#622 – The Expat Files: Mexico’s Economy, Education, and the Expatriate Experience

Automatically transcribed from the original recording; names and wording may contain errors.

[00:00] South of the border down Mexico way That's where I fell in love when the stars above came out to play and now as I wonder Hello there all you expat wannabes I'm Johnny Mueller and you're listening to the expat files living in Latin America The show that tells you just what it's like to live work play and or retire down here in Latin America It's a mix of the good the bad the ugly and the great and it's all right here. So let's get started Hey now here's something that's totally confusing. I'm looking at an article that came out on the big national latin wire services It says this year Mexico's unemployment rate is 3.5% as Compared to last year's figure of 4% that would be like around a massive 15% improvement in one year, right? Well talk about figures

[00:52] Statistics and government lies if you read down the article and of course is in Spanish It says about seven paragraphs in that in Mexico people working in the informal economy that is on the streets 100% cash no receipts not paying taxes Which in my mind is good thing because when you do you get absolutely nothing But more corruption for the effort and the hiring of even more malignant government slugs and then it says in 2015 58% of Mexicans worked in the informal economy Meaning about 2% more are working on the books than in the previous year, which begs the question How is it possible that in the main headline? It says that Mexico's got a 3.5% unemployment rate when?

[01:42] 57% of the workers are completely off the books and taking cash How do they even measure those numbers and people who are off the books? Of course are gonna lie when approached by some government official with a clipboard, right? I mean, come on How many people are gonna tell a government official that they're cheating and not paying taxes? How do you even polar accumulate numbers like that with any accuracy at all? then the article says Mexico has around a hundred and twenty million people and 55.3 million a little less than half live in poverty and the Mexican government's definition of poverty People make it about ten bucks a day or less. But listen to this it says here since 1992 the wealth that is the revenue Collected by the Mexican government has increased by five times. That's 500%

[02:33] meanwhile 48% of government-run free state schools have no sewers or sanitary drainage and 31% of free government state schools have no drinking water and get this 12.8% of free government schools in Mexico have no toilets or sanitary facilities 12.2% of Mexican public schools do not have any electricity at all meanwhile Mexican government coffers are swelling since they own the state gas and oil production by the way The Mexican government's in control of one of the biggest natural gas deposits in the world Just confirming once again that governments everywhere are run by scumbag

[03:19] Vomitus crooks then there's this article that came out last week in Spanish again And it's entitled Mexico prepares support programs for migrants expected to be deported by Trump This is interesting. I'll be to paraphrase it It says before US president-elect Donald Trump takes the White House Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto is preparing a strategic defense for those returning Mexican immigrants All right, it's me Johnny here. Talk about PC verbiage. Come on Let's tell it like it is instead of returning Mexican immigrants How about returning illegal Mexican deported lawbreakers and just a little clarification here if someone says oh, no They're not all breaking laws. Some of them are very good citizens Well for one thing they're not citizens number two every last

[04:08] Illegal immigrant in the United States broke law number one as soon as they walked across the border illegally So they are all lawmakers by definition So don't give me that good productive citizen BS if the very first action you commit when you come to a new country is Coming in illegally. You have committed a criminal act period that being too strong I'm sorry. I went off on that little rant. Where were we? Oh, yeah Anyway, the article goes on to say Mexican president Ben. Yeah, and yet, though sent the Mexican State Senate Answers to parliamentary questions They had presented in the face of the growing fear of a flood of returning immigrants caused by Trump's threats regarding deportation of millions of

[04:54] undocumented immigrants. Oh Man, there they go beat needed death with that other PC word Undocumented. All right. So then it says which Mexican senators and lawmakers called Xenophobic and racist positions that go beyond the US presidential campaign. Now, let me stop for a second. Did you get that? Mexican senators and lawmakers which is an oxymoron in itself are saying they are afraid of The millions of immigrants that will be deported and return back to Mexico They're afraid of their own citizens coming back to their own homeland. Yep. You heard that right? They're afraid of their own people But this is a corker the Mexican president said that while it is true

