The Collapse of the Baltic Tigers: How did Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania escape ruin?
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- Опубликовано: 21 ноя 2021
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Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, the so-called Baltic republics, have experienced one of the highest economic growth rates in the world over the last three decades. However, their road to prosperity was not exactly a leisurely stroll in the woods. The Baltic countries had to face one of the biggest bubbles and crises in the old continent in living memory.
A huge crisis that they faced in a completely different way than what we are used to. This is the story of the miracle, collapse and recovery of the so-called Baltic Tigers.
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As a Singaporean, I have always rooted for the three Baltic states since 1991! Hope to visit all three countries one day!
Why ? You can start a business faster in Singapore....why do you come here ?
Bro, leggo tgt.
I'd suggest you take more than just one day for three countries ;)
You are welcome, as soon as this crazy pandemic thing is over.
That, possibly, implies a desire for autonomy from the ccp. Careful, the almighty state could react cruelly, given their present whining about Taiwan and far-flung, belligerent atols.
I remember being assigned Estonia in my economics class back in college and thinking that this little country is so cool and how innovative their new (back then) policies were around taxation and internet adoption. Always somehow read up a lot about Estonia over the years and I’m so happy that their policies worked. Very inspiring for other countries.
Thank you and greetings from Estonia to you! 🇪🇪❤️
Remmber if you are foreclosed you still owe bank the money ! Enjoy paying loans for stuff that got reposesed for decades.
@@ivanmonahhov2314 Such debts are usually handled by courts. If you've made a reasonable effort to pay back your debts (court will help with fair planning), you can get it wiped in 10 years at the latest.
Also, who would have thought that you have to actually still pay a dept you couldn't afford in the first place? Amazing how such obligations come as a surprise to people taking loans.
Lithuanian government given data is always false and fake in Lithuania, come and look to reality in provinces where they just started to close down hospitals while people dying. Statistic information on paper is worth nothing especially when its fake. In lithuania is much higher gvp than latvia and poland but wages and prices ar much worse then there? Why? But the statistics? You been fooled like the rest off a europe by our government fake statistics. You're welcome.
They've already outdone the former champion Finland in the PISA basic education survey...!
I lived in Estonia about 5 years ago. Their digital system is GREAT! Moved to Germany, and their system is paper, paper, paper...
Can confirm as a German who lived in Estonia, it's ... awkward coming back
In Turkey the digital system is also amazing . As you said in Netherlands and Germany still paper and letters .
@@ferhatdikmen3762 netherlands isnt paper. Netherlands isnt Germany
I’m Norwegian and have lived in Amsterdam 7 years. I never lived in Germany, but visit it frequently. My impression is that the NL is noticeably behind Scandinavia in adapting to the online world, but still works well, while Germany seems to insist on living 20 years behind. It’s a stark contrast the moment you cross the border. Strange for what from the outside is a fundamentally modern and effective country. I have too little experience from the Baltic countries to have an opinion, but I have noticed an attentive and open attitude. Seems similar to Scandinavia.
Our digital banking system (UPI) is the best in the world, at present.
I've just been to Estonia and let me tell you - what a country that is. Efficient, growing, digital, gorgeous. 🇪🇪
Don’t invite the neighbours over for a bbq
I'm from Brazil, and I have to say the Baltic nations are damn awesome. The way these nations survived Russian oppression to become modern developed countries are sensational.
Eh. I wouldn't call us developed. I mean, there are parts to praise but ever since 2016 it's gotten markedly worse. The nation is divided, our healthcare workers are literally crying blood, the women still believe that if their male spouse beats them black and blue then it means that he still cares about her, and that despite our brave health workers, the general attitude seems to be 'if you're not healthy, then just die and get out of the way'.
It's a beautiful place, all the Baltics are. Our three countries have soul. But you know what? So does Ukraine, the poor country that gets left out of these lists. And Bulgaria. So don't lionize (or tigerize) us. We're just some arseholes trying to make sense of the world after we stopped bleeding. And we're not doing that well, we've just got great PR.
@@Killjoy_Mel Let me guess: human sciences?
@@Killjoy_Mel Can you name something that has gotten worse since 2016? Maybe you've simply became more ideological, similar to US liberals who are talking about worst times evar, while objectively its the opposite.
My wife works in healthcare, and because healthcare workers being under stress due to pandemic is mentioned a lot in DW stories, I've occasionally asked her about it. According to her, they are not stressed at all, at least in PERH, biggest health care center in Estonia. Deciding by your name, this is also your country. Her opinion is obviously also subjective.
Wife beating is barely a thing. Not that it doesn't exist, but statistically Eastern Europe is doing better than Western Europe. Going off to a rant here, you seem very one-directional here, both can be abusive by means available to them. Abusive men being stronger, tend to use physical violence, while women use phycological. Although yes, men are reported to be more abusive.
Another piece of statistics, when you look at relationships where women get most to least abused, bisexual is 1st, lesbian 2nd, heterosexual 3rd. And relationships with least abuses involves just 2 men, by large margin (41% and 28% respectively when comparing lesbian and gay relationship, by one study). When finger-pointing next time, use two fingers
@LML Blogas tas paukštis,kuris į savo lizdą šika.Lietuvių liaudies patarlė.
Total success stories. That's fantastic! 🙂👍
I'm going this Christmas to Estonia - Love Baltics from India
🇪🇪 🇱🇹 🇱🇻 ♥️ 🇮🇳
Long live the Baltics!
Me walking around my apartment in Riga and watching this. As an 1980s born millenial I lived through all this and have the booms and busts in my living memory. One good thing that was done in Latvia in 2009-10 - while yes public workforce was reduced massively, the state introduced some really easy to understand, easy to manage and cheap, tax friendly forms of enterprise.
Basically the government said - you are fired but here is really cheap and easy way to start your own business.
Generation X (or Gen X for short) is the demographic cohort following the baby boomers and preceding the millennials. Researchers and popular media use the early-to-mid-1960s as starting birth years and the late 1970s to early 1980s as ending birth years, with the generation being generally defined as people born from 1965 to 1980. You ain't a millennial.
Millennials, also known as Generation Y or Gen Y, are the demographic cohort following Generation X and preceding Generation Z. Researchers and popular media use the early 1980s as starting birth years and the mid-1990s to early 2000s as ending birth years, with the generation typically being defined as people born from 1981 to 1996.
@@FlamingBasketballClub I was born in mid 1980s. That is why I added the "s" at the end of the year indicating that I am a representing individual of currently the older millenial generation
@@nuucha I was kinda capping 🧢
What a contrast to the US then and esp now! Better solution than "spending your way" out of the problem (that has never really worked)!
Baltic countries are literally an utopia 🙄
Go your own way, build wealth and safety. Greetengs from Poland.
*elect nazis
@@fredburns6846 Every country is free to elect whoever the hell they want. I assume your country is consistently electing globalists who outsources all jobs and imports africans to drain welfare resources?
❤️🇵🇱❤️
Baltic Tigers showed great guts to challenge the need of public services and kept their commitments economically. They did a great job compared to 99% of countries including all major western ones.
Yes, we are tough. I as Lithuanian myself always thought what makes us what we are. So after some surfing on internet waves I found results of few studies on mentality of Europeans. I mostly can speak on behalf of Lithuanians yet our neighbors Latvians and Estonians are pretty similar. Particularly interesting is the "Eupedia map of individualism" showing dominant the mentality in European countries (you can find this map). By this Lithuanians, Latvians and Estonians are very similar to other Northern, Central and Western Europeans and different from Southern and Eastern ones. The other one is the study on how different nations organize their working place - by this Baltic peoples are very close to Germans. And the third one is - the persistence in efforts to achieve distant goals and willingness to give up some comfort for the sake of it. In this case we are close to Chinese, Koreans and Japanese.
Lithuanian government given data is always false and fake in Lithuania, come and look to reality in provinces where they just started to close down hospitals while people dying. Statistic information on paper is worth nothing especially when its fake. In lithuania is much higher gvp than latvia and poland but wages and prices ar much worse then there? Why? But the statistics? You been fooled like the rest off a europe by our government fake statistics. You're welcome.
@@fidenemini111 Typical comment by which one likes to put oneself at the top next to others regarded as the top of the top... that´s what fuels kind of "racial" discrimination and sense of superiority and inferiority that has already caused so much trouble in history. About time to stop this bullshit!
