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Bulgaria writes new chapter in long story of demographic decline
- ggm 6y agoNo young bulgarian-australians would go home permanently, based on the experience of the one who did, tried to helm a Rom, wound up on a stabbing murder charge, and has been held against high court judgements he should be allowed to go home, all because the dead person was the son or relative of a senior Bulgarian minister. Revenge politics writ large. If they want to reverse a demographic decline, they will need to respect fundamental rule of law.
- hinoki 6y agoDue the the typo (helm a Rom => help a Roma), I couldn't follow, but some Googling turned up Jock Palfreeman [0]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jock_Palfreeman https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jock_Palfreeman
- hristov 6y agoThat of course was complete bs. The story of him trying to help a fictional Roma was fabricated after the fact to save his ass. What he did is he got drunk and stabbed somebody. Bulgaria does have issues with the rule of law but that particular drunken hooligan is not part of it.
- ggm 6y agoYou were there? Otherwise, your of course is no more or less compelling than my newspaper sourced statements.
- MaximumYComb 6y agoHis blood alcohol was 0.015%. That's less than a single beer for an adult male.
- aparashk 6y agoKilling someone under the influence is not an act which would attract lenience from the law in any developed country. The media, especially in Australia, has not been great at reflecting the incident in all of its subtlety.
- ggm 6y agoBulgarian justices don't think the conviction was safe. Bulgarian politicians want him kept in jail. For example, somebody is dead, but convictions for manslaughter are different to murder. Lots of convictions for manslaughter are accepted every year worldwide and attract the lenience they deserve. This case has been politicised.
- MaximumYComb 6y agoHis blood alcohol was 0.015%. A single beer would put you higher than that. Having less than one beer isn't "under the influence".
- thiagocesar 6y agoAt some point, the EU has to see a pattern of degradation and corruption, and start engaging actively with the people of the countries, instead of just expecting places such as Bulgaria and Romania to wake up and decide to be rich and developed out of nowhere.
- random3 6y agoGreat point! I'd generalize this and say you have to do this with any minority group that is "below" some desired level (within a country, community, etc.). And concretely, you need to invest in access to money and high quality education first.
- toomuchtodo 6y agoYou’re both right. You have to empower the disenfranchised through active engagement and investment, but also use financial repercussions against those who would continue to subjugate another class. Without both, success is much more difficult. Fight corruption with a financial boot. I imagine Bulgaria needs the EU more than the EU needs Bulgaria. This requires more spine in Brussels though.
- Ar-Curunir 6y agoThe non-elite in Bulgaria need access to the capital and economic opportunities of the EU; the Bulgarian elite already have access. Also, economic sanctions inevitably hurt the poor more than the rich; this is the case in Venezuela, Iran, and many other countries across the world
- krastanov 6y agoYou are right, but I would like to point out that this very article lists multiple ways Bulgaria is already improving. It is not all doom and gloom, even if there are outstanding serious problems.
- jariel 6y agoThe EU has also created conditions to move the health, young workers and the educated class out of there, and into the the West, which is an existential shock to their system. It's hard to institute reform when the people most able to commit to it have been given 2x their paycheck to go elsewhere.
- stanislavb 6y agoSome insights: after the communist regime fell, the country was taken over by mafia organizations and most of the old secret services took many places in politics. i.e. there was a seeming democracy serving mostly the people playing against the law and same old and corrupt guys that used to be part of the communist party. As a result, many capable and smart people just left as soon as they could. Unfortunately, that is still the fact - the country is run by the mafia and it has the highest level of corruption in EU.
- toomuchtodo 6y agoHow does this compare to the fall of the USSR, and the rise of oligarchs in post-communist Russia? Very similar?
- pvg 6y agoSuperficially similar but one of these was the disintegration of a nuclear superpower and multi-national empire. Bulgaria is a small country in the Balkans. Its population is smaller than that of NYC.
- JBiserkov 6y agoBulgaria is in top 10 EU countries by area. It contains the entire Balkan mountains after which the Balkan peninsula is named.
- pvg 6y agoАз съм българче, oбичам наште планини зелени. It's still a small country.
- vldx 6y agoTerritorially, Bulgaria is close to Greece and larger than Austria, Portugal, Ireland and Czechia. It holds 16th position among 51 countries in Europe. High-income countries such as Denmark, Ireland and Switzerland also have lower population than NYC. What is your point?
