To put it by comparison: Monaco (the country) is a smaller than Central Park in NYC but their GDP per capita is around $256,000 while the USA it hovers at around $92,000. Like why does a European microstate that small have a higher GDP than a major super power? They don’t have income tax to be worried about (unless you are a French citizen).
Is it because everyone there is basically a millionaire or working in the tourism industry where their main clientele are basically elites who have left over cash? The country’s population is 38,500 (about half of San Clemente, CA) but even with a small population, do people in Monaco have a higher disposable income when you take it into account?
I haven’t been to Monaco but I visited Gibraltar couple of times. Gibraltar has GDP per capita of $111k so it’s also higher than USA. Couple of observations.
It’s not that nice. I mean there’s nothing wrong but it’s not full of luxury homes. It looks normal.
During one of my visits the power went out. Someone said it happens regularly. Looks like they don’t have great infrastructure.
A lot of Spanish people cross the border there to work in restaurants and such but LLanitos (residents of Gibraltar) also hold normal jobs like driving taxis. They are not all super rich. It looks like most people there are simply upper-middle class.
Where do they have money from? Online gambling licenses and tourism.
Funny story: I once tracked some online scam selling fake products online. The scam was promoted on websites in Poland. To get the product they where asking to send the money to a company registered in Gibraltar. I checked the address it was some shared office with bunch of different companies registered there. That’s another way they make money. They serve as a fiscal residence for shady businesses.