@@lukaspundzius9293 Congrats! First rational comment from someone living the effects of savage capitalism on their skin! More comments like yours are needed
@@lukaspundzius9293 My partner is Latvian. She says much the same thing. What this video is essentially celebrating is that the Baltic Governments closed schools, hospitals and fired thousands of people in order to pad the margins of international banks during a global financial crisis created by those very banks. The sad reality in Latvia is that successive governments have allowed what few assets the country did posses to be stripped away and sold off.
As an American of Lithuanian and Baltic roots it’s great to see these “emerging economies” becoming flourishing economies. They just need to take care of their citizens and help them become more prosperous
Lithuania cares enough about own citizens. Citizens as well must to take responsibility of their prosperity,. And never mix individual greed and appetites for goods. As usual Lithuanian mentality contains '' never will be enough''...even if we are in prosperity and care...My family proud to be Lithuanian.
The Baltics aren't emerging economies. According to IMF, WB, and OECD, they are fully-developed high-income countries.
We take care of the citizens with effective free healthcare and higher education systems, 2 years of parental leave, etc... for sure better than the americas, it is not normal to pay for an ambulance here
They take better care of their people than Americans , by a mile
@@JustasSireika Lithuania -High income country with the smallest pension , not sufficient for the basic living and in many cases not enough to survive?
You explain the economic journey of the Baltics so well! In the case of Lithuania, when we finally gained independence from Russia in 1991 and introduced our own currency - Litas - we had to have an American company manufacture the new bills and coins. The company was actually caught cheating Lithuania out of some of the security features on the bills because they thought the currency and our economy would soon collapse. And now look how far we've come and still growing!
My dear neighbour , we regained independence in 1991. Huge difference.
Lithuania regained Independance in 1990 (March 11), not 1991 (true for Estonia and Latvia)
@@juozasramanauskas308 Yes you're right. I got mixed up because the Soviets attacked Vilnius in January 1991 - but that was after the independence. Thank you!
@@jacintas1503 You're welcome. Very common mistake, actually. Easier, when you have been there at the time :)
Regained*
Great video! Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania had a huge crisis and a big stockdale moment. And they prevailed.
I am Italian and I lived in Estonia for three months in Summer 2021. It is incredible to see how different two countries can be. Italy is willing to collapse under enormous debts, international pressure, and especially day to day policies (now Draghi is doing exactly what his predecessors did): the very response to covid crisis, which could have been not a disaster but a booster for a country like Italy, is obviously a short-term one, with horrible medium and long-term consequences (I have been in Sweden from Oct 2020 to June 2021, and the response was totally different and much smarter). No one in Italy would cut public workplace, bureaucracy and so on (even now, a non-elected government is not doing it); no one would cut salaries. Estonia is a different world, as China (where I lived for almost ten years) is. But Estonia is in the EU: that is the point. Italy is a beggar, prone to give anything in exchange of funds, while Estonia is a proud he-man: it is the mirror of their own different population, sheep the former, tigers the latter.
(I USE GOOGLE, SORRY)
It is very harsh about your country! I'm so sorry about that!
I have experienced all the power of 20 and 21 years in Latvia. The main thing for any person, if given the opportunity to compare - as it was then and as it is now! We have a huge number of different problems that still need to be addressed as a society, I repeat, as a society. To the public, regardless of nationality. It seems to me that things are moving in the right direction, because I see on a daily basis that this land has become expensive not only for Latvians. This is significant because as such, Latvians were the only one in the country where we live, only 54% of the total population. We are already more (due to cosmopolitan emigrants). It seems that the public is beginning to believe in the predictability of the future, the system, the criminality of the villains .......
I am very concerned about what is happening in Ukraine at the moment. There are battles in the dimension of Master and Margarita. Not only the place of Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, but also Italy in the world of the future stands out there. Do you think it is an exaggeration? Go deeper! You will understand! There's not just a question of who's good, who's bad. Whoever wins is Satan or the Prophet.
But greetings to the Italians from me! I invited you to a race! Who better to bake Italian pizza Margarita. My verdict - currently Latvians! (long laughter).
But I said that the greatest opportunity in the world is the opportunity to compare! I have done it, at least in Naples!
Fireworks !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
What did you do in China for 10 years? Just curious
I'll give my little Estonia this: it knows how to batten the hatches, tighten belts, and just get on with it. From experience. Call it a 'conquered people' syndrome. It's a cultural stamp pressed into the souls of any Eastern European citizen.
I don't love the he-man comparison though. I am a woman in Estonia. This he-man shit can help you endure hell (like the people of the Baltics have done for millennia of conquests), but on an individual level it's neither kind nor sustainable. Tigers. We're not tigers. We're just cornered house cats, and I'd much rather this cornered house cat found a warm lap and loving hands to protect it, nurture it, help it grow, and make it feel secure. This sense of insecurity might seem honourable to macho folk, but it comes at a great cost to anybody who isn't the biggest baddest neanderthal in the troupe. Which is why I find Estonian nationalism particularly stupid. The person who becomes a chest thumping nationalist he-man is a person who really doesn't love themselves or feel security in themselves, their life experience, and their own identity. I love my country, I love what's left of its ancient culture, I love our potato hair and potato faces, we are a surprisingly hardy and warm, productive folk. But fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck this he-man shit. He-men don't survive in the long run. It's those who are able to work together with strangers, and foster relations with stranger tribes that end up surviving. Tigers hunt alone. Sheep may be prey, but they survive because they are many and work together.
So basically, fuck this macho shit. Prosperity for all. We all deserve gentleness. There's no pride in hardy survival because thing about hardiness and survival is that you don't have a choice. True prosperity begins when a nation gets out of its insular he-man, we-so-bad-we-don't-need-nuthin mentality, and becomes warm, generous, receiving and giving. And yes, that means asking for money from the EU. Which, btw, Estonia has done. A part of a flawed but wonderful whole and all that.
@@Killjoy_Mel Jesus, what went wrong to society if their only concern is to lower men. You are not man if you born with vagina, period. Equal rights is ok, but for the God sake, stop hating men for their masculinity, men are not gonna start to use hormones to lower their testosterone level in order to hide masculinity.
Kudos to Lithuania for officially calling Taiwanese embassy what it is, rather than Chinese Taipei embassy!
It's the same. 😂 It's not Republic of China Embassy, and they still have Peoples Repbulic of China embassy. Makes no difference. Taiwanese embassy doesn't work as UN country one, same as Palestinian and Kosovo embassies. They are much like consulates.
But taiwan isnt a country, not even in its constitution states that Taiwan is a country.
@@dxelson yeah, that's a thing. When we say "Taiwan (not Chinese Taipei) " we mean sovereign independent "China" country, while Taiwanese mean only legitimate China in territory of Taiwan. While Chinese government use Chiense Taipei sometimes just to accent that its part of China. In Chinese constitution its recognised as ordinary province (not autonomous region/province/municipality or special status 2 systems 1 state region as Macao and Hong Kong) and they use Taiwan when translating it more then often, I mean on government and its institutions, like universities. We in the West imagine Communist China claim Taiwan which want to be independent like Singapore or such, but actually Taiwan itself claim Mainland China. From (both sides) Chinese perspective there can't be two Chinas, just one.
@@dcinput7645 Taiwan has, despite Chinese rage, been considering independence. The day of claiming the mainland is over. Due to a unique historical experience Taiwan has developed it's own national culture
@@stephenmarcus9601been considered independent ***. Not independence. Firstly, I work with Japanese, South Korean and Taiwanese students, helping them master English, and there is special form of lesson I conduct called "free talk", where we use English in communicating about anything. Taiwanese people either don't care, either they claim Mainland is part of ROC, and it will eventually be part of ROC when communist govnement fell. Same goes for Taiwanese government, they de facto in their legal system don't recognise Taiwan as a country without ROC context, and claim Mainland China too, different parties reffer to it differently, take more or less attention to that, but you are wrong. Taiwan is independent, sovereign and autonomous - yes, but ain't recognised in UN as a state, because it don't want to be Taiwan, but ROC, and because PRC also don't want it to be there....
Was checking their GDP per capita in 2000 and it was approx. €3-4k. 20 years later it is approx. €17-23k. Simply impressive!
Lithuanian PPP is 41288 USD,Spain 41700 USD 🤗🤗🤗
@@airisfinglas2628 geras aš iš latvijos mano mama iš lietuvos ir aš mokaus lietuviška kalba
@@airisfinglas2628 Cost of living in Baltic states is also one of the higest in eastern EU yet GDP in PPP is way higer than nominal even in comparison to other countries where cost of living is way lower. I doubt GDP in PPP is correct.
@@sleepyjoe7843 is correct.PPP of Lithuania 46300 USD on 2022.
