It's hard for me to compare the cost of living in Singapore vs (insert American city) because I've never lived there. I can only compare to Australia because I lived there for 5 years after leaving New Zealand.
There's a lot of things that are far cheaper in America, for example I can buy an SSD cheaper on Amazon shipped to Singapore, than buying it in Singapore. But then (having visited only a couple of times) I'm unaware of anywhere to get lunch for $4(sgd) in America.
Singapore can definitely be an expensive place to live. If you choose that sort of life-style. However your federal tax alone is more than my whole income tax. And if Sanders gets his way, that will go up even more. Coupled with State tax, I can only guess my disposable income is more in Singapore than it would be in America.
For example, lets say that USD/SGD was 1:1, with a yearly salary of $75,000. In America the federal tax alone is 17,666. (not including state tax)
In Singapore the income tax on that would be $2000, however every couple of years Singapore does 50% tax rebate up to the first $1000. So the effective tax for last year would have been $1000. Meaning your net income was $74,000 vs $57,334.
This doesn't include singapore's common "13th month" salary which is often an extra month of salary as bonus, usually to cover the cost of taxes as tax is not withheld here like it is in Australia / NZ.
That means you would get an extra $6200 (approx) on top of the 75k, making your net income more around $80,000
If you paid $500/m rent in the US that's $6k/yr, in singapore you pay say $1,300 or $13,000/yr
I don't fully understand how you do taxes in America, but based on my limited research from when I wanted to live in America, and just now, this is what I worked out. This isn't meant to be factual and proof of the cost of living between the two countries.
Edit: Also not a good idea if you're American to move to Singapore to work, since you get double taxed. Even all forms here in Singapore ask if you're American Tax Citizen.
Let's just run through this see what we can quickly glean.
The meals may be cheaper. What's that constitute a meal, though? Here, I can get a footlong sub and side items for $8-10. A restaurant meal, with tip, is going to be $10-15 per seat if it's an inexpensive one with one plate and a drink. What's the $2-3 USD you claimed get you?
For taxes, I try to stay in states with no state tax. So, it's just federal. We get various types of deducations that should be considered. I'm ignoring that to simplify to worst case. So, $75,000 is $5,156.25 + 25% of amount over $37,450. That's $14543.75 of tax. That leaves $60,456.25 of disposable income in an area with cost of living of $15,600 which leaves me with $44,856.25.
Note: Wait, are you paying $1,300 for your part of rent or is that the whole rent? If we're halving it for a roommate, I can drop a few hundred off mine to add a few thousand a year. That's still around $50,000/yr so not huge difference.
"This doesn't include singapore's common "13th month" salary which is often an extra month of salary as bonus, usually to cover the cost of taxes as tax is not withheld here like it is in Australia / NZ."
We do withholding here, too. Many withhold extra to cover for overtime as the IRS will come after our ass if we don't have the difference. People like the check they get during tax season, though. So, similar in practice to the bonus but with some differences.
"Also not a good idea if you're American to move to Singapore to work, since you get double taxed. Even all forms here in Singapore ask if you're American Tax Citizen."
That last part is due to all the tax avoidance and U.S. cracking down on it. We can't even open a bank account in some places like Switzerland. Plus, if we renounce citizenship over taxes, they claim taxes on 10 years of our income in the new country as punishment. Taxes are not among America's strong suit unless you're rich enough to avoid them with loopholes designed for the rich. :)
There's a lot of things that are far cheaper in America, for example I can buy an SSD cheaper on Amazon shipped to Singapore, than buying it in Singapore. But then (having visited only a couple of times) I'm unaware of anywhere to get lunch for $4(sgd) in America.
Singapore can definitely be an expensive place to live. If you choose that sort of life-style. However your federal tax alone is more than my whole income tax. And if Sanders gets his way, that will go up even more. Coupled with State tax, I can only guess my disposable income is more in Singapore than it would be in America.
For example, lets say that USD/SGD was 1:1, with a yearly salary of $75,000. In America the federal tax alone is 17,666. (not including state tax)
In Singapore the income tax on that would be $2000, however every couple of years Singapore does 50% tax rebate up to the first $1000. So the effective tax for last year would have been $1000. Meaning your net income was $74,000 vs $57,334.
This doesn't include singapore's common "13th month" salary which is often an extra month of salary as bonus, usually to cover the cost of taxes as tax is not withheld here like it is in Australia / NZ.
That means you would get an extra $6200 (approx) on top of the 75k, making your net income more around $80,000
If you paid $500/m rent in the US that's $6k/yr, in singapore you pay say $1,300 or $13,000/yr
So that leaves you with:
US: $51,334 SG: $67,000
https://smartasset.com/taxes/income-taxes
I don't fully understand how you do taxes in America, but based on my limited research from when I wanted to live in America, and just now, this is what I worked out. This isn't meant to be factual and proof of the cost of living between the two countries.
Edit: Also not a good idea if you're American to move to Singapore to work, since you get double taxed. Even all forms here in Singapore ask if you're American Tax Citizen.