[05:40] Mexican government has no control over the massive deportations that Trump has announced But he says quote the Mexican government will respond with strategic sense Yeah whatever that means and always put the defense of the country's interests and the Mexicans and their Well-being as priorities. Yeah, right. Then why haven't you been doing that for the last 50 years or so? Since when have the Mexicans and their well-being been the government of Mexico's priority? Man, if that's not the joke of the century. Well, I was wrong. I did say that was the topper, huh? Nope, the final paragraph here is a topper. It says quote This is by the president now the Mexican government assumes the defense of the dignity

[06:29] well-being and rights of Mexicans in the United States as indispensable Tell me what planet is this guy living on then? He says the Mexican foreign ministry will begin to negotiate with the Mexican Ministry of Labor public education finance social development agriculture economics and agrarian development in order to make a comprehensive support program for the returning immigrants Well, don't you think if you ever had something like that in place a long long time ago Mexicans wouldn't be streaming by the millions into the United States to escape their own homeland man They are a guillotine all politicians in the public square. Oh, by the way, just a little funny here did you know that a guy named guillotine invented the guillotine and

[07:16] After the French Revolution popularized the thing so much his own family changed their name to Dissociate themselves from it Makes sense, huh? How would you feel if your kid's name was John a guillotine Johnny guillotine? However, that would make an excellent name for a front man in a metal band. Hmm. There's an idea Okay, you get it. That's the end of my rant However, I must say I applaud that 57% of Mexicans who work off the books do business strictly in cash and pay no taxes I mean why support a fat-ass lying thieving Hypocritical malignant bureaucracy if you could somehow avoid it and I mean that in the kindest open-hearted spirit of the holidays By the way, here's a little Latin man on the street story. That's sure to amuse

[08:04] No, I don't mean it's a story about a little Latin man. I mean it's a little story about a Latin man Anyway, I was at a party the other day, you know, it's Christmas time and all that they have these things called convivios You know office parties and such a real big thing down here They're kind of a toned down version of a US style drunken office Christmas party In fact if a teenager or adult Latin doesn't get invited to at least two or three of them at this time of year They feel really left out. The word again is convivio In English, it means with life Go figure out. Well, I guess maybe it does fit, you know, you go to a party It has to have some kind of lively atmosphere and stuff to be fun. So with life, I guess it does fit anyway I was at one of those convivios talking with a guy who spoke some broken English enough that I knew he was

[08:54] Deported from up in the states. There's a lot of them around here You know luckily he got deported right before the holidays to hang with the folks and hit a few convivios Now for those of you who think I'm being unduly harsh here Maybe a classist or even a racist thinking how can Johnny jump to those negative conclusions like that? well here's the story if you run into an English speaking Latin person here in Latin America and They enunciate correctly and conjugate their words and sentences in a nice orderly Unstreetlike fashion, you know, they learned that English in a class at school in that case You can bet they hadn't slipped into the US illegally and had been deported. They're just Latins who took up English in school down here However, if you're running to a land person down here who speaks a little English, but it's nothing but Street Barrio English from up in Cleveland

[09:44] Or Chicago, there's a 99% chance He was an illegal caught and deported and now he's back in his home country talking to you Believe me. I've been down here long enough to know that's the case. That's the story Capisce. Anyway, we got to talking a little bit You know Latin's who learned a bit of English up in the States love to lay it on a gringo Anyway, he told me he is starting a job at the beginning of the year at one of the nearby Latin Walmart's There are thousands of them down here. Cool. I said and congratulated him and he told me Everyone wants to work at Walmart here in Latin America So there's a big waiting list and now they can be picky and higher only people have got a little bit English like him Then he said, you know, this is a great stepping stone for me If I just work one or two years at this Walmart, I can achieve my goal my dream

[10:32] And I said, what's that? I mean, what else am I gonna say, right? Just leave the guy hanging there and not ask him what his dream was. Come on. That'd be rude Well, he told me he's got a plan. He works at Walmart for a couple years down here gets the experience works His ass off proves. He's a good worker. That's when his real fantasy of a dream kicks in you'll never guess Well, you'll guess the first part. He wants to go back to the States, of course they all do and the second part well guess what he wants to transfer to a US based Walmart if That's even possible Who knows like he was saying there are hundreds and hundreds of Walmarts in Latin neighborhoods up in the states where they speak nothing But Spanish, did you know that and then he says or he thinks he'll have a shoe in because he'll already be an honored Walmart employee

