Based on articles like this, one gets an impression that Albania is a bad place - which is not the case according to people who actually spent some time there: https://youtu.be/R1BYTmqWjTU
You'd probably find dealing with seven million pages of official Central European paperwork to be preferable to that sort of thing.
I honestly have no idea why you would think that unpredictable corruption, and a lack of regulation is going to make it easier to start a business. Especially as corruption and weak regulation tend to only benefit the incumbents.
You do have a good point, in that it throws off bigger investors, but people get by. They don't make a killing income, but neither do they starve.
What is "predictable" for bigger investors though is unpredictable for these very people. No wonder the average grandma in the EU does not have the skills to start a small business, if needed. The laws and regulations are simply too complex for her.
I guess the issue is with scaling a business in a corrupt environment (as opposed to starting it, which is 0 friction). Once you grow bigger than your local gang's area, you deal with higher and higher levels of corruption. God forbid you end up scaling a business to the point where you have to bribe the highest level gang - the national government. That would be very expensive and risky (the regime can always change - new people, new demands). BUT assuming you stay small, you can make a living running your own (family) business without much friction.
Really I don’t understand where you get your information from. I’ve started businesses in the EU, it’s trivial easy, there are no complicated laws or regulations to worry about, at least not for micro-businesses.
The most likely reason you don’t see so many micro-business in the EU is simply because people have other options that provide greater prosperity and security than running a micro-business. Running businesses are hard, running tiny ones is stressful. You’ve got no safety net, no income guarantee, no rights to holidays or time off. Going and working for an employer that can provide all that is simply a better life for most.
https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/IC.BUS.EASE.XQ?end=2019...
Are you from San Marino by chance? It seems like such a cool and wonky political system, and would love to learn more!
Protection money for running a small mom&pop shop selling kebab or souvenirs for tourists is probably less than the protection money you pay for the same kinds of businesses to the government in Germany (percentage wise).
But the more you want to scale the business and try to deal with higher and higher strata of gangs (all the way up to the national level), the more expensive it gets. And unpredictable.
So my theory is - it is easy to start a micro-business in a corrupt environment, but it is hard to scale it.
Why? Corruption?
Institutionally, the mix of corruption, bad demographics, weak infrastructure due to Hoxhaism plus the post-1991 collapse, blowback from ethnoreligious conflicts across the border in former Yugoslavia, the civil war in the 1997, and the earthquake in 2019 have not helped.
Tourists tend to be treated with kiddy gloves by organized crime because of the response that diplomatic blunders trigger. Odds are as well that, if you as a tourist went out of your way to go to a warlord controlled area you were(or were seen as) their client.
Meanwhile the police shakedowns were incessant. We ended up paying over $100 USDd/day to police in straight up bribes for made up offenses.
>That and the cartel can just straight up roll up with guns and take all your shit, why wouldn't they just do that if they wanted your money?
Being robbed by the government is more palatable to tourists. Would you travel to a place where ununiformed criminals shook you down for $100 a day?
What you are describing is a tax. A tax is generally understood to reduce an activity which is why cigarettes etc are highly taxed. Not sure this is making the argument you think it is. In fact you are describing a system where the cartel disincentives this behavior, by making it less profitable.
>Being robbed by the government is more palatable to tourists.
Hard disagree with this one.
Absolutely correct and totally irrelevant to the original point, which was that the administrative overhead for the cartel is vanishingly small.
>Hard disagree
It was palatable enough for you to travel to Mexico.
This is purely a matter of opinion but being told I have to worry about the cartels and the police is a bigger pill to swallow than just worrying about the cartels. The fact I personally was willing to go doesn't indicate I find being robbed in uniform more palatable.
In any case, you're telling me I "need" this or that to disagree with a mere opinion about "palate", which is just insane. An opinion cannot be proved, I think you know this, and I don't see you offering some kind of poll that samples tourists about who they'd rather be robbed by or whatever you may be looking for either so I will disengage now.