@@airisfinglas2628 Reality is different. People are fleeing for a reason from these countries. Baltic states lost 20% of their population (mostly young ones). Next 10 years expected to lose another 15%. GDP in PPP is surely not correct from baltic states.
I love Latvia 🇱🇻 and have family history from there when my grandpa had to flee the Red Army
Why did he have to flee the red army? 😬🤐
@@stuarttimocin7929 Maybe he was Jewish, a politician, from intelligent society or some of his family members were, or didn't want to serve or fought against in partisan forest forces or some of his family members were. Soviets had many checkboxes and failing one meant heavy repercussions.
Your video misses mentioning one big difference between Latvia and Lithuania: Latvia took help from IMF (got cheaper loans, but also got pushed/dictated reforms) and Lithuania rejected that idea (had to take way more expensive loans, but got more flexibility in reforms). Well, they both survived and outcome wasn't that different on grand scale, but this aspect can be interesting for economy nerds anyway.
Latvia was also the one that needed help the most to the point that the struggling Estonia and Lithuania both also gave some financial help.
Love Lithuania!!!
❤️❤️❤️
❤️❤️❤️
Me too! 🇱🇹
They did not default,they took responsibility for the economy,doing what any family,facing the same problem,would do.Spend less get out of debt and go forward.
Well, they didn't have much choice to be honest. There were dozens of international agreements about joining €-zone, that had to be met.
Greetings to our Estonian brothers from Finland! :) For those who don't know, Estonian is the only language which actually resembles Finnish in practice 👀
Finno-Uralic language gang 🤝
Karelian language also is close to Finnish
@@liberoAquila I know but too much for one comment. USSR stole Karelia from us in WW2 (yea short version again). We still have northern Karelia in Finland.
Isn't Hungarian from the same language group?
@@happyelephant5384 it is!
Im impressed and surprised ive never heard about Your HUGE effort and baldnes, very well done! Keep up with good work, Baltics!
Thanks, my guy. I didn't even know we were that bald.
When you going through CCCP... keep going :)
Your countries did much more brave changes in system than poland, we are still firmly in 82' in most resorts, and our gov is mentally in deep deep cottage where impressing priest and neighbour with new clothes is peak glory..... Thats why we gonna lose our country soon.
I think you mean boldness 😭
Some of the tallest and baldest people in the world 😄
Once they broke free of mother Russia they become successful. Food for thought I think.
Same as Finland and Poland
Our mother has never been Russia.. ;)
Russia is more like a drunken agressive stepfather.
@@andriusgimbutas3723 Poland didn't get the same economical success as the Baltics.
Probably this time size does matter ;)
Russia was an abusive husband pulling out all spirit,resource and money away and beat their spouse from time to time and at couple minutes of being sober - some good moments and productivity. Definitely not a "mother" analogy. Food for thought: why did that russian saying stuck internationally? Do we allow the abuser to form narrative to neighboars and not the victim?
Those three Northern countries is really something. Hey from US
I'm a simple Lithuanian. I see Baltics, I press like
Lithuanian government given data is always false and fake in Lithuania, come and look to reality in provinces where they just started to close down hospitals while people dying. Statistic information on paper is worth nothing especially when its fake. In lithuania is much higher gvp than latvia and poland but wages and prices ar much worse then there? Why? But the statistics? You been fooled like the rest off a europe by our government fake statistics. You're welcome.
@@lukaspundzius9293 looks like you're from the lower class. Because you do not understand the actions taken to close down hospitals, schools etc. And what you're saying, I often hear from populist activists
@@dachronic6709 and by you lower class should be always low? Why the gvp in poland and latvia smaller but wages and prices better? Maybe because off enormous coruption and people like you who support that ? Maybe you also benefits from government flaws and corruption or tour parents all life did this?
@@lukaspundzius9293 You definitely do not understand things correctly or just miss the point. Social lifts work pretty well here. Look, lets say it is hypothetical situation: you are from small village, you love computing, after school you choose to go university and got degree in programing. Now you sit in Vilnius, Kaunas, Klaipėda, code things, earn 2-3k net salary and all of a sudden you are considered as upper middle class.
Closing small, low quality schools means that the whole education sector is optimized, so it gives even more opportunities for those from mall villages, because they would be able to compete with those who is learning in higher quality schools.
@@ZhylvisLT ok and for those who just doesn't have this oportunity? Just leave them behind without nothing right? And can everybody work as like economist m. You don't understand every kind off specialist is needed for a country to just make its all functioning? It much more process, complicated than you imagine. And ok tell me is there in Switzerland the small already been gone? Sweden? Norway? Maybe in America it already happened, if its so easy and futuristic as you imagine?
Beautiful countries. Visited several times and I can't believe how developed they are considering 50 years of communism. Strongly recommend a visit.
i visited Lithuania really a beautiful country happy about them economic development
Sveiciens visiem latviešiem!
Čau!
Sveiki iš Lietuvos!
Pirmyn Braliukai!!! Pirmyn Latvija!!
Čau!
@Bipe 👎
As a Latvian, I confirm that we played it cool in 2008-2010. And it was the right thing to do, because the housing bubble - and the overall inflation - has reached an absurd level. There was the price though, not mentioned in the video: the people. Latvia alone has lost 10% of the population within the several years after the crisis. The unemployed were not consumed by recovering economy, they fled to UK and Ireland to make their living. Most these people are still there, rising their kids and never going back.
I love it that this comment section's basically full of actual Baltic folk debunking the shit out of this global delusion that the Baltics are tigers. Nah, all we've got is great PR. And same as you. Our folk go to UK, Australia and Ireland. Anyway, regards from your slow-speaking northern sister.
@@Killjoy_Mel That's what I thought. Latvians usually move to Germany, the UK or Russia it seems in search of better opportunities. The Baltics, Romania and Bulgaria seem to have the biggest demographic problems, which were exacerbated since joining the EU. While the standard of living has increased, so has the cost of goods and many of my latvian friends say the Euro only brought trouble. How can you call a country such as Latvia and Lithuania with such fast population decline and one of the highest suicide and alcoholism rates in the world a "Tiger"?
@@bangdobrich No one, at least from Lithuania, move to Russia for better opportunities. Don't be delusional. Yes, demographic problems exist, but mostly because grass is still greener on the other side, and gates are wide open. Suicide rates are not only economical problem too. I have known few suiceders, none of them take their live because of it.
@@Killjoy_Mel As you can actually see there are many more of those, who are debunking comments like this, or yours.
Hi. Yes then i went abroad 2. Met lots of Latvians because crysys hit you even harder than Lithuania. How are the things now ? We have the same absurd level of 2007 prior to crysis, to make a decent living you have to have 2500 euro a month. I know its comming down again because you cant have such low GDP and such insane prices that even english people shrugs from them. PRoblem is that who will want to invest in country without cheap work force with small population and high living standart.
Slightly disappointed you didnt talk more about the so-called unicorn companies these little countries have been pumping out recently. Estonia has in fact created the most unicorn companies in Europe per capita as of this year, and the other 2 are no slouches either. Anyway, greetings from Poland, glad to see our northern neighbours doing well.
Estonia the Baltic Tiger - is a good doc. movie in YT.
I dont think that they actually doing well. More like they actively trying to... kill themself off. Population of Latvia in 1991 was 2 651 000, now - 1 902 000. They lost almost 1\5 of population. Estonia suffer less, from 1 561 000 to 1 331 000. Still not good. Lithuania have 3 700 000 population and now have 2 795 000. They almost lost 1\3 of population.
May be, I just not understand european way of life, or... you guys really try to free place for other peoples, you know, from Africa?
@@lolnoobus Well, staying home with kids for 15 years isn't our dream. In order to have kids and somewhat good living standards we would have to earn as much as western europe, that isn't happening any time soon.
@@lolnoobusComparing the numbers to 1991 is a little bit inaccurate, because in the first several years after the independence, it was huge numbers of workers from other Soviet republics who left the Baltics back to their home countries. Now, of course, the population decline has still been bad, especially after joining the EU, but as said, the initial decline was mostly non-native Baltic people leaving the countries. And even now, if you look at the demographics, its Baltic Russians who are leaving the baltics in the biggest numbers.
But of course, the decline is still a big problem and something the country really needs to work on. Ideally they should try to attract some of the people who have left for other EU countries to come back, and to promote higher birth rates locally.
there are companies that are not in stock market and thus cannot be called a "unicorn" technically but are very much prospering. Just looc at Nord VPN (lithuanian) blasting ads on pretty much all of youtube, or Carvertical, or Trafi
Shows you once again that giving baltic states away to Russians during Yalta conference after WW2 was a mistake. It was never meant to be - these countries and nations deserve to decide for themselves.