[11:18] Yeah, right an honored Walmart employee. Sorry And you know dumb me I said well if you're working at Walmart down here Why don't you just stick it out and work your way up the ladder here? He said what are you kidding? Walmart's up in the States pay nine or ten bucks an hour Then he snapped his fingers and shook his head and said big money Whereas down here he says at the very same Walmart doing the very same job You make around $20 a day around two bucks an hour and you have a 44 hour workweek So you get it his definition of success is to work the very same job that he's doing here in Walmart up in the States So he can't really blame him and you can't really blame the Walmart chain for expanding to the third world here in Latin America Specifically because they stock a lot of imported items and charge first world prices yet

[12:08] They only pay around two bucks an hour for their employees Which is the same basic reason why so many US franchises are making a killing down here They charge first world prices yet. They only pay two bucks an hour You can pretty much figure for grunt work down here in Latin America They pay about one fifth the salary for the same job description up in the States Imagine the profit margins, especially when these days up in the States salaries are the biggest single part of your overhead when you're in the service or retail industry and if you take just the Walmart Example and analyze it you'll see there's no turning back There's no way the United States is ever gonna bring back Manufacturing or unskilled high-paying blue-collar jobs like for example in the auto industry

[12:54] Trump and every other dreamer who thinks that's a possibility Apparently never visited a Walmart or a Costco here in Latin America They're absolute carbon copies of the ones you see up the States however, they pay again one fifth of the first world salaries and People are standing in line down here to get those jobs yet deep down every Latin work on those jobs down here Wants to get that same job up in the States at a Walmart or Costco thinking they'll be riding high making five times more King of the poop pile tits of the Ritz. It's all so screwed up There's no way to bring back those golden blue-collar days of the 50s 60s and 70s up in the States That's over forever So I hope you're not holding your breath that anything's really gonna get straightened out in the States now that Trump's in well

[13:43] It ain't though It will be fun to watch the show from a nice safe distance here in Latin America The economy's gutted and a patient is bleeding to death. You know that oh and to reinforce that listen to this sad fact Did you know that Walmart is the third largest employer in the world? The first largest being the United States Department of Defense The who'd have thunk the second largest the Chinese People Liberation Army Oh, and how about this if Walmart itself was a nation? It would be the 26th largest economy on earth In fact if you took the entire population of Houston, Texas They could not fill all the jobs in the world's Walmart And if you took Home Depot, Kroger, Target, Sears, Costco and Kmart and combined them all they still

[14:34] Aren't as big as the Walmart chain. Yep Walmart the prototype George Soros transnational dream come true What a screwed-up world we live in huh? Meanwhile every up-and-coming Latin person either wants to work there shop there or both Even though their prices are much higher than those big open gigantic food produce Mercado's Making Walmart here in Latin America even more so Costco the place to be seen I know it sounds crazy, but it's true You got to get your boots on the ground to see it and the Costco's down here Well, they're a cut above Walmart because it costs around 10 to 20 bucks a year to join It's a big box membership club store, right? Which instantly cuts out to 60 or 70 percent of latins making only around 300 to 400 bucks a month

[15:24] Yep, that Costco membership card is something latins proudly display in that first flap in their wallet Yep, right along with that stack of maxed out credit cards Yep down here having a Costco membership card is a symbol of latin upper middle class and it's funny People even dress up a bit to go to Costco and shop not so much with Walmart But you do see some of that However, latins do dress up when they go to mediocre US franchise restaurants like TGIF Sizzler Applebee's IHOP and Starbucks. Yep. Those are places to be seen. So you have to look your best, right? Yep, us franchises are bathrobe and curler free zones That said one more very interesting thing that came to light recently about Mexico Why are we talking about Mexico? This is Mexico day, I guess because according to stats 1.5 million gringos are living there now

