Kuwait or Taiwan
Two countries side by side across the same rows as the full comparison. A dash means the value is missing: fields are not filled with guesses. about the data
| Kuwait | Taiwan | |
|---|---|---|
| Salary in IT | — | — |
| Citizenship | — | — |
| Partner can work | — | — |
| Parents | — | — |
| Pets | difficult | no trouble |
| Pet limit | no limit | no limit |
| Quarantine | — | no |
| Residence permit fee | — | — |
| Rent, 2 bedrooms | $ 1 265 · estimate | $ 915 · estimate |
| Basket | $ 24,2 | $ 47,6 |
| Life expectancy | 84.58 | 80.8 |
| Homicides/100k | 0.78 | 0.61 |
| Natural hazards, 0–10 | 2.7 | — |
How the two sets of routes differ
Long-stay routes in this reference: Kuwait — 30, Taiwan — 154. Types present in both: work, study, family and investment. Taiwan adds: remote work, startup, talent, repatriation, retirement, job seeking and working holiday.
Fees, thresholds and deadlines
Kuwait: fees range from 1 to 200 KWD. Routes with no fee: 1. Routes stating an income threshold: 2; the lowest is 450 KWD a month. Taiwan: fees range from 100 to 4,200 TWD. Routes with no fee: 4. Routes stating an income threshold: 30; the lowest is 26,000 TWD a month. Routes with a published decision deadline: 75; the shortest is 3 days.
Beyond the first permit
Permanent status: Taiwan after 5 years; the other country publishes no term.
Kuwait in brief
Kuwait levies no income tax on wages (gov.uk, «Living in Kuwait») and its residence system is built entirely around a sponsor: a residence permit for work is issued under art. 18 of implementing decision No. 957/2019 (private sector) or art. 17 (public sector), and joining a supporter under art. 22. There is no permanent status under the new law either: the 1959 emiri decree was repealed by decree-law No. 114/2024, which knows only fixed-term permits — up to five years ordinary, up to ten for children of Kuwaiti women and property owners, up to fifteen for investors. The naturalisation rules could not be verified against the primary source: the relevant interior ministry site is protected by an anti-bot mechanism that blocked automated access throughout the research. Importing pets requires a permit from the responsible authority (Public Authority for Agriculture Affairs and Fish Resources), but the details of the procedure could not be confirmed through the official channels available in this pass. Of the measurable: one of the lowest homicide rates in the world (0.78 per 100,000, UNODC 2022), a high life expectancy (84.58 years, World Bank 2024) and some of the highest summer temperatures anywhere — a mean July temperature of 37.7 °C with heavy air pollution from desert dust (PM2.5 62.35 µg/m³, World Bank 2023). The country is effectively a single capital agglomeration: the official «cities» in this reference are governorates (Kuwait City, Hawalli, Al Ahmadi, Al Farwaniyah, Al Jahra), not separate destinations.
Taiwan in brief
Taiwan is one of the few destinations where the primary source is available in full and in official English translation: the Immigration Act sits in the Ministry of Justice's law database, and the animal import rules are laid out page by page on the quarantine agency's site. The structure is simple: the visa is only for entry, and it is the Alien Resident Certificate (ARC) that allows a person to live there — obtained within 30 days of arrival, valid for up to three years and renewable. Permanent residence is granted after five years of residence with 183 days in each of them. The fork that determines everything: workers in the categories Taiwanese law treats as unskilled labour are excluded from this system — neither the resident visa nor permanent residence is open to them, and their spouses cannot obtain a resident certificate. The spouse of a national reaches permanent residence not in five years but in ten. A rule worth knowing in advance: overstaying the card by less than 30 days can be fixed with a fine, but a whole year is then deducted from the qualifying period for permanent residence. Bringing animals is straightforward: there is no quarantine at all where the requirements are met, but those requirements are strict — a microchip, vaccination, an antibody titre of at least 0.5 IU/ml and an application 20 days ahead; Pit Bull Terriers are banned. The country has fewer indicators than the others: the World Bank, the WHO, UNODC and INFORM do not treat Taiwan as a state and publish no data on it, so the indicators section here holds only what Ookla and livingcost provide.
Other comparisons
Kuwait or… South Korea · Japan · Thailand · Kazakhstan · Lebanon · Uzbekistan · Malaysia · Azerbaijan
Taiwan or… Philippines · Bangladesh · Iraq · Mongolia · Oman · People's Republic of China · Sri Lanka · Singapore
More on each: Kuwait · Taiwan. Build your own comparison — up to four countries
This material is for reference and is not legal, tax or immigration advice. Visa rules, tax thresholds and prices change. Before deciding anything, check the official sources and consult a licensed professional in the relevant country.