Specialist Polish stores are cropping up all over the UK and Ireland to cater to the expat community, who are beginning to put down roots. Now Warsaw wants to attract its young people back home.
Posted on 09/22/2007 9:53:58 PM PDT by Atlantic Bridge
Young Polish workers have flocked in the hundreds of thousands to the UK, Ireland and Sweden to find work since Poland's EU entry in 2004. Now Poland is faced with a serious lack of skilled workers and Warsaw wants to entice them back home.
One of Poland's biggest exports since joining the European Union has been its own people. But now Warsaw has decided the brain drain needs to be reversed and the government has launched a campaign to entice the migrants to come back home.
In one of the biggest exoduses in post-war Europe, between 1.2 and 2 million of Poland's 38 million people have opted to leave home and seek their fortunes (more...) in the booming economies of the United Kingdom and Ireland, as well as Sweden. These three countries were the only EU member states to welcome the new Eastern European workforce with open arms in 2004, and it has paid off. The host nations estimate the labor injection has helped to keep inflation and wages in check and further boosted the economy. But while many of the young Poles are enjoying their new lives so much they want to put down roots, their native Poland has now decided it needs them back.
(Excerpt) Read more at spiegel.de ...
Specialist Polish stores are cropping up all over the UK and Ireland to cater to the expat community, who are beginning to put down roots. Now Warsaw wants to attract its young people back home.
So Poland and NY State have quite a bit in common!
Due to some idiotic protectionism the former Schroeder government of Germany delayed the free movement of Polish labor until 2011. If this labour market opens for young Poles the problems of the old ones may grow.
A average Polish woman has only 1.26 kids. Even nations like Germany, Russia or Italy have much higher birth-rates. Together with the massive drain of young people who move to (for them) more attractive countries this fact leaves Poland in a disastrous population development.
Since it is extremely improbable that all those young and well-paid Poles in Ireland or Sweden will leave their jobs for a harder work at home where they are paid a third, the countryside of Poland has a good chance to disintegrate into a lonely steppe.
Such happened already in eastern Germany during the 90ties. Practically all expedient young Germans left the eastern part and moved to the west. Today Germany has to deal with a partly deserted countryside in the east that is only inhabited by elderly people and a few young (nazi) males. Schools have to be closed, and whole districts of towns are broken up. I am quite sure that within the next decade whole villages are flattened because they lack the inhabitants. The difference to Poland is that those movements happened inside Germany. That means that the young Germans from the east are still available to the German state for paying taxes and as a workforce.
Time will tell if Poland is in deep trouble or not. Nevertheless it is a dangerous development.
Ping!
So the Polish kids are moving the the UK. And the Kids from the UK are moving to Canada and Australia.
And the Candadians are moving to the USA.
I just wish the Poles would come straight here.
Do they?
From 2007 CIA World Factbook:
POLAND
Population growth rate:
-0.046% (2007 est.)
Birth rate:
9.94 births/1,000 population (2007 est.)
Death rate:
9.94 deaths/1,000 population (2007 est.)
Net migration rate:
-0.46 migrant(s)/1,000 population (2007 est.)
Not what could be called “robust.”
ROFL!
Congratulations to your new compatriots!
Been in Poland three times in the last year. The hookers want $200 per trick and welders at mfg. plants get $100 a week.
By the way, I asked the hookers why they needed the money and they told me they were hungry. I was at the Intercontinental in Kracow (?). I went to the front desk and had a large pizza ordered for them. Sat with them while they wolfed down the pizza. And yes, I shared this story with my wife.
>>>Time will tell if Poland is in deep trouble or not. Nevertheless it is a dangerous development.<<<
I’ve long wondered why nations such as Poland, Bulgaria, and Romania were so quick to jump in with the EU.
They were already facing demographic challenges, and the inevitable exodus just compounds matters.
>>>And leave all this behind?<<<<
My guess is those are Roma or gypsies. They’ve always lived like that.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.