Hungary – why staying is not an option for many anymore

If we first look at some statistics the country seems to be on a really good way. The rate of unemployment decreased from 6.2 % in November 2015 to around 4.5% in November 2016. According to statictics ranking the rate of unemployment of all countries in Europe in October 2016 from the highest to the lowest Hungary is on the 29th place with 4.9% two places before Germany with 4.1%. So this number is actually really low compared to e.g. Greece with the highest unemployment rate all over Europe with 23.4%. 

Also the youth unemployment rate in Hungary decreased extremely between 2013 and 2015 namely from 26.6% to 17.3% or rather 15.3 % in the fourth quarter of 2015 according to ec.europa.eu. Another statistics from statista.com shows that the youth employment in Hungary in March 2015 was with 19.3%  below the average rate in Europe with 20.9%. Compared to Spain and Greece with 49.9%  and 49.7% Hungary seemed to be on a quite good 18th place.

So why do people still want to leave a country that now doesn’t seem to be that bad of a place to live in anymore? How does it come that „[p]rior to the world financial crisis of 2008, only 17,000 Hungarians lived in the United Kingdom [and by] 2011 this number had already increased to 44,000 according to the researchers“? Why is Hungary facing the problem of a brain drain that „is getting worse as more and more young, educated workers leave  the country“ as reported by the Hungarian daily economic news site in November 2015?

After the end of communism in Hungary in 1989 the situation changed a lot and it came to a sort of redistribution.  A small part of the Hungarian society managed to gain a lot of money in a really short time during the majority due to inflation and close-downs of lots of enterprises basically just couldn’t keep up. Still today you will see mainly foreign branches being extremely successful in Hungary during local sellers seem to struggle. Back in that time „just a third of the Hungarian society could preserve the former standard of living“. Of course already in times of communism there were differences concerning people’s property but due to the limitations of property in the daily life the differences were barely visible.

Because of this development or rather change lots of people started to share the opinion that nowadays hard work doesn’t really pay off in Hungary anymore. And even today’s children seem to share this opinion. The consequences of this are that the qualified ones try to go abroad to start a new live e.g. in Germany, Austria or Great Britain during lots of others will be somehow left behind. Another problem in the Hungarian society is the quite high consumption of alcohol and also drugs. Some children just don’t receive enough help, education and protection from home and especially for them it’s hard to break out of this circle.

So in a nutshell big parts of Hungary’s today’s youth – of course this doesn’t contain all children and students and this information is based on people’s sensation – have a lack of interest in learning, see money as most important and essential in life and are losing the team spirit the country once used to have.

„For ordinary people low wages, high taxes, and rampant corruption have become an obstacle to a decent life“, says another article. According to statistics Hungary is on the 7th place of all countries with the most annual working hours and still the wages are very low compared to other European countries. Another problem are the high taxes that were near 50% in 2016. A young man that describes the seven reasons why he’s leaving Hungary in an article says: „For eight years my taxes have supported corrupt politicians and a state that increasingly fails to provide basic services.“ This is a really strong statement in my eyes.

It also shows that many people here are against the policy of Viktor Mihály Orbán but somehow I feel that many are afraid of saying things like this out loud. The political situation seems to be really tense. I came here with the huge aim to talk to people and have serious and important discussions. But first of all the language barriere is still a problem and second of all lots of Hungarians are open-minded and extremely unhappy about the recent political situation. Off-the-record some told me that they voted for Orbán six years ago and never expected him to destroy the whole democratic system in only six years. Also they said that right now there is just no political alternative since there is „no real opposition today“. Also there is a lot of political propanda everywhere which is full of „immigrant-bashing and anti-Brussels messages“.  At last but not least political connections are more and more important and corruption is becoming a serious problem.  One of the man‘s seven reasons against staying here forever is: „I want to live in a country[…] where crime is prosecuted regardless of the political connections of the suspect.“

Before Hungary will help other European countries in the whole immigrant crisis by e.g. taking a certain amount of refugees it needs to have a political alternative that also gives very poor people hope to not be left behind anymore. It needs to become a place where working hard everyday pays off and where corruption, drugs, alcohol, unemployment and homelessness are fought. Before the Hungarians will feel able to help others who are fleeing from war, destruction and suffering they need to feel not suffering themselves anymore.

Sources:

http://www.tradingeconomics.com/hungary/unemployment-rate

http://budapestbeacon.com/public-policy/hungarys-brain-drain-young-and-highly-educated-leaving-in-droves/29309

https://www.owep.de/artikel/443/jugendlichen-in-ungarn

https://meanwhileinbudapest.com/2016/06/04/7-reasons-i-am-leaving-hungary/

https://meanwhileinbudapest.com/2016/06/07/taxation-of-labour-in-hungary-2016/