Repatriation: Yes, you can go home again!

[Gary D]

18 hours ago, hk blues said:

I'm not saying they're the best by any means but the word atrocious was a little hard IMO.  The education my son is getting at an average level private school here is comparable to that I received in the UK.

That's the problem with the education in the Philippines it's 50 years behind.

[Gary D]

1 hour ago, hk blues said:

I was disturbed to discover my wife will get nothing from the UK government by way of state pension due to the age difference between us.  

And, would our wives wish to remain in a strange country without us?  

Food for thought?

Not sure that's true. It would effect any widows pension but everyone now get their own pension depending on how many years they have worked. My wife will see about 2/3 of the srate pension for her 23 years.

Edited February 14, 2019 by Gary D

[Jake]

3 hours ago, hk blues said:

And, would our wives wish to remain in a strange country without us?  

Food for thought?

Actually, that was a very deep question with this additional caveat -- would your high school or college age children refuse to go back to PI with their mother?  

[Jake]

8 hours ago, Snowy79 said:

Some serious thoughts need to go into the process regardless how you look at it.  Without trying to put the cat amongst the pigeons what country would your wife or kids be best in when we are not around? 

Excellent question Snowy!  

[hk blues]

5 hours ago, GeoffH said:

 

Really?  Surely if the only factor they’re deciding upon is age then that has to be age based discrimination?

 

In Australia that would be against the law.  There is a time before benefits apply (5 years maybe?  Not sure).

It is age discrimination, but then again giving a pension only to people aged 65 or over is also age discrimination!   

In a sense I agree with the principle - it ensures that old guys like us don't go marrying 18 year-olds from x,y,z country and then leave the UK Govt. to pay them for the next 6 or 7 decades whilst we are  pushing up the daisies.  I suppose the government has to prioritise where it spends the taxpayers money.  

[Kuya John]

37 minutes ago, hk blues said:

In a sense I agree with the principle - it ensures that old guys like us don't go marrying 18 year-olds from x,y,z country and then leave the UK Govt. to pay them for the next 6 or 7 decades whilst we are  pushing up the daisies.  

They say only the good die young,

When my late wife died at the age of 42, her pension rights left too, she had worked and paid taxes since the age of 15 years!

As for benefits or Government handout's, as her Widower with a child of 9 years old, all I was offered was Free Milk!

Am I worried about the Government paying my now wife anything, you can bet your life I'm not.

They are happy to pay benefit's to people who have no intention of ever working and sit on their fat butts complaining!

Sorry for the outburst but the biggest tax avoiders are the ones who do very little,  I'm still paying taxes at 70+.

rant over JB

 

Edited February 14, 2019 by Kuya John

[fillipino_wannabe]

6 hours ago, hk blues said:

Everything is up for debate surely? 

Not all schools and universities in the UK/US are better than all schools and universities in the Philippines, are they? From my own personal experience, my son's school here is better then mine was in the UK - maybe he is exceptionally lucky and I was exceptionally unlucky but I'm dubious.  As ex-pats here we are generally able to procure better than the average Filipino so, again, let's compare apples with apples.

Job opportunities in general are most certainly better in the UK/US, but again that doesn't mean to say there are none here - take a look around, there are banks, shops, industries etc etc etc that are employing people here.  Low salary, yes - but low cost of living also. 

It's really not as black and white as is painted IMHO - I stand by my belief that as an ex-pat in the Philippines with a relatively reasonable income/wealth my son will have a better life than as an average Joe back in the UK.  We are all different and do what we think is best for ourselves and our families and best of luck whichever choice we make.

 

Obviously not all, but you can't really compare countries by comparing the worst schools in one country to the best schools in another, otherwise no big comparison would ever work lol. Some of the private schools might be ok here but the only ones that aren't ridiculously expensive are too religious for me, the big international schools are nearly as expensive as a private school in the UK.
Cost of living is lower but it's not 10x lower like the salaries are, 500 pesos per day max to work in a shop here, 5k per day in the UK. 1000 pesos per day for a skilled worker here tops, 12-20k in the UK.
It's only really houses that are a lot cheaper here and a lot of that is offset (if you buy) by the lower interest rates in the UK and the fact that a house is a good investment aswell.

[hk blues]

15 minutes ago, fillipino_wannabe said:

Obviously not all, but you can't really compare countries by comparing the worst schools in one country to the best schools in another, otherwise no big comparison would ever work lol. Some of the private schools might be ok here but the only ones that aren't ridiculously expensive are too religious for me, the big international schools are nearly as expensive as a private school in the UK.
Cost of living is lower but it's not 10x lower like the salaries are, 500 pesos per day max to work in a shop here, 5k per day in the UK. 1000 pesos per day for a skilled worker here tops, 12-20k in the UK.
It's only really houses that are a lot cheaper here and a lot of that is offset (if you buy) by the lower interest rates in the UK and the fact that a house is a good investment aswell.

I wasn't comparing the best with the worst, indeed I'm not comparing anything because we cannot as what do we know other than our own extremely limited experiences?  I'm just of the opinion that there are enough reasonable schools here at a reasonable cost to say education is acceptable.  

Nobody has disputed that the job opportunities are better in the UK, but again I'd say there are enough job opportunities here to satisfy the needs of most - my son included.

Sorry to labour a point, but there are a helluva lot of things here that are much cheaper than houses. surely?  Beer, food, transport, clothing - pretty much everything with the exception of luxury items and cars.  I do agree that property is usually a good investment in the UK and less so here, but I believe the property market here has yet to mature so who knows what the future will bring?  

I don't want to come across as being pro-Philippines and anti-UK, I'm not.  But, I do think the comparisons are less black and white than often painted - As another poster said, better a big fish (relatively wealthy guy) in a small pond than a small fish (average wealth) in a big pond. 

Unfortunately, I fear I'm a small fish in a small pond! 

[sonjack2847]

OK this is about going back why did you come here? If it was just for a woman then more fool you.

 

[sonjack2847]

5 hours ago, Gary D said:

That's the problem with the education in the Philippines it's 50 years behind.

Really? my daughter is learning 3 languages so why do you say that