But the justice has eventually won now (the republics have been restored) and they are repairing the damage done and catching up!
I mean that's pretty clear given they were countries before ww2 and had extensive history before that too
Lithuania was arguably even more successful before WW2 than it is now in terms of growth.
Escape from Soviet foolishness.
No one in soviet zone was foolish, everyone knew what is going on and what is wrong with it.. It's much more like soviet error that was a great learning example for China not to follow same steps
look how much they lost population after escaping from soviet foolishness you fool, 50 more years and where wont be any baltic nations
@@devastator18 The biggest majority of the people who have left are people from other Soviet republics (primarily Russia). Of course, the population decline is bad in general, but even now its primarily Baltic Russians who are leaving, who wouldn't have been there in the first place if not for the Soviet Union, apart from a small minority that immigrated during the days of the Russian Empire.
@@devastator18 majority of the people that leave the baltics for good are young adults seeking opportunities in life
Basically, the governents exercised a trendous degree of political will and self discipline. It is unlikely to be repeated by other countries anytime soon. Defiunitely not here in the USA.
All three countries wanted to adopt euro as their currency. To have it done you had to have fixed exchange rate for a long time. That is why not one Baltic country decided to "re-start" of this fix rate period. And now all of them enjoy euro and it's benefits...and low interest rates fueling new economic bubbles ;D
i dont think it is transferable to the usa. too many diferencies beetwen them
@@goranbrajkovic9925
I was not refering to what Baltic States specifically did so much as show political will and self disipline.
@@ycplum7062 look at the national debts chart of Baltic countries.
@@aris1188
On average, they are much lower than other European countries as a percentage of GDP.
I am from Moldova and it’s very inspiring to see countries that emerged from the USSR climb to such highs! A shame that right after the independence of Moldova, it was governed by absolute thieves up until recently. A lot of time lost...
What is the future of Moldova (central governemnt) - Transnistria relations?
JuliusRou хороший канал про Эстонию. Советую там фильмы: Минусы Эстонии , Плюсы Эстонии , Минусы Таллинна , Кяру , Рапла , Остров Хийумаа - самый бедный регион в Эстонии , Что такое хутор? , Тапа - база НАТО , Валга , Турба , Саку , Палдиски , Пылва , Клоога , Мыйзакюла самый маленький город в Эстонии , Кейла итд.
Он сам имеет паспорт Румынии.
I don't think there is that much difference. Most difference is in the fact that Scandinavian banks gave huge amounts of credit and local thieves had more to steal.
Don't spend more money than you have?
Wow! What a groundbreaking strategy!
No really, I'm barely being sarcastic. Somehow Western European countries and the US can't stop interfering with normal market function and insist on just letting the printing machines go brrrrrrr.
Common sense seems sparse in government these days, good to see that it still exists.
its because western europe and North America never lived under comunism, and think that if things were organized by the state it would be better.
for instance, in portugal:
the left says: we are going to raise salaries
the rigth says: we are going to maintain salaries and reduce the public services (40% of the portuguese workforce is just state expenditure)
the people vote for the left, because they want to see their salaries grow and not be fired. how can I explain to them that if they voted for the rigth, they would get a better life in 15 years? the portuguese power of purchase is down 10% since the left took over, the country is under a demographic colapse and with a trade deficit. in 2011 it was close to a default because the government needed to get more debt to pay the intersts in old debt and the salaries of the public workforce. its just politics.
these people know that raising our minimum salary rigth now is going to bust dozens of companies that are under stress after the pandemic. the country is getting less competitive by the day and povety is increasing, so the government raises taxes on fluel, making our products even more expensive and less competitive. Our taxes are the highest they have ever been since the country was founded in 1143, but the socialist machine as to be fead. if they dont raise the salaries they will lose the next january election (and they have favours to give to the people that give them money)
and that's why this keeps hapening.
it's not because people are dumb (they are, but thats not the issue), its because economics is complicated and oximoric. raising the salaries of the lowest payed people in society is good, isnt it? ans who would be the monster to oppose it?
now try to explain to the factory emplyee or to the public servant that if their salary is raised for all this would mean enterprizes closing, moving to other countries ou not coming at all, leading to more unemployment and making more people emigrate, wich would mean more taxes and more debt until all it bursts and bum! we are in a 10 years long recession again and their purchase power is now 10% lower again!
we are voting for our own misery. and willingly so. beeing lied by our government and government controlled midia .
the pole say that the rulling party, the socialists will get 40% of the votes (tecnicly 15- 20%, because 60% of the portuguese eligible population doenst even care). and renovate their government with the support of labour and the comunist Marxist-leninist party (that cry in the day stalin died), that is estimated to compose 50-60% of the parliament.
this means: people have decided that they want to stay like this or dont even care, at least for the next 5 years. and why? because they belive that its better this way and do so since 1974.
That is what you have to do when you have huge debt to pay off. The same strategy was used by Germany after WW1. The trick is that the US dollar is global currency and used extensively through out the world. So every one and their mother can contribute to paying off US debts through inflation. Especially those countries that have opted for more responsible economic policies.
@@Duck-wc9de Well, this communism, but also socialism, is the state leadership. And the result was the collapse of the Soviet Union. In the economy should be country so much as urgently needed and as little as possible. With this communism, but also with socialism, it is a problem that the state wanted to be the master. But the state is a bad host, or rather the state is not a host at all. But without a host, everything rolls down the hill. Believe me, we have felt it on our own skin and we don't want any more.
The implementation of this simple strategy was excruciatingly painful for the country, and self-sacrificial for the politicians who got to champion the policy.
They learn the nordic mentality.........it's not South America we talk about.
We don't learn it we have it. 2 Latvians could be in love to each other their whole life and never tell it to the other.
It's virtually the opposite of the Nordic model. The Nordics build prosperity by having large government spending and investing in their people. The Baltics build prosperity by having little government spending and hard capitalism.
This video is generalized and does not take into account the local differences among the so-called "tigers". Much can be said about each country as their examples are somewhat similar but entirely different from each other in local perspective. However, this should be a separate video - as it is a unique topic in it's own right
It doesn't actually discuss the toll the crisis of 2008 took on our societies, thousands of people loosing all their money because SEB was a shitty bank, nor the wild west of 1991.
Not to mention it completely ignores the relationship with EU and our "duties" to the union post 2004!? 🙄
Getting rid of a lot of corruption, and unnecessary bureaucracy helped push them forward.
We still have alot of corruption in Latvia
That is correct. As a Lithuanian I still cannot believe how my country had changed from a rundown, gang ridden, poor and corrupt country in the 90s to 2010s (those 20 years are when the differences were most noticible). Personally- I'm most impressed how our police had changed from bribe starved, soviet-like arrogant pricks to officers you can rely on and don't have to change the side of the road when you see a patrol walking.
Estonia haas aa loott of corruption!! Like our Government now is fucking us big time. Qnd we have had the same party in politics since like 2002, with some exceptions for a few years. And they just raise our taxes and take more more money from us.
I pay 40% tax some even 45%.. doesn't leave you much money in hand.
@@Tar1ff all eastern European countries changed, but it seems that you performed the best.
Certain Russians are screeching when Baltic economies are mentioned :)))
@@Miakkk mmmm, it's the Nordic model ( high taxes). Still, it's a nice place to live. You just play your now thing.
It’s important to remember that all three baltic countries had gone through the same process earlier in the early 90s when the Sovietunion collapsed. So from the publics view they still had it much better than last time they had to do the same thing. This made it much easier to get acceptance for these harsh measures.
I can't imagine any western european country or the USA to be able to do the same. The public outrage would be enourmous.
it also really helped that Estonia and Latvia had/have relativly small number of people compared to the rest of europe. have no idea how Lithuania pulled that one off tho.
@@firmak3560 Baltic politics is kinda simple. When they come upon a decision they ask themselves; "will doing this help protect us from the russians?" If the answer is Yes then they go ahead.
@@Myth-zd6ko don't forget that about 1/3 of population in Latvia are ethnic Russians. This makes things a little bit more tricky 😜
@@dimon-livansky Either tricky or easier, since some portion of Russian speaking people (not just Russians) chose not to become full citizens, they can't vote, thus politicians can pretty much ignore them - those non-citizens do not impact elections.
I've been eying Estonia's growth in economy and technology, but the other two are also doing fine. It's amazing how they've kept steady growth in income since the dissolution of USSR and they're catching up with other wealthy nations of Europe pretty fast.