>That and the cartel can just straight up roll up with guns and take all your shit, why wouldn't they just do that if they wanted your money?
...and I gave you this answer (paraphrased)...
>Because it's easier to get the cops to do it for them.
Looks like we're done here.
In other words, do you think it's possible that the cartels are responsible for the shitty police behaviour in the rest of Mexico?
In US I find gang-active areas there is far less police hassling as they are focused on either severe crimes or just fucking off doing nothing. I've lived in several semi-dangerous cities and police do not enforce traffic laws (like at all) as they have bigger fish to fry. Your odds of getting shook down are practically zero. Whereas in bumfuck US you get pulled over all the time for practically nothing, "civil asset forfeiture" (aka shakedown) cuz a dog looked at you wrong etc. I will admit my basis for comparison is a bit different though as I don't worry at all going into even the most dangerous parts of US because here I can legally have a gun, in Mexico all I can do is run.
I suspect based on my other Norte Americano experiences the police in Mexico would be even worse without the cartels, but I'm not sure.
We are all impoverished by corruption, even in areas outside of where we live.
The only "bad" experience I had was after a music festival in Pula, Croatia, some guy tried to mug me. But he did a terrible job at it. I told him "no", held my ground in a defensive stance, and he backed off. Then I went to the nearest bar, told the bouncer there, and he let me chill in there for a while to calm down.
I've heard Albania is of a similar vibe as to these countries, but with less English speakers.
Contrary to others, I had a terrible time in Greece. I was roofied and mugged in Rhodes, had a bad encounter with the cops in Greece, and everyone was just rude.
That... is far from true. Even ex-YU countries you listed, which share lots of semi-recent history, are very different among themselves, but Albania is a whole new world altogether.
Rhodes is pretty, I've been there, but it's gone to tourism and like so many other Greek islands, it's not a place to enjoy, just a place where "you'll get your ass grabbed" (local expression to mean "being taken advantage of").
I wouldn't have expected a tourist to be mugged, at that, normally people will take your money in non-violent ways. But I've been away from Greece for a long while and I guess things change.
Anyway, sorry. I'm currently abroad, in the UK, where I've immigrated. It makes me sad that when I hear Greece being discussed it's always something awful like your experience :(
I will definitely give it another try. The beauty of Greece is undeniable
Safety-wise, it felt like ex-Soviet countries did in the early 90s: generally safe but there were lots of gang activity, so you did not want to cross the wrong person. Everyone knew someone who was involved in criminal activity.
In smaller villages, going out to bars in the evening meant that the local tough guys would necessarily stare at us foreigners. There was a general "Americans are not welcome here" feeling in the air (and also in the things kids would shout at us), but it wasn't a big deal. Groceries were dirt cheap, the people - poor. I saw foreign police cars conducting a raid in Albanian villages to catch criminals.
In touristy places, like Saranda, I felt the most safe, even if my friend was pointing out all the bars, restaurants and clubs presumably owned by the mafia.
I had no bad incidents in Albania, only a great time, though my friend handled most interactions with other people. I would not go back without someone local. That's just my preference, I do have friends (non-Albanian) who go regularly on vacation to Albania by themselves.
I'm Greek and, unfortunately, my racist, xenophobic country never welcomed our closest neighbours (and more than just neighbours; half of the Greeks are at least half Albanian, from the time of the Ottoman occupation when we were all one, big, happy jurisdiction, under the Sultan :spits:). In the nineties it seems the word "alvanos" ("Albanian") was an insult, in Greece.
Anyway, Albanians are ordinary people. They won't eat you. Here's a web page that describes some basic greetings in Albanian:
https://ling-app.com/sq/greetings-in-albanian/
Oh, btw, fuck Suella Braverman.
HOWEVER, what Greece would have done differently if they found such cameras: - They would not remove them directly - Instead, they would chase the signal down to the roots and see who is behind