I have a hard time believing that a handful of digital nomads are responsible for rent increases and the other changes mentioned in the article.
In the US, you can find people from nearly every state who believe that Californians are responsible for driving up home prices. This article feels like an international version of that same myth.
As for digital nomads, my experience hiring or working with digital nomads has been universally negative for many years. All anecdotes, of course, but every one of them treated the job like a side project that they’d get to whenever they had some free time during a permanent vacation lifestyle. Some of them produced good work if you could micromanage them enough to make sure they were actually working, but the rest of the time felt like a game of chicken where they were constantly trying to push the limits of how little work they could do or how many meetings (rare but important at the time) they could miss or have their “camera broken” while they obviously tried to half listen in from some vacation spot. I’m sure there are good digital nomads out there, but I’ve been burned enough time that I prefer not to work with them unless it’s on a well-defined contract basis with clear project-based fees.
Note: I am a digital nomad for half the year every year myself.
With that said on your second commentary about digital nomads, my question would simply be: Are they getting the work you expect done finished in a timely manner (comparable to others on your team)? If so, regardless of any other point, what is the problem? If not, then why didn't you address the issue quickly since you mention you're the one who hired them.
I do know there are some digital nomads who definitely minimize the amount of work they can do, but I still think the issue is with employers in general not being good at managing remote workers (not just digital nomads). If you don't set expectations or clearly communicate that they aren't working up to expectations, then of course they will continue to act in such a way.
Work is not my life, and I think that jars with the thinking of some others who prioritize their work over everything else. My honest opinion is that this primarily a failing of management and hiring you are speaking to. I do good work, and whatever is expected of me, and my manager is always happy. I make sure to do at minimum just that. But if I'm not doing that I would hope somebody would simply communicate that.
> my question would simply be: Are they getting the work you expect done finished in a timely manner (comparable to others on your team)? If so, regardless of any other point, what is the problem?
No, they are not getting comparable work done. That’s literally the entire problem I was trying to describe.
> If not, then why didn't you address the issue quickly since you mention you're the one who hired them.
Why do you assume I’m not addressing the issue? I specifically said it took heavy management interaction to try to keep them on track.
This is the same argument that always comes up: If they “get their work done” then what’s the problem? If they got their work done I wouldn’t care. The problem is that they don’t get their work done in a timely manner and/or they sandbag to exaggerate how long their work will take so they can do minimal work, thereby shifting the workload to their teammates who are actually honest.
> If not, then why didn't you address the issue quickly since you mention you're the one who hired them.
For me, it’s because I’m busy and this takes time. Being a good employee isn’t unique to digits nomads or not. But having to micromanage to correct problems is something I’d like to avoid as a manager. I have fantastic employees and do not experience this type of behavior and work on hiring people who are self starters and problem solvers not people who bill by the hour, work for an hour and bill 8 and claim it’s because I didn’t assign more work. I’d rather hire someone smart who figures out what they can do by maximizing their time themself that helps toward our broader mission.
I don’t want to assign tasks, I want to remove blockers and help expand impact. So I like to find more things to do, not finish things and then wait.
But if a tangent, but I think this is the dumbest excuse ever. I wish people would just say they don’t want to turn it on. It seems weird when a programmer complains about this like it’s something outside their control. I’m sure it actually happens, but I’ve never had a MacBook camera fail and I have like 15 year old iMacs with the cam still working.
This makes people sound incompetent, especially when cameras aren’t required or anything.
you don't need the camera anyway. I worked with my cofounders as a contractor for a year without knowing what either of them looked like. we collaborated over slack, I did my job and they deposited the money into my account on time every month. I didn't actually see them face to face till i flew to greece to sign paperwork to get equity and officially form a startup as CTO.
Been working together for 4 years now and we still only talk audio only.