[16:17] I get many emails from people living in Mexico In fact at my expat insider seminars, I always have a couple of gringos or gringas living in Mexico in attendance Now, you know, I always mention that when you move down to latin america, that is vote with your feet become an expat and all that It's one of the last opportunities you'll have in your life to really shrink your footprint and become as anonymous as you want to be And of course anyone who's got a brain up in the states knows that you don't want to be an idiot Put all your debts on social media like facebook and definitely don't want to give away your debts on the internet to every Pop-up window that says sign in here to win a free ipad because if you do you're just asking for trouble The least of which is being bombarded with so much crap and spam. You can't delete the junk fast enough So in the end just remember google's not a benevolent organization

[17:04] They're actually in the business of selling you and your photo and your debts to the highest bidder Yep, google, facebook, twitter, even linkedin are cyber pimps and they're pimping you out whether you know it or not Which begs the question how much of your own personal data have you unwittingly given away on the net? Hmm. Well, it could be worse. You could be a clueless latin guy living in mexico. Listen to this This one comes from the mexican journal cronica That's cronica.com.mx. We'll translate some of this here the title of the article Mexico struggles with widespread cyber theft of personal data It says the cyber theft of personal and business data is more than widespread in mexico Illustrating the limited power that government institutions possess to counter this rapidly involving ever elusive new type of crime

[17:53] In fact, it's an industry now in mexico It says mexico has become a haven for black market data theft of all kinds and the potential profits are considerable The former commissioner of the mexican autonomous crime bureau tests with protection of personal data Says quote a medical file in mexico and throughout latin america now can be worth up to ten thousand dollars Because the information enables cyber terrorists to receive insurance pension and other government and private benefits when used to impersonate people For example, one of the easiest criminal scams is to sell the data so that someone else can use their medical benefits Government officials also point out that there's widespread cyber impunity

[18:39] Whatever that is they say because of mexico's weak and woefully inadequate Legislative tools and a failure to enforce existing laws leaving the cyber criminals far ahead in the race against the government The article also says that cyber theft is not the work of isolated hackers, but definitely the work of a complex criminal organization According to sebastian brenner a security strategist for semantic corporation in latin america He says there are very well structured groups with experts for every stage of the criminal process From infiltration capturing data and commercialization and sale of the stolen data He says the data from a stolen email account is worth around 30

[19:24] While that of an internet gaming account could reach up to three thousand dollars in value He said at the lowest level there are cyber crime marketing enterprises as well as competitor firms and others that specialize in creating new electronic systems To sell and disperse the stolen data through international markets organized crime gets into the act every step of the way Ultimately, the information is used for theft, bribery, extortion, and kidnapping Worse yet is the problem that mexicans and other latin american citizens are so willing and so easily Give up their own personal data to practically any official looking organization or websites That might ask for data with a simple request

[20:10] For example nearly every latin person who uses the internet regularly has responded to false or counterfeit emails Typical examples are the strategically placed bots that appear to be from the likes of google yahoo facebook and others requesting data to update accounts warning that accounts will be closed advising that data or memory will be lost Unless they respond immediately and give up their data to one of these trick or trojan horse emails The problem is that latin americans have all the cutting edge technology of the first world But without the sophistication or technical knowledge to understand the importance of guarding their own personal data In fact one cyber terrorist bragged that in two minutes

[20:55] He could get virtually any latin computer or smartphone user to give up all their personal data even their passwords then software and security antivirus giant norton says cyber crime in mexico has doubled since 2013 The norton company highlighting mexico status as a regional hub for online crime While the mexican government finds it impossible to keep up with the evolving technology They estimate now that mexican cybercrime is in the range of five billion dollars a year Then it says mexico's director of the national institute of penal sciences Whatever that is told an international cybercrime conference taking place in mexico city that cyber crimes were now Generating many more criminal complaints than those associated with piracy or even drug trafficking

[21:45] Then it said over half of latin american companies and banks reported cybercrime attacks in 2012 and three orders of them reported cybercrime issues in 2015 though less than one percent of those reports end up in the media I wonder why it says in mexico the combination of rampant organized crime and high levels of internet connectivity Has placed mexico eighth in the world for identity theft on top of that. It's now the world's largest distributor of child pornography Then it says while mexican organized crime is not thought to be directly involved in organized child pornography The internet has become a very important tool for gangs Which use social media and youtube for extortions and targeting kidnap victims and home invasions

