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Thank you for such kind and generous gesture. Sadly, with how things are with the courier and customs dep. here they can charge 30-40% of orignal price to rece

Thank you for such kind and generous gesture. Sadly, with how things are with the courier and customs dep. here they can charge 30-40% of orignal price to receive electronic items Fortunately, I have managed to get few python freelance gigs here and there and in a few months, I may be able to afford one.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
MontyCarloHall 5y ago
> they can charge 30-40% of orignal price to receive electronic items Ouch. Hanlon’s razor aside, it’s almost as if the government is intentionally preventing the economy from modernizing. Really sad that some bureaucrats couldn’t see the huge long term gains of a more technology-oriented economy, and instead could only focus on whatever marginal short term revenue these tariffs generated.
- atatatat 5y ago
  Could go the opposite way and welcome everyone and everything in, and have situations like your ports being bought by China, as is happening in African nations.
  - MontyCarloHall 5y ago
    AFAIK, China has invested considerably in controlling African port infrastructure and operations, not trade policy in the abstract. While owning a port often implies direct control over what goes through it, the converse is not true: a government can still control its own port infrastructure while being completely laissez-faire about what goes through it.
    - mtnGoat 5y ago
      They are building the ports to control the policy, it ain’t altruistic. China owned port can be shut down on a whim, thus giving its owner political power because closing the port would effect the nations livelihood via exports/imports.
    - kyawzazaw 5y ago
      They do in a proxy way control the policy. Often times, it is not just port infrastructure. Also manufacturing, agriculture and mining.
- mongodude 5y ago
  This is the problem in many emerging economies in SE Asia. Just because many people are struggling to arrange their daily meals, Governments get into socialist mode and taxes anything which does not classify as bare necessity. Sadly, it is a vicious loop and these economies are not modernizing enough at a rapid pace despite so much talent waiting for an opportunity.
  - z3t4 5y ago
    If the tax money is spent on education, healthcare, and infrastructure such as communication/fiber and water, then it will only take one generation to go from: poor - have to work in order to eat, to poor - but have free time to learn coding without starving, then after 3 generations you might have gone to an information society without going through the industrial age. Unless other countries suck out all the bright minds.
    - andi999 5y ago
      Or you do it like Singapore a bit faster.
  - co_pilates 5y ago
    That's not socialist, socialists tax in order to provide services and security for the people, what you describe is just greed and graft.
  - tauwauwau 5y ago
    I agree with everything you said but your usage of "Just Because" for daily meals doesn't feel right.
- eigenvector 5y ago
  Red tape is definitely an issue, but freight costs to Nepal are also extremely high. It's a landlocked country with very poor transportation networks. Air courier (eg DHL) to Kathmandu is in the range of $5/kg, and if the final destination is in a village it needs to be hand-carried there. So accessing cheap stuff from abroad is much harder than we might think coming from developed countries. There is no such thing as slapping on a FedEx label right to the final destination.
  - fridif 5y ago
    So the freight cost to send someone a laptop is under $25? That seems reasonable if of course the person is living in Kathmandu... The government tax on electronics is not good though. I'd have to paypal them extra money to cover it, if paypal is even a thing for them.
scoopertrooper 5y ago
I'm weird, your comment got me interested in Nepalese custom duties. I had a read through and it looks like notebooks do not incur import duties in Nepal! > Automatic data processing machines and units thereof; magnetic or optical readers, machines for transcribing data on to data media in coded form and machines for processing such data, not elsewhere specified or included. -Portable automatic data processing machines, weighing not more than 10 kg, consisting of at least a central processing unit, a keyboard and a display: 8471.30.10 ---Notebook and Laptop > Import Duty (% except otherwise specified) > SAARC: Free > GENERAL: Free https://customs.gov.np/storage/files/1/Custom%20Tariff/Customs%20Tariff%20%202077%20(2020-21)%20Eng.pdf https://customs.gov.np/storage/files/1/Custom%20Tariff/Custo... You're welcome.
- afavour 5y ago
  What the law specifies is not always the lived reality.
- davidjytang 5y ago
  My experience with China customs is that if custom officer feels like taxing you 15%/25%/45% on this particular day, they will find a way to tax you. Unless.
- kyawzazaw 5y ago
  If the officer feels like doing that, they will. That's sadly the case in many countries.
  - jeofken 5y ago
    Was the case for me when I flew back to Germany with my music instruments. They would not listen to any reason but forced me to pay to get the instruments that are my property back. Thieves.
- pera 5y ago
  In Argentina you have to pay 50% of the market value for all electronic imports and you will have to deal with customs officers (who will usually try to make your day quite miserable if you don't "tip" em)
rckoepke 5y ago
I'd like to help more; Could you email me at koepke@gmail.com whenever you have free time and energy?
bmsleight_ 5y ago
FedEx are very good, the sender can choose to pay all the charges.
- cute_boi 5y ago
  Nope. In 2016 I tried fedex and told my friends to send old macbook. In insurance he had written the purchase price. And I had to pay all the taxes. And it was 40% tax. Customs officers are thieves here. And fedex did nothing. I supposed the would deliver to my home. But they made me run for 2-3 days and told me to go to customs and claim my items.
908B64B197 5y ago
> Sadly, with how things are with the courier and customs dep. here they can charge 30-40% of orignal price to receive electronic items Something I never really understood, when going to less developed countries, why are customs always trying to fleece everyone? Normalized bribes, byzantine bureaucracy, astronomical import duties on computers and essential products. What's the goal with this? Is there some kind of long term strategy I'm not seeing? Do they not want investments or a tech sector? The unemployment and brain drain these countries suffer sure paints a bleak picture.
- krrrh 5y ago
  I don’t know about Nepal, but traditionally places like Brazil pursued “import substitution” strategies of charging high tariffs on technology products to try to establish home-grown industries, and pursue autarky (self-sufficiency). It’s an insane thing to do since the benefits to consumers and business users of these products is many times higher than the money made by the industries producing them. To a lesser extent the same pattern emerges in dirigiste-curious economies like Canada who limit foreign entrants into markets like telecom, resulting in a general tax on the entire population who suffer expensive and inadequate data plans in order to protect local oligopolies.
  - foolinaround 5y ago
    > the benefits to consumers and business users of these products is many times higher than the money made by the industries producing them the money made by the industries producing them is tangible, and there are lobbies protecting it, whereas the benefits to customers are intangible. If you think about it, it is not the insane thing, in fact, given the system, it is the sane rational thing that benefits these actors.
  - 908B64B197 5y ago
    > To a lesser extent the same pattern emerges in dirigiste-curious economies like Canada who limit foreign entrants into markets like telecom, resulting in a general tax on the entire population who suffer expensive and inadequate data plans in order to protect local oligopolies. That's something I never understood either. Telecom is a commodity. I also think that's what hurt Blackberry back when it was still relevant: They were developing these phones in an environment where the carrier had all powers and where data was so limited. I remember them being incredibly skeptical at the iPhone because Apple was expecting data to become cheap and plentiful.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