I've personally had a thing for these countries and I'd love to visit and spend some time there in future, specially in beautiful medieval Tallinn.
I love how i can understand Estonian as a Finn, sending love🇫🇮♥️🇪🇪
I, as an Estonian, am very proud of my country.
as a Latvian, I say hello my brother
I have to say, living in Latvia, there is a large acceptance of governments actions here, for better or worse.
Though there is a lot of disbelief in goverment
I would say tolerance, rather than acceptance. People aren't necessarily happy with every decision, but they tolerate it and simply wait for elections to show their opinion. You rarely see much social unrest. I can count on one hand the amount of serious riots/protests I have seen in Latvia. Even now during Covid, the worst we got was a small group of boomer whackjobs protesting and making an extremely pathetic attempt to recreate the Baltic Way for a completely unworthy cause.
@@ugaboj Try indiference. At least 1/3 of population of Latvia is out of power due to naionalistic elements always voting against whoever supports them, and since they usually choose left since the right very much want to see them deported, we essentially have a broken system where both populist sides are out of power forever, and all that is left is a compromize candidates that don't dare to make any changes, turning the politics into a swamp.
@@hukubis I mean, I can't disagree with you there. Personally, I've voted for the Progressive party in the latest elections (and for the AP/P combined list in Riga). I think if Latvian and Russian leftwingers could unite behind the Progressives, they might just have enough votes combined, but sadly Russian voters are very loyal to Harmony, which is never going to get enough Latvian votes for the majority they would need to make a government, since no one but the Greens are even willing to work with them.
I don't hate Harmony, they have many decent policies, but the problem is that while there are definitely Latvians who are willing to vote for a party like the Progressives who want to normalize relations between Latvians and Russians. But there are very few Latvians who would vote for Harmony, myself included, because of their close ties to Putin. I very much want Latvians and Russians to be able to live together in Latvia, but I want Latvia to remain an EU, western-oriented country, I do not want it to shift into Russia's sphere of influence.
And also, I am not happy with Harmony's very conservative social stances. They are definitely only leftwing on economics.
@@ugaboj
Problem with severing ties with Russia, that I as part russian am opposed to due to both cultural and familial reasons, is the fact that georgrafically, our main benefit IS the ability to channel trade from it to Western Europe for profit.
Also, western media really underreports the problem. As we are now, while surfing both english and russian parts of the web, Im very much afraid that west doesnt understand that if push comes to shove, Russia WILL simply nuck the NATO's "non-important" border rigeons (that means us), as a last chance warning shot to send the message, before all out nuck exchange. They very much see NATO with US in charge placing their nucks and army infrastructure so close to their borders as US saw USSR placing missles in Cuba back in the day.
Honestly, My Ideal solution for us would be: EU makes its own standing army based on buffed up France's and Polish millitary, collectively leaves NATO due to both USA playing way to many games with China lately and Erdogan being Erdogan. And then just placing some of the France's nucks in Poland or Slovakia, and maybe even one or two weaker non-rocket nuck charges on the very border with Russia as a deturent just in case, and end any more millitary escalations there.
Since no USA is involved Russia wont see us as an active threat and unstable rival in the rigeon like it seeth NATO now, but would also not risk confrontation as long as we keep the nuck delivery systems up to date and close at hand. Also, no Turkey dragging us all in out war with Iran, Iraq, Syria, Russia, Egypt, and any other places they claim they should "return" to form their great pan-turkic utopia.
As for social reforms and acceptance, while i'm not that opposed to the notion that society should not dictate who and how we fuck, when it comes to social progressivism (also known as government trying to regulate family matters in the worst way possible) - it usually ends very badly, so I suggest doing your research before supporting anything with a label of "progressive social policies".
Just to give you an example of how progressives can fuck up:
The famoust american black's 13% - 74% population to crime ratio problem is a direct result of one of early 70th "progressive policies" and not racism like some left leaning academia would want you to belive.
Long story short. Blacks use'd to have the biggest number of single parent families (around 20%). Mostly due to cultural background since more than a half of them are from western Africa, and before Ilsam and Christianity, local pagan religions resulted in the closest thing to a full flegged matriarchy. (*think high status women having VERY young male consorts being the norm).
Anyway to support single mothers progressive(femenist) left of US pushed for harsher punishment for absentee fathers and bigger financial support for said mothers at their expence. And they went too far with those benefits due to populist reasons.
Result: More and more women started to divorce their husbands, resulting in more and more single parent kids that didn't have a father who would whoop their asses away from doing drugs and joining gangs.
Now around 70% of young american blacks grow up in a single parent household, which is a main cause for crime rate.
Ideal sollution here would be to leave most things as they are now, but add an additional government contracts just so that gays and the like could "marry" without calling it marrige, just so that religious types would be also happy and shut up. Even better, if some of those contracts would involve actual duties of the partners, including criminalizing cheating in cases that are agreed upon.
When Rail Baltica is finished I will visit all 3 of them
That will be done in i think 2030
Provided that mandatory vaccinations don't exist
@@annadartanagle104 Scheduled to be completed around 2026/2027
@@annadartanagle104 2026
What's this?
This video just answered an economic question that I had; thanks Visual Politik for the answer!
Love Estonia
All the comments here talking about how efficient and cool the Estonians are... as a Latvian, all I can say is that I have never met a slower nation of people. Slow drivers, slow walkers, slow service, S L O W internet... Seriously, you'd think for a country nicknamed E-stonia, you'd have decent broadband, but no...
But in all fairness, this is all just good-natured brotherly banter. We still like you with each one of our six toes. :D
Needs to be sayd, that all countries also tackled corruption. Now Estonia is the 5th least corruptive country in the Europe and 6th least corruptive country in the world. Also the level of digitalisation: person has to be present only in 2 cases - getting married and getting divorced. This helped us a lot during the first wave of pandemic- people were used to do all online.
But looking from the inside during the crisis, damn it was hard. Salary and personell cuts not only by state, but also in the private sector, many sacrifises done on all levels.
Terre, a lithuanian tourist here. What drove me MAD in Estonian in the last 2 months i've been there. You NEED an estonian phone number to do anything, lonely tourist with international number cannot even pay for car parking in most of the places (coins only or app only, no card - good luck!). Even city freaking bee have different accounts for lithuanian and estonian services. Good luck registering with international number!
So yes, Estonia is advanced digitally, but there's plenty of room for improvement.
P.S. Maxima discount cards did not work, while Rimi worked and even automatically change language in self checkout!
@@UtamagUta Laba diena. Thanks for feedback. I know Bolt app is working internationally, no need for ee phone number.
And also as an estonian, I'm sometimes mad on how bad in some cases the architecture of some services is.
But, the transparency and low corruption is a key ingredient.
As a lithuanian born a decade after we left soviet union, i still ask that question... how. But in general we are in a kinda good spot, all though people still leave Lithuania in droves, pensions are meh and if youre disabled its not a good story and especialy in small towns and vilages. But i do see how capital of Lithuania and my hometown Vilnius has dramaticaly improved in last decade, to the point where i actually wanna live here. not leave to other countries. But still we have a long way from being a rich country, but im optimistic.
Migration is null or net positive in the last few years. Villages and small towns also look very different now, compared to 10-20 years ago. Not only Vilnius (and Kaunas) improved.
@@NeblogaiLT i dont leave that much Vilnius and hawent been around that much of Lithuania and the only vilage i hawe been around alot is Paberze near the highway from Vilnius to Utena, so i didnt saw how much other cities and vilages had changed.
Well,from what i know you have a more innovation-centered economy than Poland or Slovakia,for example.I think your future is brighter than Central Europe.Poland handled the 2008 crisis and Coronavirus very very well,but our innovation still sucks and your entrepenurship is better as well,i think in the long run Lithuania has a bright future.You were in the Soviet Union,so the fact that your country already achieved so much is admirable.
@@tomaskirdeika584 well you can see the change now in small cities. 10 years ago maybe... Villages are doomed in all developed countries
@@NeblogaiLT To be fair if you go to Panevezys it's almost like a time capsule of 1989 lol, crumbling apart
I’ll save you all 13 minutes. They created a fixed exchange rate and then Made big public spending cuts to preserve it. Plus lots of pretty drone footage of the Baltic cities
And one shot from Lisbon for some reason
Thanks for making this video!
Nevertheless, the Baltic republics are a remarkable success story!
Lots of the Lithuanian footage was old, but other than that, a good video
Greetings from Latvia (despite you posting this at midnight here)
Loved this, thank you.
