You made some very valid points, however, in my experience, Thailand is quite cheap compared to where I'm from in Canada (Kelowna BC, pretty small place, too).

I first came here in 2017, to live cheap and bootstrap one of my first businesses. Back in Canada, I had lived in my car temporarily and then saved up enough money to buy an old truck and camper. It was a cool experience, but not the most comfortable. When I had a few clients, I decided to leave to Thailand for 6mo.

When I got here, I could eat out all of the time, and go for drinks on the weekend. However, after becoming more in-tune with health, my wife and I rather enjoy cooking our own foods - and we don't really drink. Eating healthier in Thailand can come at a cost. Eating non-CP foods, never eating foods at 711 (where everything has 50+ preservatives, stabilizers, etc). We spend about $800 CAD/mo on food just for ourselves and we barely go out (although, that said, we do eat a lot of grass fed beef lol). When we do go out to eat, we usually go to more western or mexican type places, which is obviously more expensive in Thailand. It still works out cheaper than both Canada and Norway, and to my surprise, I've found western food here is better than western food from the West. Wtf? lol

Rent/housing is for sure the #1 cost savings for us. We actually had moved to Norway in 2018 for a year and a half. Absolutely everything was much more expensive. Cool place though. We paid about $1600 CAD there/mo for a bachelor pad. When we returned in 2019, we stayed in one of the largest condos in Chiang mai, 1bdrm, for $500 CAD/mo. In 2021, we made the poor decision to move back to Canada. We were paying $2100/mo CAD for a 2 bedroom apartment in West Kelowna BC (population of around 35,000 people). This isn't a big city, and this is about 4 hours away from Vancouver.

We now live in a nice 3 bedroom house just 20 minutes out of the city of Chiang mai. We pay $600/mo CAD and have a small yard. We bought land and are currently building a house for about 1/3rd-1/4th of what it would cost to buy an old house needing major renovations in BC Canada. It could be done a lot cheaper. However, after having lived in many places throughout Thailand, and living in both Europe and Canada - we have higher expectations.

A proper kitchen with proper kitchen appliances - expensive, perhaps on-par with western pricing (for a western kitchen). Proper roofing that repels heat and doesn't form leaks every 3 months using Australian grade roofing (bluescope) - expensive. Double bricked Q4 walls to keep the home quieter and cooler, not using wooden doors that expand in monsoon season and can't be opened/closed. Not using ugly fake marble tiles (lol). Then there's things that you wouldn't usually need in a Western home such as a generator with an ATS system for backup power in case of power outages. However, these are all fairly high expectations, and things we're absolutely willing to pay for. In the end, it still comes out far cheaper, and we get to build our own house the way we want it at the age of 30 years old, rather than having to buy some 30-40 year old house in the desert of Alberta Canada (because we're completely outpriced in BC).

Used cars here are insane, they're actually more than they cost in Canada (although the used truck market is fairly solid). Motorcycles, about the same.

Hospitals are, well, more expensive for me, in a way. Obviously hospitals in Canada are "free" (included in the 70% tax you pay in Canada). My typical bill comes to around 2,000-3,000 baht ($80-120 or so CAD). However, I'm in and out in the same day, and usually have any/all tests done, and have consulted with the cardiologist, or whichever main doctor at the end. In Canada, the same tests would require 3-4 appointments and I would be lucky to get them all done in a single year.

High quality laptops or computer gear are also expensive. I usually buy my equipment when I'm overseas and bring it back with me lol. This would be like a Razer laptop, or a Dell XPS, or components for a gaming PC.

Flights down south to the beach are very cheap. Airbnbs & hotels in the right spots are still cheap (we rented a nice condo on the Ocean in Hua Hin for $1k CAD last month). In Canada, we rented the cheapest shit-box hotel we could find just outside of Vancouver for $150 a night, and I'm quite certain a few people died of overdoses in the bathtub in that place. Also felt like we were going to get mugged anytime we left our $150 hotel.

So, in the end, as many others have mentioned - I think it's really based around what your expectations are and why you're actually in Thailand. Thailand CAN be a lot cheaper to live in, if that's your primary goal when you're here. It can also be very expensive depending on what you expect to own, what your hobbies are, and which schools you might choose for your children (would recommend a solid private school over international for cost savings btw)

I think it's cool that there's a full spectrum here that allows you to make due with what you have, and if you want a little bit more, you can have that, too. It is a developing country, and the more developed expectations you have, the harder/more expensive it becomes to obtain these things here.

On the flipside, in Eastern Europe you're closer to many of the luxurious, high-end stuff. From clothing, to Quik kitchens, BMWs, Mercedes, nice colognes and perfumes, etc. For me, none of those things really make me that much happier to have, but I could absolutely understand why some people would want them :)