That said, I can understand why you'd want it at the initial outset. In my case, the introduction was made by a mutual friend whom provided that guarantee of trust. (reputation is everything)
Oh but the camera sometimes is broken. Glitchy firmware or bad drivers for the OS can lead to all sorts of problems (I'm talking about people using Desktops of course)
Investors chasing returns are probably the bigger driver but digital nomads are highlighting for them where might be a good investment.
Investor-landlords (especially if they are local) are also probably more keen to lay the blame at digital nomads' feet. Every guilty party loves a good scapegoat.
Not sure what kind of places you work at, but my entire team is distributed and we are all young and consistently working 10-12 hours a day. Plus I live on the beach! When I worked in an office I worked way less and got way more distracted
The numbers certainly are low enough not to drive up rents, or create significant demand for fancy coffee shops or any other business.
> In 2022, 2,305 temporary residence permits for Mexico City were granted to U.S. citizens
Mexico City metro area has 21 million people. And who can say what percentage of those 2.3k are digital nomads. Because you also have expats.
> Extrapolating from its user base, Nomad List projects that there are currently about 7.600 remote workers in Medellín
Leaving aside this is a gross estimation - 7.6k remote workers in a metro area of 3.7 million. Are all the 7.6k digital nomads or can they be local remote workers?
Note that the article also says that many nomads switch places every month. Most of them won't need a temporary residence permit for Mexico.
> Leaving aside this is a gross estimation - 7.6k remote workers in a metro area of 3.7 million. Are all the 7.6k digital nomads or can they be local remote workers?
Given Nomad List's target audience, I think they mean digital nomads from outside Colombia.
It's also very likely that the actual numbers are higher – I have met plenty of nomads in Medellín but, like me, many were not using Nomad List.
> All anecdotes, of course, but every one of them treated the job like a side project that they’d get to whenever they had some free time during a permanent vacation lifestyle
Devil's advocate: this is the direction we should aim toward as a society. Yes, the work still needs to be performed, but efficient workers should be rewarded with more free time for the same wage, because the purpose of life, the economy, and civilization itself should be to enable everyone to do whatever they want, as much as possible, and labor is only a way to achieve that.
Agreed on the fact that digital nomads are not the prime contributors -- that can be largely attributed to corporate rental orgs, foreign investment safe havens, airbnb, and a small class of wealthy people using homes / land as wealth stores.
As for your other point...
It is easy to blame people as a class for their inability to meet your expectations, but I would encourage more self-reflection and not axing a whole group of workers because of some bad experiences. Here is an alternative view, because I think that it's important to acknowledge the evolving work-lifestyle balance that many individuals, especially digital nomads, are adopting today. Instead of prioritizing work over life, they choose to intertwine the two, enhancing their experiences and broadening their perspectives.
In engaging with digital nomads, they have largely come to a better understanding about work and life. They are not letting work get in the way of their living. The work you’re offering becomes a part of their life, rather than the defining factor. They tend to prefer environments where rigid structures and unproductive meetings make way for flexibility, creativity, and efficient communication.
Working with digital nomads requires a shift in traditional managerial approaches. Here are some recommendations:
- Effective Communication: Ensure meetings are purposeful and time-efficient. Adopt asynchronous communication, which respects the nomad’s flexible schedule and promotes a healthy work-life balance.
- Clear Goals: Communicate your vision, objectives, and deadlines clearly. This ensures expectations align and facilitates the digital nomad’s proactive role in the project.
- Flexible Schedules: Embrace flexibility in terms of work schedules. Trust your team to meet the agreed-upon deadlines, focusing more on the quality of outcomes rather than hours logged.
- Measurable Benchmarks: Establish clear, achievable benchmarks. This helps in maintaining a project’s momentum and provides a clear gauge of progress.
- Clarity in Tasks: Digital nomads value their time, hence it’s crucial that tasks are defined precisely. Ambiguity may lead to delays and misunderstandings.
- Realistic Expectations: Understand the work scope and timelines. Overestimating or underestimating these aspects can lead to frustration and tension in the professional relationship.
