I think the main difference is that (in my opinion) Croatia used to be unbeatable for the price/quality of life ratio, nowadays it's probably slightly overpriced, but depends on what you value.
It was also that way for the Germans who are accused of having benefited at the expense of others, when that was really more an effect of national scale, not all Germans individually. The Euro has had an odd distorting and perverting effect all across Europe; but it has always generally been excellent for the ruling and upper class that have gained access to an overflowing trough of other people’s money at the EU.
The Euro has been a kind of wealth transfer mechanism to the ruling, upper, and even foreign classes, just as it has been a tool to restore the aristocracy just as it had in the USA; the aristocracy gets the money, the people get the inflation and debt that fuels the fraud.
We shall see if it all goes off the rails and the people establish legitimate democratic rule, or if the authoritarian aristocracy can fully entrench itself again.
For example living in Split is cca 26% cheaper than Vienna.
https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/compare_cities.jsp?cou...
https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/compare_cities.jsp?cou...
https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/compare_cities.jsp?cou...
Again depends on what you value, some might find it worth, just saying the equation was much more in Croatia favor 5 years ago.
Split has great weather for much longer than Vienna, and people are almost certainly spending time there to be next to the sea, islands, etc. – of which Vienna has none.
But you can compare to cities in Italy, Spain, Greece, etc. the choice is nuanced and based on what you value. It used to be a clear win for Croatia a while back.
Not everyone cares about having access to the urban amenities that Vienna has. Split is also a pretty nice place, even off-season (I once lived there for 3 months February-April.)
That is why the costs of living between the two are not as disparate as you might expect.
For example 1 euro = 200.482 escudos, and when euro came we had stuff happening like 50 cents escudos becoming 50 cents in euro, I bet something similar has happened in Croatia.
Those 50 cents across coins are naturally not the same value, especially when the income wasn't suffered the same valuation across monetary systems.
What AI is doing very effectively is allowing tax authorities to identify digital nomads illegally working in jurisdictions without registering for tax.
This contrasts with, for example, Ireland, where not only does a digital nomad's income become subject to local tax on day 1, so does their company (if they are the beneficial owner).
Croatia's approach is excellent if you want many wealthy (compared to local standards) people to bring an influx of hard currency into your economy, at the cost of inflation. Eventually the benefits outweigh the costs and the government begins to subject digital nomads to local taxation and stricter visa rules.
That's by design of our employment laws. We are the ones whose social security system will have to pay up when the employer closes down shop or fires their remote employees over night, and we are the ones whose health system has to take care when people burn out from being overworked, so we demand that employers create a local subsidiary with people and bank accounts we can hold accountable when laws are being violated.
Oh, and we also want to make sure that people and companies pay their taxes.
Digital nomads make landlords and property owners richer so there's a high chance the system will be allowed indefinitely since a lot of Croatians are property owners so they directly or indirectly benefit from this gentrification.
The system will only be challenged in politics once enough young Croatian voters find themselves priced out of their own cities like in Barcelona or Lisbon.
Speaking as someone living in Austria ATM, that's the worst kind of industry you want to boost if you want more money in the community, as it only creates dead-end low wage unskilled jobs(often taken by seasonal immigrants who send that money home) and is rife with cash-driven tax evasion, leading to more wealth and income disparity. If you get more and richer tourists, you won't get better paid baristas or waiters with better pension plans, but wealthier business owners who will buy more properties and flashy cars while still hiring the cheapest most desperate labor possible from abroad.
As a government, you should do the opposite, focus on attracting or creating highly skilled innovation jobs (like NL or Sweden did) and the hospitality jobs will follow naturally.
There's a reason countries where the tourism industry is a big part of the GDP, are low income countries.
Unreal that you can't see the obvious logical flaw in this argument.
Outside of the direct coastal areas that already struggle with this issue from tourism, the brain drain that followed the 90s Independence War still left a sizable amount of empty real estate just sitting around.