MontyCarloHall 5y ago

> they can charge 30-40% of orignal price to receive electronic items Ouch. Hanlon’s razor aside, it’s almost as if the government is intentionally preventing the economy from modernizing. Really sad that some bureaucrats couldn’t see the huge long term gains of a more technology-oriented economy, and instead could only focus on whatever marginal short term revenue these tariffs generated.

atatatat 5y ago
Could go the opposite way and welcome everyone and everything in, and have situations like your ports being bought by China, as is happening in African nations.
- MontyCarloHall 5y ago
  AFAIK, China has invested considerably in controlling African port infrastructure and operations, not trade policy in the abstract. While owning a port often implies direct control over what goes through it, the converse is not true: a government can still control its own port infrastructure while being completely laissez-faire about what goes through it.
  - mtnGoat 5y ago
    They are building the ports to control the policy, it ain’t altruistic. China owned port can be shut down on a whim, thus giving its owner political power because closing the port would effect the nations livelihood via exports/imports.
  - kyawzazaw 5y ago
    They do in a proxy way control the policy. Often times, it is not just port infrastructure. Also manufacturing, agriculture and mining.
mongodude 5y ago
This is the problem in many emerging economies in SE Asia. Just because many people are struggling to arrange their daily meals, Governments get into socialist mode and taxes anything which does not classify as bare necessity. Sadly, it is a vicious loop and these economies are not modernizing enough at a rapid pace despite so much talent waiting for an opportunity.
- z3t4 5y ago
  If the tax money is spent on education, healthcare, and infrastructure such as communication/fiber and water, then it will only take one generation to go from: poor - have to work in order to eat, to poor - but have free time to learn coding without starving, then after 3 generations you might have gone to an information society without going through the industrial age. Unless other countries suck out all the bright minds.
  - andi999 5y ago
    Or you do it like Singapore a bit faster.
- co_pilates 5y ago
  That's not socialist, socialists tax in order to provide services and security for the people, what you describe is just greed and graft.
- tauwauwau 5y ago
  I agree with everything you said but your usage of "Just Because" for daily meals doesn't feel right.
eigenvector 5y ago
Red tape is definitely an issue, but freight costs to Nepal are also extremely high. It's a landlocked country with very poor transportation networks. Air courier (eg DHL) to Kathmandu is in the range of $5/kg, and if the final destination is in a village it needs to be hand-carried there. So accessing cheap stuff from abroad is much harder than we might think coming from developed countries. There is no such thing as slapping on a FedEx label right to the final destination.
- fridif 5y ago
  So the freight cost to send someone a laptop is under $25? That seems reasonable if of course the person is living in Kathmandu... The government tax on electronics is not good though. I'd have to paypal them extra money to cover it, if paypal is even a thing for them.

