Why Araby live well

The future in the middle of the desert

All about UAE country

The life of indigenous people of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) is like a fairy tale. Residents of Abu Dhabi of venerable age still remember how in the early 1960s the luxurious city today was a poor fishing village. And their main food for years in childhood was fish caught in the Persian Gulf, which had to be eaten until it spoiled in the wild heat. Dubai lived better, because it was one of the major ports of the Persian Gulf, but also did not differ in wealth. The oil found here, whose exports in 1980 amounted to 73 percent of the Federation's GDP of seven small but proud absolute monarchies, changed everything.

Usually the story of a country begins with the economy, but the UAE is a special case. Social policy here is impressive even in comparison with the rest of the neighboring countries of the Emirates, which have rapidly become rich due to oil and gas.

At marriage, a young family of UAE citizens gets a cottage, a land plot and a state subsidy of about $20,000 from the state. Higher education and medical care is free, including university studies, a scholarship and treatment in clinics abroad. By the way, in the country itself, medicine is at a very high level.

According to the UAE Constitution, a woman can receive education and work on a par with a man. Property issues during divorce are solved simply: they are prescribed in the prenuptial contract, which is signed by almost all marriages in the country.

But, in contrast to Western legal practice, children are usually left with men during divorce. Even if both spouses are native to the UAE. A foreign wife has very little chance of staying after she divorces her children.

The average salary is about $4,000 a month, and this is given that indigenous residents of the Emirates do not like to get stuck at work, preferring public service, where jobs are specially created for them. It is possible to retire after 20 years of work experience. But access to it is granted after reaching the age of 55 years for men and 50 years for women. Salaries and pensions cannot be received at the same time. Someone chooses the salary, and someone the pension. Its minimum basic size - $2780 per month. And every year after reaching 20 years of service increases the pension by 2%.

The cost of utility services is 90% covered by state subsidies. At the same time, with income comparable to the richest European countries, prices are quite sparing - for example, a liter of milk or a dozen eggs cost $1.5.

More than 80% of the labor force in the Emirates are foreigners. Out of more than 9 million people living in the Emirates, only 1.74 million are citizens of the UAE. At the same time 2.9 million Indians, 1.1 million Pakistanis, 1.1 million people from Bangladesh, hundreds of thousands of Egyptians, Filipinos, Iranians, Jordanians, etc. live and work in the country.

Visitors from Asia usually work in the field of services and construction, from the United States and Europe - in managerial positions. And very well paid: more than $10 thousand per month, where the cost of accommodation and transportation is borne by a hired foreigner company. Asian workers receive much less. Thus, 70% of expats have a salary of about $800 per month - almost a penny compared to the abovementioned figures, but their wages are very good at home. Unlike Western countries, there are no naturalization programs in the UAE. I have worked through the term of my contract - we ask you to go home.

The skeptic, of course, may ask - what will these emirates, who are used to living in the oil heaven, do when the oil runs out? And they will be shamed, because Emirates have been preparing for it for a long time and seriously. In the UAE as a whole, the money from oil sales now accounts for only 29% of total revenues, while in the Emirate of Dubai it is 6%. And this has been done due to a well-thought-out diversification of the economy.

It would seem, for example, why would a city with a population of 2.7 million people need the world's tallest skyscraper Burj Khalifa with its 828 meters from the ground to the top of the spire, hotels, offices, apartments and restaurants, for the construction of which $1.5 billion was spent? But, firstly, it already brings income, and not only through rent (for example, an Indian billionaire B.R. Shetty bought the whole hundredth floor for his three apartments), and secondly, it is a bait for tourists.

The same can be said about one of the highest, luxurious and expensive hotels in the world, Dubai Burj al-Arab. The cheapest room in it costs from $1000 per day, and the most expensive - $28 thousand.

Why all this "most, most, most"? And then that otherwise more than 20 million tourists a year, leaving billions of dollars here, would not come to the former outpost town in the desert today. At the same time, hotels are only part of the infrastructure. The World's artificial archipelago, consisting of embankment islands, repeating the shape of the continents, also impresses visitors to the country.

This is not the whole list of what the UAE does to create a confident future for several generations ahead. Even the desert can become a comfortable place to live if resources are used wisely. Dubai and Abu Dhabi are the best examples of this.