- forgotmypw17 6y agoIf you can't get past the splash image like me: http://archive.is/LGCzt http://archive.is/LGCzt
- JBiserkov 6y ago"All other countries have a mafia, in Bulgaria the mafia has a country."
- ekianjo 6y agoCan we say the same thing about Mexico and the cartels?
- pstuart 6y agoYes. And their other south of them as well. All of them the result of US interference, both directly and indirectly via The War on Drugs™.
- mrslave 6y agoYour statement that Mexico is a narco-state as a direct consequence of USA fighting against the importers of illegal drugs from Mexico cannot simply be given but clearly requires expounding. And even if it were, the implication is the nation of USA isn't entitled to fight against illegal, anti-social, and violent activity is absurd.
- triceratops 6y ago> the implication is the nation of USA isn't entitled to fight against illegal, anti-social, and violent activity is absurd. If drugs are outlawed, only outlaws will deal in drugs. The cartels are terrible, evil organizations made up of despicable and desperate human beings. There is nothing good to say about them. But if drugs were strongly regulated, instead of made illegal, and drug addiction treated like an illness, would they even exist?
- unishark 6y agoLatin America has a problem with corruption and the rule of law generally that goes well beyond drugs. I don't really know how to fix it and don't believe anyone else does either. I am certainly willing to support an attempt at legalization since it has a moral basis in "freedom" and such. But the above poster is not wrong. If murder-for-hire, sex trafficking in children, etc are outlawed, then only outlaws will do those too. Meanwhile Canada did not become a weak and corrupt narco state, despite having an even larger border with the US. For that matter Japan's (even stricter) drug laws didn't turn Korea and China or any other neighbor into a narco states. The problem is more complicated than people want to believe.
- demarq 6y agoit seems to me things get better as the population reduces, i’m not sure why there is a focus on maintaining it or increasing it. in fact one of the most interesting parts of that article is that discrimination was no longer tenable given that the value of each worker had gone up
- okareaman 6y agoI read the article but I didn't see a definition of the problem. Fewer Bulgarians means what?
- atdt 6y agoIt means whole towns with no children, and older people wasting away in agony because there is no one left around to care for them.
- p2t2p 6y agoI am a Russian who moved to Australia. My parents kept voting for Putin for last 20 years, were never politically engaged and never supported the opposition. If Bulgaria situation is any similar then for those older people that agony is of their own creation.
- jojobas 6y agoOh just import few million of refugees, worked everywhere else. /s
- krastanov 6y agoI am confused by the negativity expressed in this comment section. This article presents a fairly positive outlook on how things are changing in Bulgaria (when you wrap your head around the idea that for a small country it is not the total number but the structure of the population that matters). The article mentions a number of serious outstanding challenges, but it also lists multiple reasons to be pleased with how things have changed.
- pgtan 6y agothis is because the Bulgarians, unlike the Germans for example, are capable of (social) self-criticism and self-irony.
- krastanov 6y agoAre you saying the negativity is ironic or sarcastic? That sounds like a cheap excuse. Self-criticism and self-irony are also extremely important, but they need to be constructive, not just self-flagellation. But your claim that Germans are not self-critical now makes me think your comment was sarcastic and I missed the sarcasm. I apologize if that is the case.
- rdxm 6y agoyet another failed nation/state....
- nikolay 6y agoBulgaria is a disaster due to being on the crossroads of the East, West, Russia, and Turkey and the multitude of geopolitical and economic interests andalso on the way of the drug channels from the Middle East to Europe. The Balkan mentality, greatly twisted in the half millennium of Ottoman rule, does not help much either. Things are much worse than what the numbers show, unfortunately! The kleptocratic governments are covered up by the US and EU just so that we can limit the influence of Russia in Bulgaria. Anyway, the moral, mental, and health decline is much worse than the demographic one! From a great example in the Soviet Bloc, we turned into the worst example in the EU! Neither the West, nor Russia has interest in Bulgaria being a modern country, because poor slaves are pulled by the nose much better! Edit: I'm Bulgarian, I live in California since 1999, but I spend 2-3 months every summer in Bulgaria and witness the constant decline every time.
- selimthegrim 6y agoOttomans have been gone for 200 years now, haven’t they?
- throwqqq 6y agoFull independence from the Ottoman Empire was achieved in 1908.
- lactobacillis 6y agoLooks like the fear and loathing is still there in Bulgaria.
- Florin_Andrei 6y agoThere's a lot of lingering resentment in that whole general area, even after all these years. Some of it is justified. Most of the satellite countries had to pay tribute (taxes) to the empire, money that could have been used instead for self-development. Compound this issue over centuries, and maybe you can understand why people are not happy about that part of history.
