Why Are We In Panama?

Fair question. As we’ve been reporting for years, Panama offers diverse advantages. This little country can be an ideal retirement, investment, doing business, starting-over, tax, and offshore haven.

But of all the reasons why one might well choose Panama, which is our agenda?

Business. We’re enjoying the other benefits of being in Panama (including, especially, the tax advantages), but it was the country’s attitude toward entrepreneurs that made it the no-brainer choice for us.

We moved to Panama a little more than eight years ago. It was a turning point, and not only geographically.

Ten months before that move, I’d made another big decision—to leave the publishing group where I’d been working for more than 23 years. I’d started with Agora as an entry-level editor, just out of college, worked my way up through the ranks, and, by the time I took my leave, more than two decades later, I was a partner in one of their divisions, the International Living group, managing their offices in Ireland (which I’d opened for them years earlier), as well as satellite operations in a half-dozen other countries, and living in Paris.

After 23 years, it was time for a change. At first, I thought I might retire… and, for five months, I did. If I were going to do nothing, Paris seemed like a good place for it. And, indeed, if you ever decide you’d like to try doing nothing, I recommend Paris as the venue.

But I was still young (in my mid-40s), and five months of long walks along the Seine and long breaks at the sidewalk cafés of the Latin Quarter was enough.

So, one day, after one of those long walks, I returned home with a new agenda. I’d like to start a business, I told Lief.

I’d spent 23 years learning the publishing trade, so I didn’t have to think too long about what kind of business to start. Where to start it was a bigger question. I knew that France was not the answer. In my experience, the French attitude toward business-builders cannot be described in a family-friendly publication.