I Paid off my mortgage last month. Thirty years.
Bank sent the deed over, congratulations, it's yours free and clear.
Two weeks later the county tax bill shows up. $9,400. And that's not a one time thing, that's every year until I die.
Stop paying it and eventually they take the house. The one I just spent three decades buying.
So what actually changed here?
For thirty years I paid a bank so I could live in my own house. Now I pay the county so I can live in my own house.
Different envelope. Same arrangement.
Nobody ever finishes paying for a home. You just run out of banks.
Lots of entrepreneurs are pointing at bureaucracy lately.
El Salvador could really take a leap forward to become the Singapur of the Americas if they got rid of paperwork, constant oversight and compliance protocols.
I think President Bukele knows measures have to be taken and I got hope he is just waiting for the right moment to deploy it.
@luisdabeat__ Not joking: Our application for a license for our business is over 1000 pages long. Multiple government departments requiring the same application with minor differences in wording. I am over 3 years in and I am tired.
Shedding light on this in the hope that reforms come quickly. People who arrived eager to create value and contribute to El Salvador’s growth are leaving, while others never make it past the initial discovery phase. So much potential being lost right now.
For all the progress El Salvador has made, there’s still a lot that needs to change to make it a place desirable to build for entrepreneurs. I really wish I could say differently. But I’ve been here 2+ years, built up an entrepreneurial community, and can tell you first hand the challenges are substantial.
@sovmindset I own land in El Salvador with the goal of building something amazing. That was 3 years ago. I have considering bailing on my project multiple times. It's very sad. The llocal community (all Salvadoran) are the only thing that has kept me going.
@luisdabeat__ well said. But I'm really struggling with business bureaucracy here, it's limiting me a lot. I hope things will get easier for entrepreneurs here. I see cheerleaders saying "you can just do stuff" but it's not the reality. Tons of obstacles, laws are not interpreted correctly.
People who steal a significant amount of someone’s money deserve life in prison. I’ve never understood the discrepancy in sentencing between physical and financial violence. By stealing someone’s money, you are stealing part of their life. SBF, Coldcard hacker, etc. deserve life in prison.
The environmental case against capitalism sounds very sophisticated until you remember what planned economies actually did.
The Aral Sea was once one of the world’s largest lakes. Soviet irrigation planning helped turn it into one of the world’s most famous environmental disasters.
Maybe giving planners more power over nature is not the beautiful idea people think it is.