Paul; read my comments about how much a senior/chief scientist makes... A teacher in an elementary school perhaps makes 200-250 dollars per month? It is the living standard in these countries unfortunately. Of course the food and the clothing and the rest of the "basic living expenses" are much much cheaper in eastern Europe compared to the western countries or the US/Canada, but if you want to buy a car in Ukraine, you probably need at least 8-10-15 thousand dollars to buy something nice and realiable.

Now here is the catch; even though they make only 250 dollars a month on the average, an eastern european woman will do as much as she can to look as feminine and beautiful as possible! A low-to-average income American woman will wear only a lousy shirt and a pair of baggy jeans with ugly sneakers and she will look like a boy in high school; but a ukraininan or a russian woman will always find a nice looking dress or a blouse/skirt and matching nice shoes even with a limited income. She will match the coors or choose the best fabric available that she can purchase... On the average, the eastern european women are far more feminine than western women! you can not even compare the two... In the west, the western women, for years, wanted to be seen as strong and as skillfull and as independent as men... Yes they are more independent and make a good living on their own, but now they lost most of their femininity. While the eastern european women still are very well educated they do not want to be seen as strong as a man! They want to be seen as an intelligent, well educated and an elegant and beautiful lady! This is an important detail that the western women have missed!
They still live life like a poem! On the other hand Western women live their life as if they are driving an excavator or using some sort of a heavy machine 24 hours a day!

And the eastern women manage to do all this (well educated and look nice and feminine) while they have very modest incomes. Aren't they wonderful!!?  

Best of luck...