[22:34] All right Just one last thing about identity theft here in latin america the latin magazine el Economista reports a large international security company set up an experiment in which their own company employees planted 500 wallets across mexico's capital city There were false phone numbers and personal identity information in those wallets along with some false credit cards They then tracked down how many wallets were actually returned or reported to the supposed owners Well only 47 were returned or nine percent of the total How about that less than one out of ten decent good Samaritans in mexico at least in that experiment And according to another extensive study nine out of ten mexicans carry sufficient information in their wallets

[23:24] To be victims of identity fraud should the wallets be lost or stolen Which begs the question if you lost your wallet up in the states How useful and valuable would it be to someone who had bad intentions? All right. Let's change the subject and read an email This one comes from mr. B. I want to move to latin america with my wife and kids I have a canadian driver's license and I love driving truck I'm hoping to continue driving once we relocate to central america What's the demand like for commercial truck drivers? Do I need some connections to get a foot in a door in this field? Anyway, johnny your show is both a blessing and inspiring signed mr. B and family All right. So mr. B. I want to give you a nice big general answer here that should give you some idea

[24:11] It's like this for those who do have a career up in the states or canada anywhere in the first world and want to transfer it Down here in latin america in your case you're talking about driving a truck. Well, it's certainly true Trucks really do move latin america There used to be a lot of railroads, but those have kind of gone defunct as they have in the states pretty much I'd say 98 percent of all goods maybe more are hauled by truck So yes, there are plenty of truck driving jobs Just as there are plenty of carpentry and plumbing jobs available, too Not to mention stoneworkers contractors mechanics masons electricians, whatever you've got up in the first row They've got it down here, too However, and this is a big however, you'll find the pay in any one of these careers

[24:57] That is working for someone else Is going to be at about a fifth of what they pay up in the first world for the very same skill And yes, they have unions here, but they're very weak Most of those unions by the way are for government service employees figures, huh? So yes, if you come down with a first world skill, you'll certainly find a job Especially if you speak some spanish though, it'll be difficult to have a truly first world style of life Unless you are the owner operator of the business. Yep. That's the hitch. That's how it always is, huh? That's true. Pretty much anywhere It's the owner who makes the investment takes the risks and therefore makes the real money if the enterprise is a success So again bottom line if you have a career up in the states and plan on transferring it down here to latin america You better think about being the boss unless you want to knock your lifestyle down a few notches

[25:47] Don't plan on working for anyone else and actually making a decent wage But again, it all depends on your lifestyle And if you've got a little nest egg or not since most people who come down Don't really find their calling in a business sense until they've had some boots on the ground for six months or so But much earlier than that the ideas start coming and then comes the problem of sorting out What you think is the best project for you because you can't do it all In fact over the years. I've got a couple of small notebooks just filled with cool business ideas But I have to live a few more lifetimes to try them all and let's face it Even though you've got that gringo advantage working for you all the time And you see details and such that latins will never pick up on still part of making money in any successful business

[26:34] Involves a bit of personality timing and luck and as far as doing business up in the first world First of all, you don't have the gringo advantage second. You have countless government regulations screwing with you at every turn and Generally, if you don't have an internet company, you'll need a hell of a lot of cash to get started So whatever job or business venture you get into down here in latin america, it'll cost you a lot less You'll have much less regulation and you'll have that all important gringo advantage going for you And of course, it's the strongest and in full force the farther you're away from tourist destinations And the fact is I know of almost no expat gringos ones who have successful businesses down here today Who thought of the idea while living up in the states and brought it down with them unless it was an internet-based business

[27:21] You could do anywhere they'll freely admit they never dreamed They'd be doing what they're doing now But you know when you've got boots on the ground and opportunities present themselves you jump in or some other gringo will South of the border This is the expat files living in latin america If you want me to help you out with your own plan b just schedule a one-on-one consult Send me an email at the expat files at gmail.com And if you want to learn how to move forward with your own plan b from right up there in the states go to www.expatplanb.com and check out my three videos. See ya nos vemos