I am astonished that they were able to successfully apply such harsh austerity measures, I can't ever imagine something like that working in my country, people will be on the streets and there would be chaos everywhere!
The people still had the collapse of the USSR and the restoration of independence in relatively recent memory and the situation was even worse then. Also this followed a period of absolutely massive growth, so people hadnt yet become as accustomed to the increased living standards.
Still people were understandably furious with the government and the pm of the time for bringing the country to the point where these austerity measures became necessary. Just not to the point of actually rioting.
Russia was holding them back...
The reduction of Latvian public spending and civil servants was not only necessary from a fiscal point of view - it also reflected that the country had lost about a quarter of its population since independence so the public sector was in for some major trimming, anyway.
I went to visit Riga two months ago - and I was impressed by how wealthy and well kept everything looked.
Did you go anywhere besides the center of old Rīga? Maybe visited some other towns? Or at least been to a residential area?
@@ArgumentumAdHominem
Yes, I did. I had a walk in the outer "Moscow suburb" and in Sloka - both were residential parts where tourists normally don't go.
I acknowledge that things looked a lot less pleasant there and that downtown Riga is the wealthiest bit of the country (though most of Jurmala seems to be doing very well, too)- but hey, you'll find a lot worse than that in areas of East Germany, a region that got huge subsidies to clean up and rebuild.
@@notroll1279 Ok then you do know what you are talking about :). Admittedly most people in Latvia still live in buildings of 1960s era that are not doing too well, places like purvciems, imanta and vecmilgravis. I must admit I'm surprised about Germany. That said, I have only entensively explored Baden-Württemberg, which I admit is likely above average in living standard.
Regardless, Riga is a capital. I think the main message comes from visiting other towns in Latvia. Many of them are straight up abandoned. Many have no schools or hospitals. This is a stark contrast to Germany, where every village looks like a place I would in principle not mind living as long as there's something interesting to do.
@@ArgumentumAdHominem
People tend to leave rural areas and move to the big cities pretty much everywhere... and Latvia has additionally been hit with the repatriation of Russians and with emigration.
That thins out a lot of villages and small towns.
Baden-Württemberg, together with Bavaria, leads the GDP per capita ranking in Germany. Both look back on more than 70 years of economic stability, political freedom and mostly above average growth. So it's no wonder that rural BW is better off than rural Latvia - but as a whole, I think the Baltic republics have achieved a lot and I'm looking forward to see more of them.
@@notroll1279 I really would not mind you to be right. But it's really not as clean as the video makes it sound. Let's start with the fact that after Soviet union, Latvia inherited radio production, van production, metal processing factory, lots of agriculture and livestock. Almost all factories i know of were quickly cut to scrap. I challenge people to make a round about the country and find a single plowed field or a single herd of cows. You will probably succeed if you look hard enough, but you'll have to search. We used to have a sugar factory, but it was closed as terms of entry in the EU, since it "competed with Dutch sugar production". I know of many people including my father who went out of business because the taxes kept rising and rising over the past decades. I honestly don't know if Latvia even produces any sizeable export. I bet that most of country's budget consists of transit fees between Russia and Europe, outsourced IT companies that can get away with paying people 1000eur before tax (you probably know that prices in lv are not less than in Germany), money sent home by family members working in UK and Ireland, as well as "efficient use" of European development funds. The government seeks any opportunity to fine citizens. For example, recently they introduced a fine for having too long grass in front of your house, even if it is a summer house you visit once per year. The bailout of the notorious Parex Bank was shady at best, as it was for example done against the will of the people, using the money of the pension fund. Taking about pensions, do you know that baby boomers pension in Latvia is calculated using pivot years. It does not matter how much you paid in total into the pension fund, it only matters for how many years you paid, and how much did you pay on average during pivot years (i think it's two or three years somewhere miss 1990s, I can check). Obviously, most citizens found out about pivot years after the fact. More recently, I hear stories from my classmate, trained as a pediatrician, having to work 72h shifts at the hospital to treat Corona patients on top of her usual work. Why? Because many of our doctors now work in Germany where you get better pay and can't really get sued by relatives as long as you follow the protocol. If you Google, you can find many videos of people (mostly pensioners) queuing to Aldi in the rain to get bread and potato a bit cheaper. Most pensioners in Latvia get around 200-250 eur pensions per month. I have no clue how they survive. Technically, medicine has a free option, but wait times for sth like MRI can reach years. Most pharmaceuticals they have to cover out of their pocket. Ok, I'll stop here for now
Too nice video 📹 in clearly explained economic situations of 3 new Baltic states & how they built their independent economic systems...thanks for sharing 👏 😀 🙄 😉
Go Latvia!
Laba diena :). Lets wait and see for the next 5 years, fintech and IT is booming at the moment, fruits to follow promptly
We already are the capital of FinTech startups in the EU. Surprisingly, even our gaming industry is taking off. The future does look very interesting.
Very little mentioned about the human costs of those "bold" policies. Over 20% unemployment followed by massive emigration to EU - which in turn heavily undermines demography (which was already bad). I'd say the result is mixed, we'll see if it's positive
This site on many occasions has been proven to be wrong.
How's that bad? If your society suffer from mass unemployment while some EU countries need more workers, this mass migration from Baltic countries (which is perfectly legal, unlike migrant crisis from other parts of the world) was/is a *win-win* for both sides.
Demography was aready bad and in time the decline of (first) the state and then the economy followed by the society would do even worse. With the improvement of the situation overall, by means of growth and solvency, will bring unemployment down, then improve quality of life and ultimately bring people back.
@@ihl0700677525 I absolutely agree!
@@ihl0700677525 absolutely not. A migration is a migration .Go back to your country
Thanks for great video
Sveiciens no Latvijas. Hello from Latvia.
Sveiki broliai 🇱🇹❤️🇱🇻
Baltic States can be a great model for many other european countries and for all world,like some other examples of small countries but with huge influence(like Singapore and Switzerland),or with a great economic policy(Baltic States).
How can they be a model for Singapore or Switzerland LOL
Toally different stories over there
Perhaps they can be a model to our neighbours to the south, Bulgaria.
@@_o..o_1871 I think that it is a mistake here,I said that Baltic States,Switzerland and Singapore are models for many countries.
Congratulations from Ukraine. its a pity we cant do good as you guys, too much corruption
Really excellent overview. Well done.
As a Latvian I can tell that all that came with a huge price tag. A lot of people moved out to Western and Northern Europe to have a job. Most of them haven't returned. And it is a big loss in human resources.
It was their choice
Lots of Estonians have returned home recent years, ofcourse not all, all the best to Latvia.
Same applies to Estonia. Reform party in Estonia mainly protected the assets of Swedish bankers (gamblers actually) during crisis, citizens paid for the risk.
...excellent job from the Baltic states...
Estonia the Baltic Tiger - it is highly recommended doc. movie in YT.
LOTS of love from the US
You missed crucial points:
1. There was 2 financial crisis. First when currency was local and the stocks crashed.
2. Before 2008 crisis we went to Euro so no devaluation of local currency was available.
Also- it was mentioned that Latvia had to deal with collapsing Parex bank. But in Lithuania during the same period two big banks had to be taken over by the government, as their owners had used them for money laundering, and stole from bank capital. That was because before ~2010, the regulator (Lithuanian Bank) was so weak, or maybe bribed, that allowed it all. So having the currency pegged probably saved the country from much larger misuse too.