In order to foster a healthier work dynamic, consider the following:
- Trust-Based Relationships: Build trust by focusing on outcomes, not micromanaging. This fosters a sense of responsibility and ownership in the nomad.
- Meaningful Work: Provide stimulating and meaningful work. This encourages engagement and can lead to higher productivity.
- Experiential Opportunities: If possible, integrate opportunities for travel and new experiences into your work offerings. This aligns with the nomad’s lifestyle and enhances their work satisfaction.
In essence, it’s not about confining individuals to boxes, but adapting to their style of work and making the most of the unique skills and perspectives they bring to the table. When work and life coexist harmoniously, the results can be rewarding for both the individual and the employer.
If you can find a way to merge experience with work in an authentic way, you will have a better experience with these sorts.
These all seem to apply to management in general. Most people do better when given engaging tasks and clear objectives.
Being respectful of time rather depends on the nature of the job. I'm remote but there are meetings where my expertise is needed and others that I chair - if I don't attend then I'm not doing my job.
Just those few things. Do them perfectly, and everything will be great.
The managers are hopelessly outgunned. For years they (we) bumbled along, and cut our employees a lot of slack. At least I did. At the same time, they cut us some slack too, for instance by figuring out the precise details of their own tasks, working things out with colleagues, and so forth.
If each employee has to be managed perfectly, then where are you going to get managers, especially without paying them more, and with the additional expectation that managers should be technically qualified? Screw that. Most of us came out of the techie ranks. I was happy to go back.
On nearly every article about digital nomads I see people hunched over working on a laptop sitting on a non-adjustable chair, or working on their laptop on the couch. Natural light also seems to be lacking in the pictures from this article.
I admire their lifestyle but having experience with RSI I will never work somewhere that doesn't have a height adjustable desk, ergonomic seat and at least a laptop stand to raise it to eye level. Preferably an external monitor.
Assuming these people have an above average income for the region they are in, can't they afford to rent a co-op space somewhere that allows them to work in a healthy way with good posture?
I think many people are used to poor working conditions and don't realize how bad it is. The company where I work has a token interest in ergonomics, so the desks are somewhat height adjustable (as in they're not strictly impossible to adjust, but it's not very practical – but since we don't do hot-desking it's fine enough). They provide office chairs which, while not great, offer the usual adjustments. If you have special needs, say you're too tall and the desk doesn't go high enough, they'll find ways to accommodate you.
In my specific office ("IT"), we have somewhat better conditions, with displays that can actually be set at the correct level, etc. Still, many people will just spend their days hunched over their laptops ignoring the screen in front of them, sit in chairs set comically low or high, etc.
A lot of digital nomads are in their 20s, which doesn't mean they shouldn't think about RSI, but that they are less likely to. Plenty of them are older than that, but even then, it's a group which self-selects for priorities other than ergonomics. At their future peril, I'm sure.
I am a digital nomad for about half the year every year in various areas. Personally I usually do rent space or sign up for a coworking spot that has these amenities. Most don't have an adjustable desk, but many will have at least places to work while standing and decent chairs, which I appreciate. This is done primarily to always have a place that is apt for taking calls, focusing, and having stable wifi.
I do work at cafes every once in a while, but I try to make sure I am still performing my job well so that people don't get skeptical of my lifestyle/location hurting my work.
I'm 38, around 31 I started developing chronic pain issues ad RSI. a friend suggested i take up lifting weights. I joined him and he taught me proper form and technique. between cutting out processed food and sugar, and lifting regularly, All the chronic pain has been gone for a few years and I'm more or less as pliable as when I was in my 20's.
It's just not a long term thing, for obvious reasons. People do it for a bit and then realise that the lifestyle is transient. So it doesn't go on long enough to cause serious problems.
If you're still doing this at age 50 then you'll be a lonely old man.
