
Wow this escalated quickly. What OP is saying is not anecdotal but true to every major US tech company. You can cope all you want, won't make a difference
I have seen teams that are 100% Indians with a manager actively pushing Indian resumes and friends/family on top. They don’t play nice and by the DEI rules like a lot of Americans do.
But I have also seen amazing Indian managers that don’t act like this.
It’s ok to acknowledge that culturally Indians will favor themselves heavily. As bad as some of you want to make it sound like racism to close that conversation at all cost.
I'm sure you do. But your real life experience is not everyone else's real life experience, so there's no really need to make blanket statements about people.
Oh wow, you went from one place to some totally different place at the drop of a hat. Where did me "coming" to Western Europe come into the discussion about racial stereotyping about Indians? I'm not in Western Europe, and I don't plan to live there, not sure how you got that impression.
I think there's no reasoning with someone who only wants to deal in absolutes. Have a good day.
There is some bias in some teams, but it's not universal, and such a bias for one's ethnicity really exists in teams of all ethnicities. You just see it more because there are plenty of xxxx in IT.
The reason is basically that you are "required" to hire other "Indians".
If you get a job at a good company on your own merit, you immediately start getting calls to "refer" your college friends, family, people from your region/state.
Refer here means refer it to HR and make some "setting" that you are guranteed to be hired based on your "reference".
Naturally reference would mean that considering you are an employee you would know about open positions and may refer the position to your friend, who would later on get the job on his own merit considering that he is skilled for the position along with required experience.
But the case for Indian employees is that a reference entails to scam the company itself, by letting a less skilled person into the company by making a "setting" with HR etc, who may themselves be from the same region/state.
And if you try to be morally upright person to deny such a scammy "reference", you would then get to listen verbal abuses from your friends and even from your own family members. To deny such a reference leads to straight up "banishment".
Tip:- Among 100 Indians if you see, only 1 or 2 are actually good at their job (or by morality).
Jokes aside, if in 15 years you have worked with only few good Indian engineers, you probably have not yet worked at places with high talent density. I could understand if you had said you have (a) worked with many low quality engineers from India, or (b) worked with far more low quality engineers from India than high quality ones. But if, in absolute numbers, you haven't come across many good engineers from India, I can only infer than you probably haven't worked with very good engineers across the board.
In Australia, the product selection is often limited, and a lot of local stores are just reselling Chinese-made products with huge markups anyway. At that point, you may as well order directly from China and save money.
It also saves 10% GST.