Video ignores everything about European union and the euro tbh... useless assessment because it's very important context and at least in Lithuania the change to Euro drastically changed how things worked within 2 years, inflation trippled
They look like sophisticated developed countries to me, not folk that have higher unemployments levels than the UK. How funny when you said the debt went exponential - that's an understatement, that what's happening everywhere, including UK.
its because western europe and North America never lived under comunism, and think that if things were organized by the state it would be better.
for instance, in portugal:
the left says: we are going to raise salaries
the rigth says: we are going to maintain salaries and reduce the public services (40% of the portuguese workforce is just state expenditure)
the people vote for the left, because they want to see their salaries grow and not be fired. how can I explain to them that if they voted for the rigth, they would get a better life in 15 years? the portuguese power of purchase is down 10% since the left took over, the country is under a demographic colapse and with a trade deficit. in 2011 it was close to a default because the government needed to get more debt to pay the intersts in old debt and the salaries of the public workforce. its just politics.
these people know that raising our minimum salary rigth now is going to bust dozens of companies that are under stress after the pandemic. the country is getting less competitive by the day and povety is increasing, so the government raises taxes on fluel, making our products even more expensive and less competitive. Our taxes are the highest they have ever been since the country was founded in 1143, but the socialist machine as to be fead. if they dont raise the salaries they will lose the next january election (and they have favours to give to the people that give them money)
and that's why this keeps hapening.
it's not because people are dumb (they are, but thats not the issue), its because economics is complicated and oximoric. raising the salaries of the lowest payed people in society is good, isnt it? ans who would be the monster to oppose it?
now try to explain to the factory emplyee or to the public servant that if their salary is raised for all this would mean enterprizes closing, moving to other countries ou not coming at all, leading to more unemployment and making more people emigrate, wich would mean more taxes and more debt until all it bursts and bum! we are in a 10 years long recession again and their purchase power is now 10% lower again!
we are voting for our own misery. and willingly so. beeing lied by our government and government controlled midia .
the pole say that the rulling party, the socialists will get 40% of the votes (tecnicly 15- 20%, because 60% of the portuguese eligible population doenst even care). and renovate their government with the support of labour and the comunist Marxist-leninist party (that cry in the day stalin died), that is estimated to compose 50-60% of the parliament.
this means: people have decided that they want to stay like this or dont even care, at least for the next 5 years. and why? because they belive that its better this way and do so since 1974.
@@Duck-wc9de I get what you are trying to say. People will always go for the easy populous option, where someone gives you money. I mean, why work hard, if the government is handing out freebies. People need to understand, that to reach economic prosperity it is never easy and fast. It is a hard job that takes sometimes unpopular political decisions to be made. You have to grind it through in the beginning, so it can be easier latter. Unfortunately either of their lack of education, laziness or in general dgaf attitude, people choose the populist option, that ends up blowing over in 10-20 year, but eh who cares, it's only going to blow over in 10-20 years, for the kids to clean up after them.
Three Baltic sisters EST, LV, LT in the eastern part of Northern Europe !
They aren't the members of the Nordic council yet, but soon will be.
But to be honest we got a lot of problems in Latvia. If we fix them then I think we should be good. Lithuania is fine and Estonia is just perfect.
NO country is perfect, especially estonia. I'd say the only countries that would he close to perfect are maybe Liechtenstein or Norway, bur ofc they are very expensive
The grass is always greener on the other side
@@imweird3363 you are right about norway this country is perfect compared to others but I meant estonia perfect between baltic countries. They have robots that deliver pizza like common :D
@@crazydragy4233 not always but yeah I know what you mean
Didn't know, great summary
Great video! :)
You forgot to mention that Estonia has the lowest government debt in Europe
Almost exactly what our economics professor at WSU (Wright State Univ ) and the Chicago School of Business would recommend. A very economically politically right wing answer. They would have not only drastically cut government expenses and service but floated their currency.
A very interesting case that deserves more study. Then again the centralized economy worked very well for the Eastern European Soviet block immediately after WW2, but as it grew then it stared to collapse.
You need to understand that many post-Soviet countries didn’t want to be in Soviet Union. Russia did what they do best: Sent the soldiers and decided that this will be a part of their territory. So the fall of Soviet Union was the best thing that could happen to those countries in the long-run, although at the beginning with the economy being in ruins was very shaky and demanding for people in those countries. Thankfully now, those countries are growing and Russia is going backwards with ordinary people living in poverty. I am happy that we have our freedom and I hope that the Ukraine will get that chance too, joining NATO and the EU. They should stop being the second poorest country in Europe after Moldova (Russia blocks their access to international institutions using Putin’s influence and threats) and start becoming truly independent. I hope that the other countries will soon end Russia’s illusion of grandeur and Russian people will end Putin’s rule. He is a madman.
Putin will stay in the seat for as long as EU and US allows him to do. And EU in particular is very happy with corrupted politicians transferring money from russia to EU economies. BLOODY NOBODY cares about russian people. In the best case they are regarded as commies and who cares about commies, right? huh. Fuck europe.
Putin is very popular in Russia. I voted for him twice.
@@eafadeev Ha! I'm assuming you mean in the same election, right?
@@jvkanufan8115 LOL no, first time in 2000, second in 2018.
@@eafadeev 🙂
Very nice video.
Central european countries are slowly but surely transitioning to high income economies, similar to the ones in Western Europe. Transition isn't fully complete yet in terms of nominal values of GDP per capita and salaries, but if there's no major disaster, then in 20 years we'll get there. Demographics is the biggest long term issue in my opinion.
And the western countries will soon catch up to the north.
One of possible solutions to attract people from Southern Europe - a lot of Spanish, greek and Italian people would be willing to come here. After some 5-10 years we will be even more attractive economically
Yes ARGENTINA, firing public workers, not hiring them is the solution.
I see your moniker is aptly chosen.
Lithuanian government given data is always false and fake in Lithuania, come and look to reality in provinces where they just started to close down hospitals while people dying. Statistic information on paper is worth nothing especially when its fake. In lithuania is much higher gvp than latvia and poland but wages and prices ar much worse then there? Why? But the statistics? You been fooled like the rest off a europe by our government fake statistics. You're welcome.
@@lukaspundzius9293 if you don't like Lithuanian statistics department then take a look at EUROSTAT numbers. Situation is the same.
Some people cannot understand what "average" mean, and cannot believe that "poor Baltic countries" are not so poor after all. If you travel the world you know it.
@@faterlandas did you know eurostat using Lithuanian government provided dat?
@@lukaspundzius9293 certainly Lithuania use exotic formulas, not the standardized ones.
As a latvian, I'm proud of my country and our Baltic neighbors. Yes, here are some problems but there is no perfect country. But for me it looks like everything is getting better.
Yes, population is decreasing but there is reason behind it. Past. I see it getting better with time.
I kept seeing an ad by politicians boasting of their increased spending while matching this video!
am jealous .the Baltics have some really intelligent leaders
From inside, it all looks so much different.
@@dimon-livansky but it's still much better than 10 or 20 years ago. Leaders can be good at their jobs and corrupt at the same time
As a Lithuanian I think we had smart leaders in the government about 40% of the time. In my opinion this is why we are slightly behind Estonia who had smart leaders a bit more often.
and very patient citizens, I must say as one of them
🤣🤣good one
for context GDP was growing 10% and salaries by 15% in the prior years of overheating. In a stable economy there is no way that GDP would drop 25% or that you could just reduce salaries by a large chunk
also regarding schools, birth rate dropped from 40k per year in 80s to 20k per year in 90s so by mid 2000s there was no need for so many half empty schools
One of the Prime Ministers of the Republic of Estonia once said that if it were a crisis, I would like to live in such a crisis. I do not understand what a huge crisis the author is talking about? Of course, there are ups and downs, that is the economy and that is the case, but it is absurd to talk about a huge crisis.
Estonia is a small country and thanks to that we are able to react quickly if necessary. Large countries have been suffering from inertia for a long time. And their recession is rapid and sharp
Spain? Not so sure. Yet I was really surprised when I discovered my country - Latvia, is perfectly comparable to Portugal or even at a bit better position. I guess decades of dictatorship and unnecessary expanses of colonial warfare hurt them just as badly as Soviet occupation impacted us.
P.S. Yes, 2008-2009 were really tough. _Technically_ I was not unemployed, but my income drooped over 3 times, from a really good monthly income to basically working for food - the minimal wage of 160 Lats (around twice that in $ - 320 USD).
They are probably referring to the WB 2020 GDP per capita (PPP) estimates: Lithuania - $38,735; Estonia - $38,395; Spain - $38,335.
The dictatorship did, but they also had an economy at the time. Thanks to the Soviet Union, only socialism was played in the Baltics, but it has nothing to do with the economy.
Portugal economy grew the fastest during dictatorship
Just go to Portugal, you will see why. Spain, sorry its still not for LV yet, but I guess it will be soon in 2-3 years.
I can't believe you guys are doing the loud music again it's almost impossible to watch and enjoy these videos
Having the Nordics next door ready to invest sure helped a lot. It's one thing to be a fairly isolated economy in a time of crisis when the IMF comes knocking and a whole different thing to have a very rich 'cousin' next door who has co-signed half your loans. Suddenly you get a 9B package. Even if you don't spend it - it reassures everyone that you are not going bankrupt and shuts down short selling against your currency.
Not being a hater. But this is a pretty unique position, and something that many other countries simply don't have. Kudos for making tough choices, keeping corruption down, etc.
I think only Latvia got the loan from IMF with good terms. Lithuania had to borrow money way more expensively from foreign banks (because situation was not as bad as in Latvia, there was no local bank going bankrupt, so IMF was not an option). To this day there are many people in Lithuania who are blaming government of that time for the debt that we still have and for stealing retirement from elderly during that time. These decisions were certainly not easy.
