[sgjohnson]

How is it not? It’s not even a long-term visa, it’s a 180 day one.

You can buy permanent residence in Costa Rica for $5000-ish.

And all of this is for an activity that most countries would be fine with you doing on a tourist visa. It’s pointless.

[dahfizz]

Is Iceland all that depserate for new residents / tourists? Being choosy about who you let move into your country is their prerogative. If they can attract a few high income people, that is a win.

[Scoundreller]

I’d assume various covid requirements (vaccines and testing) have hurt tourism a bit.

Their airline was quite popular as a cheap route between Europe and North America, and again, lots of otherwise passengers can’t/won’t make that journey.

[micromacrofoot]

It's twice as long as their standard visa

[sgjohnson]

So?

[kgin]

So you get to stay twice as long.

[malermeister]

It's made for rich knowledge workers to spend a few months there while working remotely and dump a bunch of money into their economy.

[Scoundreller]

because nobody would do that on a tourist visa. Never happened. Only real difference is you can pay to do it for longer than 90 days.

[malermeister]

Yup, that's exactly the point. Not sure why that would be a bad thing?

[sgjohnson]

Because the only people eligible for this visa are the people who don’t require a regular tourist visa in the first place. And it’s literally just a tourist visa that lets you stay for twice as long.

I don’t see the appeal. It seems completely pointless to me. It’s basically targetting only wealthy countries outside of the EU, like Canada, the US, Australia and New Zealand.

And in that case, why would I bother with visa and the paperwork just to be able to stay for 90 days longer?

It’s basically like applying for a B1/B2 visa for the US if you’re from a VWP country. You can do it, but why in the gods name would you?