scoopertrooper 5y ago

I'm weird, your comment got me interested in Nepalese custom duties. I had a read through and it looks like notebooks do not incur import duties in Nepal! > Automatic data processing machines and units thereof; magnetic or optical readers, machines for transcribing data on to data media in coded form and machines for processing such data, not elsewhere specified or included. -Portable automatic data processing machines, weighing not more than 10 kg, consisting of at least a central processing unit, a keyboard and a display: 8471.30.10 ---Notebook and Laptop > Import Duty (% except otherwise specified) > SAARC: Free > GENERAL: Free https://customs.gov.np/storage/files/1/Custom%20Tariff/Customs%20Tariff%20%202077%20(2020-21)%20Eng.pdf https://customs.gov.np/storage/files/1/Custom%20Tariff/Custo... You're welcome.

afavour 5y ago
What the law specifies is not always the lived reality.
davidjytang 5y ago
My experience with China customs is that if custom officer feels like taxing you 15%/25%/45% on this particular day, they will find a way to tax you. Unless.
kyawzazaw 5y ago
If the officer feels like doing that, they will. That's sadly the case in many countries.
- jeofken 5y ago
  Was the case for me when I flew back to Germany with my music instruments. They would not listen to any reason but forced me to pay to get the instruments that are my property back. Thieves.
pera 5y ago
In Argentina you have to pay 50% of the market value for all electronic imports and you will have to deal with customs officers (who will usually try to make your day quite miserable if you don't "tip" em)

rckoepke 5y ago

I'd like to help more; Could you email me at koepke@gmail.com whenever you have free time and energy?

bmsleight_ 5y ago

FedEx are very good, the sender can choose to pay all the charges.

cute_boi 5y ago
Nope. In 2016 I tried fedex and told my friends to send old macbook. In insurance he had written the purchase price. And I had to pay all the taxes. And it was 40% tax. Customs officers are thieves here. And fedex did nothing. I supposed the would deliver to my home. But they made me run for 2-3 days and told me to go to customs and claim my items.

908B64B197 5y ago

> Sadly, with how things are with the courier and customs dep. here they can charge 30-40% of orignal price to receive electronic items Something I never really understood, when going to less developed countries, why are customs always trying to fleece everyone? Normalized bribes, byzantine bureaucracy, astronomical import duties on computers and essential products. What's the goal with this? Is there some kind of long term strategy I'm not seeing? Do they not want investments or a tech sector? The unemployment and brain drain these countries suffer sure paints a bleak picture.

krrrh 5y ago
I don’t know about Nepal, but traditionally places like Brazil pursued “import substitution” strategies of charging high tariffs on technology products to try to establish home-grown industries, and pursue autarky (self-sufficiency). It’s an insane thing to do since the benefits to consumers and business users of these products is many times higher than the money made by the industries producing them. To a lesser extent the same pattern emerges in dirigiste-curious economies like Canada who limit foreign entrants into markets like telecom, resulting in a general tax on the entire population who suffer expensive and inadequate data plans in order to protect local oligopolies.
- foolinaround 5y ago
  > the benefits to consumers and business users of these products is many times higher than the money made by the industries producing them the money made by the industries producing them is tangible, and there are lobbies protecting it, whereas the benefits to customers are intangible. If you think about it, it is not the insane thing, in fact, given the system, it is the sane rational thing that benefits these actors.
- 908B64B197 5y ago
  > To a lesser extent the same pattern emerges in dirigiste-curious economies like Canada who limit foreign entrants into markets like telecom, resulting in a general tax on the entire population who suffer expensive and inadequate data plans in order to protect local oligopolies. That's something I never understood either. Telecom is a commodity. I also think that's what hurt Blackberry back when it was still relevant: They were developing these phones in an environment where the carrier had all powers and where data was so limited. I remember them being incredibly skeptical at the iPhone because Apple was expecting data to become cheap and plentiful.