I have been to a lot of the cities mentioned in the article, and one thing I found is that most of these "digital nomads" are better classified as long-term tourists. They don't have real businesses, aren't doing any real work and aren't making any money. Their day mostly comprises "working" for a couple hours at some coffee shop and spending the rest of the day/night socializing and partying. When reality strikes and their savings start to deplete (and/or their company's HR department calls them back to the US) they will promptly pack up and leave.
Interesting to compare medellin with some American cities that are having similar issues - small mountain towns in Colorado for example have a lot the same problems but at a much smaller scale.
But I do find the gentrification causing each city to look the same sad, a neighborhood I visited in Mexico City looked identical the the richest shopping neighborhood in Denver.
I mean the world is pretty global these days. I spent a week in the San Pedro neighborhood of Monterrey and if yon blink twice you’ll think you’re in San Diego or Houston.
Pretty sure there’s basically zero influence of digital nomads. It’s just kind of how things are.
I need a clear argument for why having a comparatively small number of comparatively rich people come to your small town is actually something people should be deeply worried about. I've heard a lot of chicken little type catastrophizing without a lot of hard, unambiguous data to back it up.
I get that digital nomads might be annoying and boorish: people with 100x as much money as you, who don't speak your language and don't know anything about your culture, and live in a little bubble of luxury right next to where you are just getting by. That would make me mad. I could see rolling your eyes hard. But, are these arguments about them destroying towns and neighborhoods coming from a place of fact, or a place of emotion?
I remember back when attracting money spenders to the area was considered great for business and jobs, and competitive. Sometimes have trouble wrapping my head around folks against it.
What changed? My current theory is the housing shortage. Means that all community benefits flow towards rent-seeking real estate owners, everyone else just gets squeezed.
This article is pretty off-base with its description of Medellín from my experience (lived in Laureles for ~1 year with some locals).
Medellín has been a digital nomading hotspot since at least 2016. It is not “in the early stages of nomadification”.
Laureles is not a middle-class neighborhood.
Insinuating that the “gringo price” for an apartment is what a local (or even a gringo who can speak Spanish) will pay is dishonest.
And while I love paisas, it’s disingenuous to complain about the rich gringos when much of the current middle-class Colombian lifestyle is powered by Venezuelan migrant workers.
How would you classify it? I mean it's definitely not upscale as the article claims in the very beginning but it surely is one of the more decent neighborhoods. I guess it depends on one's definition of "middle class".
> Insinuating that the “gringo price” for an apartment is what a local (or even a gringo who can speak Spanish) will pay is dishonest.
Agreed, there is a gap in the causality chain here. Lots of places in the world have "special" prices for visitors but it doesn't automatically mean those prices will impact inflation from the point of view of locals.
Getting back to the article,
> A one-bedroom in Medellín now rents for the “gringo price” of about $1,300 a month, in a country where the median monthly income is $300.
they are really comparing apples and oranges here. A gringo tourist might pay $1,300 for a fancy apartment in a high rise in one of those upscale gated communities in Poblado. But 1) this price still includes a gringo surcharge, 2) most locals (i.e. the ones with the $300 income) don't live in such apartments, and 3) the few locals that do live in such apartments have a considerably higher monthly income.
>> Medellín has been a digital nomading hotspot since at least 2016.
Most people couldn’t even dream of working remotely in 2016. Now, a huge number of people have it as a viable option. So although it may have been popular with nomads in 2016 the number of nomads has grown exponentially since then.
Seems like pretty standard gentrification with the "digital nomad" label to give it a cool new spin, and an easy villain to understand and dislike.
"Oblivious middle class hipster types" is the likely caricature - but they are probably quite varied and less clichéd in reality; it presumably takes an element of individuality, imagination and courage to venture out like that, even where the privilege is also there.
> Then, around 2017, the nomads started arriving — particularly those from the U.S., with their high-calorie diets, Doordash addictions, and extravagant tipping culture. Noel’s eyes lit up as he described them. “Los gringos,” he said, “y sus propinas” — “and their tips.”
