Poland
Polish emigration changes local lifestyles
Classified Polnews
Warsaw, Poland December 27, 2006 The effect of Polish emigration on the Polish economy and the labor markets in Europe have received substantial press coverage. How it has affected the little people in Poland has been largely ignored. But it is how they are dealing with it now and how they see the future that is important to business and planners.
The before and after pictures of life in a neighborhood in Czestochowa, Poland offer anecdotal evidence of what might be happening around the country to one degree or another. In any case it presents an interesting look at what has happened in one neighborhood.
According to a local shopkeeper in Czestochowa, prior to the emigration boom the area around his shop was a popular place where many young Poles spent their idle time. With few employment opportunities in Czestochowa, the young people would do little more than drink beer, be rowdy and cause trouble.
But that has changed.
The young people are gone. The area is clear and quite. The shopkeeper cannot definitely say where they are but he thinks that they went West.
The shopkeeper's daughter provided some insight into what might have happened.
Her boyfriend's friends, generally in their early 20s, have found work in Switzerland. They travel to Switzerland and work a few months at a time and make very high wages compared to what they would make in Poland, if they could find a job and all.
After a few months of accumulating money, they return to Poland and spend all money partying. When they run out of money to go back to Switzerland to work for a few more months and once again return to Poland.
The effect of emigration on the neighborhood has been remarkable. No longer are there unemployed youths bothering people and causing trouble.
Young people suddenly appear from the West with a lot of money to spend and spend it in the places that were once not affordable to them.
These young people have become the role model for others who are approaching the age that will allow them to travel. They see no opportunities in Czestochowa ,or Poland in general, and are planning to head West.
According to the shopkeeper, because are no jobs in Czestochowa it is good that Poland belongs to the European Union. He likes the idea that young people can go West, and earn money that they can bring home to spend in their community. It benefits his shop.
According to his daughter, the people who left have no intent of coming back to Poland to work or live. They will come back to spend money to look important and on getting girls. But they will live and work in the West.
So in their little corner of the world daily neighborhood life has changed for the better with the troublemakers gone and people spreading easy money around. And in the future there will be fewer young people to deal with because more are planning to head West.
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