swisstrav
Contributor
I would offer that if spending $150.00 US is the tipping point whether individuals extend their stay or move on to greener pastures then the Philippine government would probablly believe that those individuals would not be contributing too much to the ecomony.
I also think this only affects a very small number of individuals who are actively spending/contributing to the economy, and will hopefully deter some of the sexpats from sticking around too long.
Cheers,
Roger
i know what you mean
however this country is basically starving for money (foreign). if you would be true, what you call the "sexpads" there is way to much money involved. they will stay on.
now if i'm not meaningful to the the philippine economy staying in a resort, average cost say 2000 to 4000php and doing 2 to 3 dives a day at say 1200php plus food and the occasional drink in the evenig then so be it.
we are talking about spendig the equivalent of approx us 100 to 150 a day. compared with a daily rural income of less than 200php/day? if this is not meanigful, again ok with me.
also i admit, compared with processing costs of us or some other western country your are in line or also on the high side. however if you compare the cost of a bottle of tanduay (68php or even less) then the cost of the visa extension is a bit out of scale.
and that's why i find it simply not worthwhile to extend.