Ugghh. If there's one thing that I hated when I went back to Colombia it's this. Waiters will now often ask you point-blank when you're paying whether you want to include a service fee (which is often ~20%). I hate the US tipping culture with deep passion and it's been painful to see Colombia getting americanized in this way.
Readit News
In the US, you can find people from nearly every state who believe that Californians are responsible for driving up home prices. This article feels like an international version of that same myth.
As for digital nomads, my experience hiring or working with digital nomads has been universally negative for many years. All anecdotes, of course, but every one of them treated the job like a side project that they’d get to whenever they had some free time during a permanent vacation lifestyle. Some of them produced good work if you could micromanage them enough to make sure they were actually working, but the rest of the time felt like a game of chicken where they were constantly trying to push the limits of how little work they could do or how many meetings (rare but important at the time) they could miss or have their “camera broken” while they obviously tried to half listen in from some vacation spot. I’m sure there are good digital nomads out there, but I’ve been burned enough time that I prefer not to work with them unless it’s on a well-defined contract basis with clear project-based fees.
With that said on your second commentary about digital nomads, my question would simply be: Are they getting the work you expect done finished in a timely manner (comparable to others on your team)? If so, regardless of any other point, what is the problem? If not, then why didn't you address the issue quickly since you mention you're the one who hired them.
I do know there are some digital nomads who definitely minimize the amount of work they can do, but I still think the issue is with employers in general not being good at managing remote workers (not just digital nomads). If you don't set expectations or clearly communicate that they aren't working up to expectations, then of course they will continue to act in such a way.
Work is not my life, and I think that jars with the thinking of some others who prioritize their work over everything else. My honest opinion is that this primarily a failing of management and hiring you are speaking to. I do good work, and whatever is expected of me, and my manager is always happy. I make sure to do at minimum just that. But if I'm not doing that I would hope somebody would simply communicate that.
No, they are not getting comparable work done. That’s literally the entire problem I was trying to describe.
> If not, then why didn't you address the issue quickly since you mention you're the one who hired them.
Why do you assume I’m not addressing the issue? I specifically said it took heavy management interaction to try to keep them on track.
This is the same argument that always comes up: If they “get their work done” then what’s the problem? If they got their work done I wouldn’t care. The problem is that they don’t get their work done in a timely manner and/or they sandbag to exaggerate how long their work will take so they can do minimal work, thereby shifting the workload to their teammates who are actually honest.
For me, it’s because I’m busy and this takes time. Being a good employee isn’t unique to digits nomads or not. But having to micromanage to correct problems is something I’d like to avoid as a manager. I have fantastic employees and do not experience this type of behavior and work on hiring people who are self starters and problem solvers not people who bill by the hour, work for an hour and bill 8 and claim it’s because I didn’t assign more work. I’d rather hire someone smart who figures out what they can do by maximizing their time themself that helps toward our broader mission.
I don’t want to assign tasks, I want to remove blockers and help expand impact. So I like to find more things to do, not finish things and then wait.
But if a tangent, but I think this is the dumbest excuse ever. I wish people would just say they don’t want to turn it on. It seems weird when a programmer complains about this like it’s something outside their control. I’m sure it actually happens, but I’ve never had a MacBook camera fail and I have like 15 year old iMacs with the cam still working.
This makes people sound incompetent, especially when cameras aren’t required or anything.
Been working together for 4 years now and we still only talk audio only.
That said, I can understand why you'd want it at the initial outset. In my case, the introduction was made by a mutual friend whom provided that guarantee of trust. (reputation is everything)
I suspect it's not entirely Covid diaspora and the handful of digital nomads pushed by lifestyle influencers.
Californicators driving up housing prices was already a meme in Portland in the 1980s.
Investor-landlords (especially if they are local) are also probably more keen to lay the blame at digital nomads' feet. Every guilty party loves a good scapegoat.
That shouldn't be something to aspire to.