- 6y ago
- axegon_ 6y agoStarting with the first sentence, I have 1 single word for this - bollocks. > Google “Bulgaria” and “demography” and you will rapidly learn that journalists and analysts have for years been reporting that the country’s population is one of the fastest shrinking in the world. Looking at our press and journalists, the first thing you need to keep in mind is that they rely solely on sensationalism: "everything is getting worse, we are the most miserable and oppressed nation in the entire multiverse". Essentially fox news, bild and daily mail. Because this is what sells best. This is what gets facebook shares, comments and likes, simple as that. It appears as if everyone has forgotten what the 90's looked like and what queuing at 4 in the morning to get a bottle of milk was, daily shooting in the streets and hyperinflation. Because this is what most of the 90's were. None of which is happening anymore. The population decline is a phenomenon which can be observed in most of Europe, the big difference is that there is very small migration from anywhere here which makes the issue more obvious (on paper) then in other countries. There are a million and one reasons for this, like bad reputation(see the paragraph above), language barrier which is a problem when it comes to daily life and realistically racism, which may be a problem outside the capital(even some large areas in the capital as well). Families in most modern societies are shrinking. And while there was a lot of immigration in the late 90's and 2000's, in recent years, the numbers have gone down drastically and there is a factor which no journalist will dare speak of because it goes against the "everything is worse than ever" rhetoric. The number of people who have returned after a certain amount of time spent abroad(me being one of them). I was one of the first that fled back for multiple reasons. And while the question "but why" was pretty common back then, no one has asked me that question in over 5 years.
- jariel 6y agoWhile you can take umbrage with the tone of the piece, it seems your concern for the 'bias' in the article has maybe led you astray with respect to the fundamentals. Bulgaria unquestionably has a demographic problem related to emigration that is completely different from 'the rest of Europe'. Since 2000 (after the 'ugly times') Bulgaria has gone from 8 -> 7 million. This is not derived from 'family sizes' - this is squarely a problem of emigration and it has everything to do with the social and economic conditions there vis-a-vis other places in Europe. What needs to be considered is how the EU of the last 20 years, which is a merging of Rich/Poor Europe has resulted in the obliteration of healthy working people and educated class from E. Europe overall, to the benefit of the 'rich west'. There may be some neoliberal advantages, in that, those people are perhaps able to achieve better employment and income with a 'greater net productivity for Europe' - but it's not going to benefit Bulgaria a whole lot. Much like businesses make short term decisions on employee work spaces because the 'sticker price' of cubes or offices is so much greater than 'open tables' and whereupon the productivity if private spaces is hard to measure ... it seems the 'free money' flowing from the EU is just too tangible to consider in the face of the more 'strategic' concern of mass emigration. As soon as you start to value those intangibles, it would seem that an economic union might actually have made more sense than a social one.
- pippy 6y agoI've never bought into the ruse of an increasing population implying a higher standard of living. Politicians love this as a stagnating economy can appear to be doing better, by pointing to an increased GDP that usually rises with an increased population. They'll never mention how much per capita adjusted for inflation it is. When inequality rises, they'll pretend it's unrelated. Of course the extra stress on the infrastructure, housing, hospitals and schools are all things that their predecessors will have to worry about. They're the first things that conservatives will conventionally not increase funding for. We measure GDP as it's traditionally an indicator for a standard of living.
