Yeah I don't think I disagree with much of what you said - just a misunderstanding. I'm saying there's more effective spending in Singapore vs NYC. The money in this city, it all disappears into some bottomless pit or is inefficiently spent like you said.

> 30% of a country's population being expat is tiny?

Do you count workers from poorer countries working in construction as expats? If so then yes they're expats, I was under the impression that expats only referred to highly paid workers contributing to the knowledge economy.

> The study you linked shows that it's high in areas with high housing prices. Again, caused by NIMBY's.

Totally in agreement - just confused because you said it's due to drugs when my understanding was it was due to home prices, and a lot of the people take up drugs on the streets.

Malaysia though? Man. That's another place with a stupendously large amount of money and a sad amount of poverty. It all disappears into a bottomless pit in Malaysia and people suffer.