Living in the Dominican Republic

The Dominican Republic runs on tourism, and that is where an arriving worker is most likely to find a foothold. Pay sits on the low side, and although tax barely touches it, everyday costs climb toward the middle, so a salary tends to be spent about as fast as it comes in. English opens some of the visitor-facing work, but the wider job market still turns on local contacts, and getting hired cold takes time.

The Dominican Republic's diaspora has one overwhelming center of gravity: of its 1.9M emigrants, 1.5M live in the United States, dwarfing the next destinations of Spain and Italy. That diaspora has grown 32% over the past decade. The country is also a destination in its own right, drawing 729.2K foreign-born residents — more than half of them from neighboring Haiti.