For the vast majority of people who already live in the United States of America and a big percentage of people who dream of moving to the U.S., the overall perception and the reality of life in the U.S. are two very different things.

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The ‘American dream’ does exist for a very small percentage of the country’s population however, for 97% of the population, when it comes to believing in the ‘American dream’, as the famous U.S. comedian George Carlin used to say: “You have to be asleep to believe in it!”

For the past decade, we have helped hundreds of clients from the U.S. to invest in hundreds of properties here in Costa Rica and assisted them in practically every aspect of moving to Costa Rica.

We have recommended trusted attorneys, immigration experts to help them obtain their residency, we’ve helped them to find the best schools for their children and the most qualified and experienced doctors for their aging parents.

It’s in our best interest to ensure that your investment in Costa Rica real estate is a profitable one and, that your new life is a happy one. After all you could become one of our neighbours – we have many ‘Gringos’ living in the same condominium where we live – and we all want happy neighbours, right?

It’s difficult to compare the world’s superpower which has a population of 320,000,000+ people with a tiny little country in Central America called Costa Rica which barely has a population of 5,000,000 but, it’s certainly a land full of stunning scenery, sunshine and smiles and when I think about my happiness and the safety and security of the people I love around me, there is not doubt in my mind that we are happiest living in Costa Rica.

Real life is very different from what Hollywood will have you believe and if you are considering investing your hard earned money in real estate in the U.S. and perhaps trying to decide if it’s a place where you might enjoy living with your family, I would encourage you to examine the information below before making your decision.

I am British and have lived in ten different countries and have lived in Costa Rica since 1999 but having also lived in the U.S. when I worked on Wall Street between 1985 – 1996, I can tell you for a fact that the United States of America that existed during that time no longer exists.

Let’s take a look at the current state of affairs in the U.S. and you can decide whether the U.S. is the best place for you or, perhaps like me, you will decide that you will be more free and far happier living in Costa Rica than you would be in the United Police States of America!

  1. While Costa Rica is ranked #1 in the Happy Planet Index, the U.S. is not included in the top ten. The U.S. may appear to be a ‘rich’ country where ‘freedom and democracy’ reigns but as any intelligent person will tell you who has visited recently, the people living there are not happy, with the largest total prison population of any nation they can’t consider themselves free anymore and “it has taken a turn down elitist lane and become a country led by a small dominant class comprised of powerful members who exert total control over the general population — an oligarchy,” says a new study jointly conducted by Princeton and Northwestern universities.
  2. In fact, the United States is ranked 21st worldwide in personal freedom. They are not #1 when it comes to personal freedom, they’re not even close — so says a new international ranking from the Legatum Institute in London. No less than 20 other nations ranked ahead of America in regards to personal freedom, which is calculated based on protections of civil rights and civil liberties. This ranking has dropped significantly in recent years; the U.S. was in ninth place just four years ago.
  3. If you plan on having your babies in the U.S.A., you might want to read more about how bad the U.S. infant mortality rates are: “In the United States, 6.1 infants die per every 1,000 live births, more than double the rates of Finland, Japan, Portugal, Sweden, the Czech Republic and Norway.”

  4. Should you have children in the U.S. you should expect them to have 49 doses of 14 vaccines before the age of 6 and 69 doses of 16 vaccines before the age of 18. Even though 22 medical studies show possible connections to vaccines and autism and some of the ingredients in these vaccines have been proven to be extremely dangerous to your child’s health, they have still not been removed and, you know that you can not sue the drug companies when a company’s vaccine kills a child, right?
  5. If you don’t believe that vaccines are good for your baby and refuse to allow them to vaccinate your child, “Child Protective Services” may kidnap your young child and as you can probably surmise, kidnapping children is an ultimate act of evil by a rogue police state
  6. The prevalence of obesity in children in the U.S.A more than tripled from 1971 to 2011. Childhood obesity is now the biggest health concern among parents in the United States, topping drug abuse and smoking. So unless you plan on keeping your kids locked up all day long and don’t allow them to eat with friends, when your children grow up in the U.S. you can expect your child to become unhealthily obese.
  7. It’s difficult to believe but did you know that while 1 in 4 children in America grow up without learning how to read, the literacy rate in Costa Rica is 97.9%?