- hristov 6y agoThe main problem with Bulgaria is mobsters and corruption. Bulgarians tend to be hard working and there are a lot of successful Bulgarians abroad but inside of the country one always has to live in fear that too obvious success will attract the wrong attention and the mobsters which more or less control the courts will just take everything they want from him. So a lot of the smarter and more ambitious people leave to try to make a living in the west, while the rest try to live and work while being careful not to piss off the wrong person. On top of that you have the West screwing over the country the usual way the west screws over developing countries. By buying out infrastructure and then raising prices, etc. This they do glove in hand with the mobsters and the corrupt government. So the result is that most major businesses are oligopolies of some type or another. Either because they have been taken over by the mob or a couple of western conglomerates have bought out all the options. Or combination of the both. Prices are high in comparison to salaries and most Bulgarians live in what one would consider poor conditions. Thus family formation is low. The EU membership has been very beneficial in putting in infrastructure and the sort. However, EU membership has also brought in a lot of real estate appreciation without a commensurate raise in ability to pay rents. I think things are improving. Mostly because of software and technology. In my experience Bulgarians seem to value education and hard work so there are a lot of programmers. Also, the mobsters who at this point own all the important real estate, have decided to more or less leave technology companies alone. They have figured out that this will maximize the value of their existing holdings. Thus there seems to be an unwritten license to run a tech company in Bulgaria. The industry seems to be thriving with native Bulgarian startups and R&D offices being open by major western companies. Lately I have even noticed a trend of expats from western countries going to Bulgaria to do a start up where life is cheaper. Most Bulgarians in the big cities speak some English. The tech industry also tends to give out decent salaries, so people in that industry do not quite live in poverty. In trendy bars and restaurants in Sofia and Varna you can usually see the mobster crowd and the tech crowd living side by side uneasily giving each other furtive glances. Thus far the government seems to value and encourage tech business. For example, in contrast to the crumbling roads, Bulgaria seems to have some of the best internet in the world. But the government and their friendly mobsters run the show and they can do anything they want in the future. So my optimism is very measured.
- 6y ago
- seer 6y agoPeople in HN might be interested to know that Bulgaria has one of the (second place I think) biggest difference between average salary in IT and average salary for everybody else. Being part of the EU it’s easy to find an IT job, with all the work from home initiatives now more than ever. SO being the poorest country in EU you can get to some ridiculous standards of living if you are in IT. And in the recent five years or so the bigger cities in the country have upped their game quite a bit. Before the covid crisis I liked to hang out with foreigners visiting the country and all of them mentioned it being a very positive experience. They often start researching rent prices and such.
- f6v 6y agoI guess that is true for any Eastern European country, especially if there's an easy way to avoid taxation. The cost of life is low for anyone working in IT, especially remotely. However, I wonder if the infrastructure makes it worthwhile. The roads in Sofia have probably not been repaired since 90s. And there's no public transportation routes available in Google Maps.
- kavalg 6y agoI agree that public transportation leaves a lot to be desired, however roads in Sofia are actually not that bad. The bigger problem is traffic congestion. It makes it impractical to commute to the other side of the city for work (e.g. ~1hr in each direction) and hence severely limits employment opportunities in case you live in your own house. With respect to taxation, I wouldn't say it is easy to avoid. It surely is for those that are close to the governing class, but not for the average Joe/Company. Quite the contrary. If you consider doing business in Bulgaria, I would advice against keeping your capital and intellectual property in a Bulgarian corporation. Everything that makes > EUR ~1M revenue/year shows up on the radar and then you either have to play on their rules (e.g. sponsor a political party, give them a share of your company at their terms) or you will be chased down by the huge government repressive apparatus (tax authorities etc).
- distances 6y ago> And there's no public transportation routes available in Google Maps. I don't think this signifies anything though. It's up to the cities to decide if they want to publish the routes and timetables, and many choose not to. Including western cities, such as Montpellier and others in France.
- f6v 6y agoBulgaria is the EU imperialism poster child. Make it impossible to find a job inside the country and blame everything on communists. Beautiful country though, and the food beats everything I've seen elsewhere.
- SergeAx 6y agoBack in the late 80s when I was spending days hacking on USSR-made clones of Apple II in my school, lots of components (floppy drives and diskettes, monitors) was made in Bulgaria. I wonder what happened to then most technologically advanced country of Eastern Block?
- stjo 6y agoYou mean Pravetz or actual Apple replicas made to confuse buyers?
- SergeAx 6y agoI mean Agat, a 6502-based desktop computer developed in Novosibirsk: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agat_(computer) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agat_(computer) It was able to run some Apple II software after applying small patches to I/O and video subroutines.
- tenebrisalietum 6y agoIf you played around with the Agat you should write some blogs. Agat seems really interesting from what I've been able to learn about it - it was like a 32-column Apple II with SECAM color.
- SergeAx 6y agoYes, it was. Not in the mood for retroblogging yet, maybe 5-10 years later, thanks for the idea)
- rini17 6y agoCzechoslovakian experience: the indigenous high tech supply chain could not survive the combination of wild privatisation (new owners often just sold everything off and pocketed the proceeds instead of development) and need to pivot to products attractive to completely different markets than before (unresolved licensing of intellectual property did not help there).
- 11235813213455 6y ago"dramatic", "pessimistic".. Hey, isn't it beautiful to have less dense human populations and more room for nature? I mean it's not as if humans were an endangered species
- dutch3000 6y agowhy is a declining, human population bad?