I feel like Singapore is also largely a country for the rich, perhaps just larger -- they import something like 30-40% of their workers as migrant workers.
Singapore is super modern futuristic place, while Monaco is just a tiny city with no infrastructure, but a dock for yachts, casinos, restaurants and some mountains. I don’t know much about Monaco (visited once), but it feels like a place to invent some laws and install money laundering schemes, or tax evasion, or whatever else similar. Singapore on the other hand feels like super futuristic utopian dream city. I lived shortly there, but not long enough to dive into local culture and meet many people. While I would like to come visit Singapore again and again, I see no point in visiting Monaco ever again, for me it’s just beyond boring.
I think if you find money laundering and tax evasion schemes to be scummy you might want to look closer at the migrant work force that helped build that utopian dream city and ask important questions like:
* How do they afford such an expensive city?
* Where do they go when the work is done?
* Why don't they get the same rights as citizens?
* If the city needs them so badly and has such a hard time finding work, why aren't they allowing migrants a more permanent residency that isn't tied to a specific company?
* Why are companies and the government restricting migrant movement?
* Why do companies (sometimes) charge their migrant workers for the right to work?
* Why do companies (sometimes) withhold the passports of their workers?
* Why does the government punish overstaying a visa with caning?
I think there are a lot of parallels to western wealth disparity but there's still a lot of grossness to the systemic human labor trafficking that is the backbone of the country.