  8. Roughly 70% of Americans are taking a prescription drug which is most definitely a symptom of a sick society. When you evaluate the health care system, it’s important to note the “U.S. has most expensive, least effective health care system when compared with 10 other western, industrialized nations.” Costa Rica provides universal health care to its citizens and permanent residents. Costa Rica offers some of the best health care in Latin America.
  9. We all want the best for our children and that includes a good education so it’s important to note that the average debt load for the class of 2012 was $29,400 and that’s for a basic education. If your child dreams of becoming a Doctor, for the class of 2012, the median education debt for new Doctors was $170,000.
  10. Costa Rica education system is ranked 20th in the “Global competitiveness Report 2013-14”, and is described as of “high quality”. The University of Costa Rica is the oldest, largest, and most prestigious institution of higher learning in Costa Rica. It is also the most important research university in the country, and Central America and would cost you much less than $1,000 per year.
  11. In the U.S. total student loan debt has risen by 275 percent since 2003 and now exceeds a trillion dollars, and it is now the second largest category of consumer debt after home mortgages.

  12. Using data sourced from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), the study determined that members of the average American household collectively watched more than eight hours of TV per day in 2011. That’s almost twice as many as Hungary, the OECD’s second most avid consumer.
  13. Contrary to the popular belief that everybody makes big money in the U.S. did you know that 39 percent of American workers made less than $20,000 last year? 52 percent of American workers made less than $30,000 last year, 63 percent of American workers made less than $40,000 last year and 72 percent of American workers made less than $50,000 last year. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 49 percent of all Americans now live in a home that receives money from the government each month. This is completely and totally unsustainable, but our long-term economic problems just keep getting worse.
  14. There is a certain amount of discrimination against blacks and Hispanics in the U.S. “There is a general belief among Americans that we’re the land of opportunity and that anyone can pull themselves up by their bootstraps,” Christensen said. “It is a land of opportunity, but that opportunity is not always equally accessible.” This of course does not happen Costa Rica.

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  15. While President Obama is now more famous for bombing innocent civilians at wedding parties and killing thousands of others with drone strikes since 2001 than he is for winning a Nobel ‘Peace’ Prize, Costa Rica’s former President Oscar Arias was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace in October 1987 in recognition of his efforts to achieve the beginnings of real peace in the region.
  16. As of September 2013, the U.S. has 4,804 nuclear warheads including tactical, strategic, and non-deployed weapons and while the U.S. spent $682 billion in ‘defense’ in 2012 which is more than the combined military spending of China, Russia, the United Kingdom, Japan, France, Saudi Arabia, India, Germany, Italy and Brazil, Costa Rica has no army, no navy, no air force and no nuclear weapons.

  17. The U.S, has Special Forces operating in over 100 countries and while the U.S. Army’s School of Americas (SOA), started in 1946, trained mass murderers and orchestrated coups in Peru, Panama, Argentina, Ecuador, Bolivia, Guatemala, El Salvador, and Mexico, Costa Rica has no special forces, no army, no navy, no air force and no nuclear weapons.
  18. And it would appear that the “war on terror” has come home and it’s wreaking havoc on innocent American lives. The culprit is the militarization of the police. In the Obama era, “police departments have received tens of thousands of machine guns; nearly 200,000 ammunition magazines; thousands of pieces of camouflage and night-vision equipment; and hundreds of silencers, armored cars and aircraft.” The result is that police agencies around the nation possess military-grade equipment, turning officers who are supposed to fight crime and protect communities into what look like invading forces from an army. And military-style police raids have increased in recent years, with one count putting the number at 80,000 such raids last year.

  19. While police officers in the U.S. have killed more U.S. citizens (nearly have 5,000) than have died in the Iraq ‘war’, in the 14 years I have lived in Costa Rica, I can not recall one single incident where an innocent civilian has been shot to death by a Costa Rican police officer.