Deleted Comment
> In 2022, 2,305 temporary residence permits for Mexico City were granted to U.S. citizens
Mexico City metro area has 21 million people. And who can say what percentage of those 2.3k are digital nomads. Because you also have expats.
> Extrapolating from its user base, Nomad List projects that there are currently about 7.600 remote workers in Medellín
Leaving aside this is a gross estimation - 7.6k remote workers in a metro area of 3.7 million. Are all the 7.6k digital nomads or can they be local remote workers?
> Leaving aside this is a gross estimation - 7.6k remote workers in a metro area of 3.7 million. Are all the 7.6k digital nomads or can they be local remote workers?
Given Nomad List's target audience, I think they mean digital nomads from outside Colombia.
It's also very likely that the actual numbers are higher – I have met plenty of nomads in Medellín but, like me, many were not using Nomad List.
Devil's advocate: this is the direction we should aim toward as a society. Yes, the work still needs to be performed, but efficient workers should be rewarded with more free time for the same wage, because the purpose of life, the economy, and civilization itself should be to enable everyone to do whatever they want, as much as possible, and labor is only a way to achieve that.
By all means be an independent contractor and set your own hours and rates.
Or work for a company that allows part time workers.
But salaries workers usually have a schedule expectation (~40 hours or so in the US) and you’d be lucky to work for an org that does less.
I think you’ll need to start a company and do that as I think most companies would rather just make more money off increased productivity.
As for your other point...
It is easy to blame people as a class for their inability to meet your expectations, but I would encourage more self-reflection and not axing a whole group of workers because of some bad experiences. Here is an alternative view, because I think that it's important to acknowledge the evolving work-lifestyle balance that many individuals, especially digital nomads, are adopting today. Instead of prioritizing work over life, they choose to intertwine the two, enhancing their experiences and broadening their perspectives.
In engaging with digital nomads, they have largely come to a better understanding about work and life. They are not letting work get in the way of their living. The work you’re offering becomes a part of their life, rather than the defining factor. They tend to prefer environments where rigid structures and unproductive meetings make way for flexibility, creativity, and efficient communication.
Working with digital nomads requires a shift in traditional managerial approaches. Here are some recommendations:
- Effective Communication: Ensure meetings are purposeful and time-efficient. Adopt asynchronous communication, which respects the nomad’s flexible schedule and promotes a healthy work-life balance.
- Clear Goals: Communicate your vision, objectives, and deadlines clearly. This ensures expectations align and facilitates the digital nomad’s proactive role in the project.
- Flexible Schedules: Embrace flexibility in terms of work schedules. Trust your team to meet the agreed-upon deadlines, focusing more on the quality of outcomes rather than hours logged.
- Measurable Benchmarks: Establish clear, achievable benchmarks. This helps in maintaining a project’s momentum and provides a clear gauge of progress.
- Clarity in Tasks: Digital nomads value their time, hence it’s crucial that tasks are defined precisely. Ambiguity may lead to delays and misunderstandings.
- Realistic Expectations: Understand the work scope and timelines. Overestimating or underestimating these aspects can lead to frustration and tension in the professional relationship.
In order to foster a healthier work dynamic, consider the following:
- Trust-Based Relationships: Build trust by focusing on outcomes, not micromanaging. This fosters a sense of responsibility and ownership in the nomad.
- Meaningful Work: Provide stimulating and meaningful work. This encourages engagement and can lead to higher productivity.
- Experiential Opportunities: If possible, integrate opportunities for travel and new experiences into your work offerings. This aligns with the nomad’s lifestyle and enhances their work satisfaction.
In essence, it’s not about confining individuals to boxes, but adapting to their style of work and making the most of the unique skills and perspectives they bring to the table. When work and life coexist harmoniously, the results can be rewarding for both the individual and the employer.
If you can find a way to merge experience with work in an authentic way, you will have a better experience with these sorts.
Being respectful of time rather depends on the nature of the job. I'm remote but there are meetings where my expertise is needed and others that I chair - if I don't attend then I'm not doing my job.