This is not how it actually happened. Our sovereign credit ratings were shit, currency devaluation was not an option, the Nordic banks closed their credit lines, and we had to borrow on intl markets on pretty atrocious terms.
@@JustasSireika Currency devaluation is always an option (until you join the Euro), and something that countries have very much been strongarmed into doing in order to get a rescue loan. Standing up to those pressures was an awesome move on the part of these countries. Devaluation helps pull the banks out of trouble and helps with currency reserves and trade balances, but it puts your people in poverty and allows foreign companies to completely dominate domestic industry since you just wiped your people's savings. Being able to retain the board through that crisis is what allowed the Baltics to retain the strong entrepreneurship culture. To reiterate my initial thesis, though - I think the geopolitical situation of closeness to Nordics and Europe's reluctance to open the door for (at the time) economically resurgent Russia had a lot to do with the success, and the model may not be easy to replicate elsewhere in the world.
_Currency devaluation is always an option_
Theoretically - sure, but in practice it was not an option for us. I was an adviser to the prime minister of Lithuania during the crisis. The government had to basically choose between currency devaluation and public spending cuts. And so we chose to slash our public spending. Back then, the thinking was that:
1) this would have a less negative impact on our population;
2) we wouldn't get sidetracked from our short-term goal to join the Eurozone;
3) we could use the crisis as a rare opportunity to cut some red tape (especially in terms of FDI and business environment), increase the overall efficiency of public governance, and get our public finances in order.
However, you aren't wrong in assuming that our proximity to the Nordics did play an important role in the economic and political development of the Baltic states. In fact, not long after the Baltic states regained their independence from the Soviet Union, it was Sweden, Finland, and Denmark in particular that helped the Baltics prepare for the EU and NATO membership. Denmark was an unofficial curator of Lithuania, Sweden was involved with Latvia, and Finland helped their beloved Estonians out.
@@JustasSireika Oh wow, I didn't know that fact that Denmark was curator of Lithuania. I remember those students exchange programs with Denmark right after Lithuania regained independence but never knew what was behind this. It makes so much sense now.
Amazing management of these economies. Such a good example. I wish southern Europe took not a "leaf or two from their manual" but the "whole book" by wich they got their strategy. The example of these countries should be a case study in southern Europe and there should be documentaries on national TV channels for people to understand why more state means more poverty. But I guess the modern censorship really opts for soccer and reality shows.
É...
It is a SMALL example. Small countries are much easier to govern and to streamline their bureaucracy. And it is always great to have bigger neighbours with higher taxes and more red tape around you. At the moment where all players play at the same level, the paradise is lost.
we are more for the dolce vitta :)
Exactly what I was thinking about! But here in Portugal we still blame Troika (which was here only for 3 years) for a stagnation of more than 20 ;) austerity is painful but sometimes needed, small countries can't grow just out of internal consumption. We have to atract business and create a competitive environment to prosper like these Baltic countries
@@tomasfontes3616 não há dúvida. Subscrevo totalmente.
Kind of wished Spain and Greece followed Latvia's plan?
its because western europe and North America never lived under comunism, and think that if things were organized by the state it would be better.
for instance, in portugal:
the left says: we are going to raise salaries
the rigth says: we are going to maintain salaries and reduce the public services (40% of the portuguese workforce is just state expenditure)
the people vote for the left, because they want to see their salaries grow and not be fired. how can I explain to them that if they voted for the rigth, they would get a better life in 15 years? the portuguese power of purchase is down 10% since the left took over, the country is under a demographic colapse and with a trade deficit. in 2011 it was close to a default because the government needed to get more debt to pay the intersts in old debt and the salaries of the public workforce. its just politics.
these people know that raising our minimum salary rigth now is going to bust dozens of companies that are under stress after the pandemic. the country is getting less competitive by the day and povety is increasing, so the government raises taxes on fluel, making our products even more expensive and less competitive. Our taxes are the highest they have ever been since the country was founded in 1143, but the socialist machine as to be fead. if they dont raise the salaries they will lose the next january election (and they have favours to give to the people that give them money)
and that's why this keeps hapening.
it's not because people are dumb (they are, but thats not the issue), its because economics is complicated and oximoric. raising the salaries of the lowest payed people in society is good, isnt it? ans who would be the monster to oppose it?
now try to explain to the factory emplyee or to the public servant that if their salary is raised for all this would mean enterprizes closing, moving to other countries ou not coming at all, leading to more unemployment and making more people emigrate, wich would mean more taxes and more debt until all it bursts and bum! we are in a 10 years long recession again and their purchase power is now 10% lower again!
we are voting for our own misery. and willingly so. beeing lied by our government and government controlled midia .
the pole say that the rulling party, the socialists will get 40% of the votes (tecnicly 15- 20%, because 60% of the portuguese eligible population doenst even care). and renovate their government with the support of labour and the comunist Marxist-leninist party (that cry in the day stalin died), that is estimated to compose 50-60% of the parliament.
this means: people have decided that they want to stay like this or dont even care, at least for the next 5 years. and why? because they belive that its better this way and do so since 1974.its because western europe and North America never lived under comunism, and think that if things were organized by the state it would be better.
for instance, in portugal:
the left says: we are going to raise salaries
the rigth says: we are going to maintain salaries and reduce the public services (40% of the portuguese workforce is just state expenditure)
the people vote for the left, because they want to see their salaries grow and not be fired. how can I explain to them that if they voted for the rigth, they would get a better life in 15 years? the portuguese power of purchase is down 10% since the left took over, the country is under a demographic colapse and with a trade deficit. in 2011 it was close to a default because the government needed to get more debt to pay the intersts in old debt and the salaries of the public workforce. its just politics.
these people know that raising our minimum salary rigth now is going to bust dozens of companies that are under stress after the pandemic. the country is getting less competitive by the day and povety is increasing, so the government raises taxes on fluel, making our products even more expensive and less competitive. Our taxes are the highest they have ever been since the country was founded in 1143, but the socialist machine as to be fead. if they dont raise the salaries they will lose the next january election (and they have favours to give to the people that give them money)
and that's why this keeps hapening.
it's not because people are dumb (they are, but thats not the issue), its because economics is complicated and oximoric. raising the salaries of the lowest payed people in society is good, isnt it? ans who would be the monster to oppose it?
now try to explain to the factory emplyee or to the public servant that if their salary is raised for all this would mean enterprizes closing, moving to other countries ou not coming at all, leading to more unemployment and making more people emigrate, wich would mean more taxes and more debt until all it bursts and bum! we are in a 10 years long recession again and their purchase power is now 10% lower again!
we are voting for our own misery. and willingly so. beeing lied by our government and government controlled midia .
the pole say that the rulling party, the socialists will get 40% of the votes (tecnicly 15- 20%, because 60% of the portuguese eligible population doenst even care). and renovate their government with the support of labour and the comunist Marxist-leninist party (that cry in the day stalin died), that is estimated to compose 50-60% of the parliament.
this means: people have decided that they want to stay like this or dont even care, at least for the next 5 years. and why? because they belive that its better this way and do so since 1974.
Stop comparing everyone to the Spanish! We try our best =(
Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania Basketball countries 🏀
Excellent job from the Baltic states...
Baltic ocupated lands by Balts form Russians
So interesting
Impressive! Those were bold decisions.
They need to diversify more their economy because there's a lot drain brain over there. They need more economic resilience.
👍
How do you think they survived and stayed resilient in the face of such a high unemployment?
Estonia barely had any brain drain. It was mostly the lower skilled who left and even that has ended.
Brain drain is not much of a problem because young professionals earn way above the national average but they all work in private industries. We need to increase the wages of government workers so those professionals have an incentive to work government jobs, right now those are in a very sad state.
The only brain drain I see is yours. Really agree with the other comments.You fail to consider that they are small countries and all 3 to various degrees are strong in IT and technology jobs. If any, professionals are poached by big firms BECAUSE?of their preparation, not the opposite.
Seems brutal! Hope it's working out! Went to Latvia as a kid right after the independence - drove hours and hours throgh forests to reach Smilene. I came back about half a decade later - and all the trees were just gone!
Nope, that's not true!
@Jakob Raahauge
Don`t worry! 52% of Latvia's territory are still forests and Latvia is one of the greenest countries in Europe.
Its incredible what some economic freedom will do for you
Hello from Ukraine🇺🇦🇺🇦🇺🇦