  20. What does this mean? When we analyze the criminal justice system, gun violence, education, inequality, the infrastructure in the U.S. the “society lags behind the rest of the developed world.” In some instances, the U.S.’s performance is downright abysmal, far below foreign countries that are snidely looked-down-upon as “third world.”
  21. In looking at the future, what do we see? According to public pension plans’ own estimates, the total amount of unfunded public pension liabilities in the United States is nearly $1 trillion. We have numerous situations in the U.S.A. where the number of employees in an organization are much smaller than the number of retired people that are being supported by that organization. For example, did you know that both New York City and Chicago have more cops collecting pensions than active cops on the street?

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  22. “In a few years CalPERS (the California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) for more than 1.6 million California public employees, retirees, and their families” – the nation’s largest pension fund for government workers) retirees are expected to outnumber active workers, a national trend among public pension funds that makes them more vulnerable to big employer rate increases.”
  23. America’s constant trillion dollar wars, it’s insane, no-questions-asked economic support for the racist and genocidal Israeli rogue state, it’s militarization of it’s police forces is costing a fortune and with $17 trillion+ in outstanding debt, this is clearly unsustainable. In an effort to combat this, no doubt taxes of every kind (except corporate taxes of course) will have to be raised dramatically and the cost of living anywhere in the U.S. will increase dramatically.

    24. History shows us that desperate governments take desperate measures and they try to prepare for the devastating consequences of their actions.

  24. Numerous cities and municipalities are facing bankruptcy, millions of hard-working people in the U.S. will not have the money they thought they were going to have for their retirement and within the next ten years we will see starving people in the streets of the United States of America and I believe we will see massive and probably very bloody civil unrest!

  25. The I.R.S. is seizing accounts without ever filing a criminal complaint! “Using a law designed to catch drug traffickers, racketeers and terrorists by tracking their cash, the government has gone after run-of-the-mill business owners and wage earners without so much as an allegation that they have committed serious crimes. The government can take the money and the owners are left to prove they are innocent. Many give up.” In fact, the “US Attorney for the Eastern District of New York Loretta Lynch, recently announced that her office seized over $904 million in asset forfeitures in 2013 alone.”
  26. Speaking of the “the devastating consequences of their actions,” here’s why anybody thinking of moving to the U.S. should be very seriously concerned about their future… According to Forbes magazine:“It confirmed that the Department of Homeland Security has issued an open purchase order for 1.6 billion rounds of ammunition. As reported elsewhere, some of this purchase order is for hollow-point rounds, forbidden by international law for use in war, along with a frightening amount specialized for snipers. Also reported elsewhere, at the height of the Iraq War the Army was expending less than 6 million rounds a month. Therefore 1.6 billion rounds would be enough to sustain a hot war for 20+ years. In America.”

Please think carefully about that for a few minutes!

Why would anyone want to live in a country where the government is clearly and openly arming itself with ammunition that is “forbidden by international law for use in war” to be used against it’s own ‘homeland’ civilian population?

The United Police States of America is now a failed state and they know it, it is rapidly deteriorating in every possible way and speaking personally? I would not live in the U.S. if you gave me $1,000,000 per year tax-free!

Costa Rica is not perfect – every country has it’s problems – but it’s been perfect for me, my wife and our family since 1999. I feel happier, more free and content than I ever did in the ten years I lived in the U.S. and hopefully that will continue.

Before you invest in real estate in the U.S., I would strongly encourage you to come visit us here first in Santa Ana, Costa Rica, stay for a few months, meet a few of your countrymen and see how you like this little country full of stunning scenery, sunshine and smiles.

What’s the worst thing that could happen to you?

You’ve spent a few enjoyable months and had a great life experience.

On the other hand, moving back to a country where the government is arming itself heavily against it’s own population could have more serious and very negative consequences for you and your family!

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Written by Scott Oliver, author of 1: How To Buy Costa Rica Real Estate Without Losing Your Camisa, 2: Costa Rica’s Guide To Making Money Offshore and 3. ¿Cómo Comprar Bienes Raíces en Costa Rica, Sin Perder Su Camisa?

Scott Oliver's Four Books

Scott Oliver’s Four Books.

PS. Did I mention that Costa Rica has no special forces, no army, no navy, no air force and no nuclear weapons?

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