He noted that 70 percent of the population now does not have a bank account and operates in an informal economy.
Wow, that's quite a statistic--and I'm not sure how that 70% operates without banking services. Sure, you can buy food, clothes, and pay your rent with cash but where I live it's pretty hard to pay for things like utilities, internet, and phone service without having a checking account that has a debit card linked to it. I don't think El Salvadorians are using credit cards for all of that, since it's usually hard to get one unless you have some kind of bank account.
Anyone from El Salvador can give any feedback about living costs and living situation in this country?
I'm curious about that as well, especially the living situation. If I'm not mistaken, there's a lot of crime in that country and even if the cost of living was dirt cheap and I could afford a mansion for pennies on the dollar of what it would cost in the US, I'm not sure I'd want to live in a place where I didn't feel safe.
Still, El Salvador has a nice climate and aside from the country's problems it might be a great place to live, especially if they're welcoming bitcoiners (or at least bitcoin entrepreneurs). Hopefully someone from there will reply here and give us the skinny on what life is really like there. I'm very curious.