The managers are hopelessly outgunned. For years they (we) bumbled along, and cut our employees a lot of slack. At least I did. At the same time, they cut us some slack too, for instance by figuring out the precise details of their own tasks, working things out with colleagues, and so forth.
If each employee has to be managed perfectly, then where are you going to get managers, especially without paying them more, and with the additional expectation that managers should be technically qualified? Screw that. Most of us came out of the techie ranks. I was happy to go back.
I admire their lifestyle but having experience with RSI I will never work somewhere that doesn't have a height adjustable desk, ergonomic seat and at least a laptop stand to raise it to eye level. Preferably an external monitor.
Assuming these people have an above average income for the region they are in, can't they afford to rent a co-op space somewhere that allows them to work in a healthy way with good posture?
In my specific office ("IT"), we have somewhat better conditions, with displays that can actually be set at the correct level, etc. Still, many people will just spend their days hunched over their laptops ignoring the screen in front of them, sit in chairs set comically low or high, etc.
I do work at cafes every once in a while, but I try to make sure I am still performing my job well so that people don't get skeptical of my lifestyle/location hurting my work.
If you're still doing this at age 50 then you'll be a lonely old man.
But I do find the gentrification causing each city to look the same sad, a neighborhood I visited in Mexico City looked identical the the richest shopping neighborhood in Denver.
Pretty sure there’s basically zero influence of digital nomads. It’s just kind of how things are.
I get that digital nomads might be annoying and boorish: people with 100x as much money as you, who don't speak your language and don't know anything about your culture, and live in a little bubble of luxury right next to where you are just getting by. That would make me mad. I could see rolling your eyes hard. But, are these arguments about them destroying towns and neighborhoods coming from a place of fact, or a place of emotion?
What changed? My current theory is the housing shortage. Means that all community benefits flow towards rent-seeking real estate owners, everyone else just gets squeezed.
Medellín has been a digital nomading hotspot since at least 2016. It is not “in the early stages of nomadification”.
Laureles is not a middle-class neighborhood.
Insinuating that the “gringo price” for an apartment is what a local (or even a gringo who can speak Spanish) will pay is dishonest.
And while I love paisas, it’s disingenuous to complain about the rich gringos when much of the current middle-class Colombian lifestyle is powered by Venezuelan migrant workers.
How would you classify it? I mean it's definitely not upscale as the article claims in the very beginning but it surely is one of the more decent neighborhoods. I guess it depends on one's definition of "middle class".
> Insinuating that the “gringo price” for an apartment is what a local (or even a gringo who can speak Spanish) will pay is dishonest.
Agreed, there is a gap in the causality chain here. Lots of places in the world have "special" prices for visitors but it doesn't automatically mean those prices will impact inflation from the point of view of locals.
Getting back to the article,
> A one-bedroom in Medellín now rents for the “gringo price” of about $1,300 a month, in a country where the median monthly income is $300.
they are really comparing apples and oranges here. A gringo tourist might pay $1,300 for a fancy apartment in a high rise in one of those upscale gated communities in Poblado. But 1) this price still includes a gringo surcharge, 2) most locals (i.e. the ones with the $300 income) don't live in such apartments, and 3) the few locals that do live in such apartments have a considerably higher monthly income.
Most people couldn’t even dream of working remotely in 2016. Now, a huge number of people have it as a viable option. So although it may have been popular with nomads in 2016 the number of nomads has grown exponentially since then.
"Oblivious middle class hipster types" is the likely caricature - but they are probably quite varied and less clichéd in reality; it presumably takes an element of individuality, imagination and courage to venture out like that, even where the privilege is also there.
Ugghh. If there's one thing that I hated when I went back to Colombia it's this. Waiters will now often ask you point-blank when you're paying whether you want to include a service fee (which is often ~20%). I hate the US tipping culture with deep passion and it's been painful to see Colombia getting americanized in this way.