[franciscop]

This article is leaving a lot out IMHO. I'm from Spain and I've had friends and family working and living in Ibiza. It is a "financial paradise" to work because you make a crazy amount of money in very little time, if you can stand the drunken/drugged culture. Both "peninsula" (mainland) people and locals go work there in summer to make a little fortune. It is known that many locals work OR rent out the 2-3 summer months and with that they have enough to live for the rest of the year.

While it's true that summer rent is very expensive, people who work there can definitely pay it, but then you would not save THAT much, so people find their way into cheaper accommodations, whatever that means. So while I don't know the personal story of the interviewee, it's definitely not because a lack of jobs or low pay (a problem that DOES plague most of the country).

For hacker news, imagine if this article was about the "poor Google employee living in a van and cannot afford rent", you'd laugh at its face.

[DLion]

Agree, I spoke with some taxi drivers who were there just for the summer season and they told me that they've been doing that every year, sharing a small flat with other taxi drivers/workers to save money and to earn enough to live the rest of the year back in their towns.

[Spooky23]

These little hacks exist everywhere.

The guys who sell Christmas trees in NYC used to all be all from the Balkans. They’d show up on a tourist visa, sell their trees, live in sketch accommodation and boogie home when they sold their allocation.

[TotalCrackpot]

Can you quantify the amount you can get per month by working there and in what types of work? Sounds interesting.

[franciscop]

The typical you'd expect from a summer party place is what blows up (food, accommodation, bars, clubs, etc), but also even in non-seasonal jobs there's a lot more shopping and people going around so they temp-hire, again at high prices.

[TotalCrackpot]

Can you be more specific than just writing "high prices"? By asking to "quantify" I asked for some quantity.

[fuzztester]

>So while I don't know the personal story of the interviewee, it's definitely not because a lack of jobs or low pay (a problem that DOES plague most of the country).

Why does that problem exist in Spain? Asking as a Spain newbie.

[franciscop]

I had the answer clear 15 years ago, then I had a different answer clear 10 years ago. Now after having lived and traveled all around the world, I'm more unsure than ever of why it's the case and I don't think there's a SINGLE strong reason. I can give you reasons criticizing both sides of the political aisle, and both other sides will complain, but again in the end I'm not sure how much each reason does contribute.

Few reasons that seem to influence to some degree: impossible bureaucracy, very difficult to open companies, vicious cycle of stagnant economy, lots of "underground economy" that skew the official numbers, talent goes to work for other countries with better pay, a general hopelessness attitude that has permeated the culture, corruption at all levels.

[fuzztester]

Wow, interesting.

Your analysis somewhat matches with a conversation I had here with a Spanish woman tourist some months ago.

We were chatting casually about this and that, and then she said she was not looking forward to going back to Spain / Europe, after her trip.

I asked her why.

I don't remember the exact words she used, but from what she said, my recollection is that she had been experiencing a kind of general malaise in the environment in Europe from some time.

Depressing.

This also matches with some of the news articles I have been reading for sometime now about Europe.

[petre]

Here is why from a Spanish news outlet. Disable js to read it.

https://english.elpais.com/spain/2023-08-02/why-does-spain-c...

I met a guy from Galicia who's call center job was outsourced to Eastern Europe. So he moved there. In fact this is a job sector threatened by AI emergence.

[Terretta]

> imagine if this article was about the "poor Google employee living in a van and cannot afford rent", you'd laugh at its face.

You don't have to imagine it, you can read that article:

"23-year-old Google employee lives in a truck in the company's parking lot and saves 90% of his income."

-- https://www.businessinsider.com/google-employee-lives-in-tru...

[seanmcdirmid]

He can afford rent, he just chooses not to pay rent and save that money. The same for many stealth campers who are working remote tech jobs while living in $60-80k conversion vans parked on the street.

[franciscop]

Oh yeah, I mean that in the Googler in a van, everyone here knows that Google pays a lot so he IS choosing to live in a van to save 90% and he could def pay for a house to stay at.

My point is that most people here don't know the level at which jobs pay in Ibiza in summer, so I brought that up as a familiar comparison (people there work 3 months and live off that the rest of the year).

[user568439]

I’m sorry but you are forgetting a lot of people that has a public job with a predefined salary not adjusted to the island reality.

Nurses, teachers, doctors, firemen… especially those who are there just temporarily can’t afford housing and it’s a big problem for the correct functioning of the island.

[franciscop]

It's true that I am not aware of the details of the gvmt jobs, but wouldn't they still follow, even if not so flexible, the basic laws of the market rates? e.g. if you are a nurse in mainland and get offered a 2000euro/month in Ibiza, but a house on its own costs much more (I wouldn't even dare to guess a whole summer month price TBH), you would decline that job. And everyone would do so, forcing them to raise the pay until it meets the needs, or have a shortage.

[hasty_pudding]

News needs sensationalism.

Thanks for posting another side of this.

What you're saying makes a lot of sense.