Bulgaria writes new chapter in long story of demographic decline

Bulgaria 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!<p>Edit: I&#x27;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.

Starting with the first sentence, I have 1 single word for this - bollocks.<p>&gt; 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.<p>Looking at our press and journalists, the first thing you need to keep in mind is that they rely solely on sensationalism: &quot;everything is getting worse, we are the most miserable and oppressed nation in the entire multiverse&quot;. 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&#x27;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&#x27;s were. None of which is happening anymore.<p>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).<p>Families in most modern societies are shrinking. And while there was a lot of immigration in the late 90&#x27;s and 2000&#x27;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 &quot;everything is worse than ever&quot; 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 &quot;but why&quot; was pretty common back then, no one has asked me that question in over 5 years.

I 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.

No 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.<p>If they want to reverse a demographic decline, they will need to respect fundamental rule of law.

People 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.<p>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.<p>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.

At 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.

Back 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?

Some 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.

I read the article but I didn&#x27;t see a definition of the problem. Fewer Bulgarians means what?

it 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.<p>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

The 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.<p>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.<p>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.<p>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.<p>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.<p>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.<p>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&amp;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.<p>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.<p>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.

&quot;dramatic&quot;, &quot;pessimistic&quot;.. Hey, isn&#x27;t it beautiful to have less dense human populations and more room for nature? I mean it&#x27;s not as if humans were an endangered species

If you can&#x27;t get past the splash image like me:<p><a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;archive.is&#x2F;LGCzt" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;archive.is&#x2F;LGCzt</a>

I&#x27;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&#x27;ll never mention how much per capita adjusted for inflation it is. When inequality rises, they&#x27;ll pretend it&#x27;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&#x27;re the first things that conservatives will conventionally not increase funding for.<p>We measure GDP as it&#x27;s traditionally an indicator for a standard of living.

why is a declining, human population bad?

Bulgaria is the EU imperialism poster child. Make it impossible to find a job inside the country and blame everything on communists.<p>Beautiful country though, and the food beats everything I&#x27;ve seen elsewhere.

&quot;All other countries have a mafia, in Bulgaria the mafia has a country.&quot;

Oh just import few million of refugees, worked everywhere else. &#x2F;s