And even in the direct coastal areas... a place to live is cheap. In doubt, just buy it, usually young people pool together some cash from relatives and some from bank loans to get started. Or they build it piece by piece, floor by floor, just like my grandparents did. Work a few years in a good job abroad, return to the homeland, build a house.
I've been working remote for 8 years now and it's never been easier and the amount of options worldwide is unreal.
‘There’s an arrogance to the way they move around the city’: is it time for digital nomads like me to leave Lisbon?
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jul/27/lisbon-portuga...
I know the guardian can be very hand wringy, but digital nomads are going to get swept up in the general anti-migration narrative that most populaces are now feeling. Anti-mass-migration in most populations, anti-tourist in Venice, anti-nomad in Portugal.
Locals are feeling betrayed by their politicians and foreigners are an easy target to point at and say "why is this happening". The Lisbon example is especially egregious, with the digital nomads being taxed less than locals. Locals are subsidizing their lifestyles.
Can you name one digital nomad visa that has been scrapped in the last year or two?
I can name a few dozen that have been implemented.
When I started in 2017 there was maybe 3 or 4 places you could move on Earth with a six figure USD salary as a remote worker, it was always a grey zone to go places on tourist visas but that's how people rolled and countries knew how good a deal it was for them compared to raising/educating/supporting locals so let it slide. There's over 70 legal valid options now for remote workers in 2025.
The easily proven evidence doesn't stack up with the narrative people and newspapers likes the Guardian are trying to push for clicks.
I personally couldn't care less if locals don't like me. My own countrymen are jealous about me having a good paying remote job too.
Also, many countries are "tightening down" their golden visa programs or removing them entirely. I have a friend who works for a golden visa consultancy, and they're already in the process of pivoting because of so many changes.
Assumed it was somewhere in that region because my European friends usually talk about it. Personally find it bizarre because the few thousand digital nomads are barely moving the needle compared to tourism or normal migration. It comes across as people getting very upset about a minor issue because they have rigid ideological views that prevent them from touching the main one. A convenient scapegoat but nothing will change in the slightest if the Portugese DN visa is scrapped.
You've created the easiest pathway to a EU passport and then wonder why the planet flocks there.
The simple solution here is to build enough housing to meet demand.
The only way a country should approach digital nomads is to charge them massive flat fees and change the law to allow local planners to zone them out of most accommodation.
So punish the people wanting to travel instead of the greed that leads to this?
In my experience, the local starbucks is crowded with tourists and their laptops (or tablets with keyboards), but these folks are not DNs, they are just waiting for their plane or airbnb to get ready.
Regarding property price and high rent, this discussion is pretty stupid. Every country wants richer-than-average people to come and pay taxes and/or spend their money. I often hear the bogus argument that DNs don't pay taxes which is bullshit, because even DNs pay taxes indirectly, as every amout they spend is someone elses taxable income (this includes rent). If they don't come, those incomes won't exist and no taxes be paid.
Most places in Europe bring in millions of poor immigrants, while some countries (most prominently spain) the people complain about rich immigrants...
And the tax thing is not a bogus argument. When people only pay taxes indirectly, they are tourists. Digital nomads pay _much_ less tax overall than other people, because people who pay income tax pay indirect taxes as well. If the digital nomads don't come, they also wouldn't raise rent and café prices for everyone around them. You come here, register yourself as a freelancer and pay income tax? You're very welcome in my book. But if you come to the country to leech off its cheap prices but don't pay income tax, you can go back where you came from.
We bring in millions of poor immigrants for various reasons: It's the human thing to do, these immigrants do cheap and hard labor that a lot of natives won't do (think construction, food delivery, etc.) and as such even provide benefits to us.
Digital Nomads mostly aren't immigrants. They come for a limited time, don't provide much to the local economy outside spending some money (and even then it's not that much because a lot of them come to cheap countries to live for cheap and save money) and then leave again. It's not really comparable.
So yeah, I'm sure it's possible to find remote work from Croatia, especially in Europe cause it's a bit less hassle to employ someone across borders between EU countries. But I do think the chances of finding even a remote job are higher if you're based in a country with plentiful employers.
toomuchtodo•3d ago