Catastrophist analysis of the future of the 70ies generation in Hungary
Despite I always complain about Hungarian pessimism, I would like to warn young Hungarians about what sort of future might be awaiting them. As some Hungarian friend just told me on the phone, none. Of course, that was a joke. I hope my warnings don’t cause more pessimism, but help to understand the situation and act with responsibility.
I have the feeling that some of the worst legacies of Communism in Hungary have been pessimism, fear and conformism, which still remain in Hungarian society. I have met many people that think this way: ‘If something may go wrong, it will surely go wrong, so why try it?’ or ‘There is nothing worse than failure, so let’s not try anything new, let’s not assume responsibilities if they involve risks’ or even ‘What we have is bad, but there is nothing we can do to change it, it is always someone else’s fault’. Other examples of this mentality would be ‘Never admit one’s mistake, because that is something very shameful...’. I think that this attitude I’m talking about comes from the lack of freedom of the communist times, the ban on new ideas or attitudes, the paternalism of the State. People were not the entire owner of their own future, so they didn’t think about it with responsibility and only tried to follow the way marked by the regime and not make mistakes. They had to be careful not to show themselves too much, to be too original. Also, some of these characteristics may also come from the mixture of the equalitarian and paternal system that some anthropologists say it is part of the Hungarian culture. But this is too difficult to me.
A consequence of that is a need to follow orders, a strong effort to be within the main stream, and a lack of vision and responsibility towards the future. The future is decided by external rules, but never questioned by oneself. Of course, I am exaggerating in order to explain my ideas. But what I want to say is that people are uncomfortable with making their own decisions and are not used to thinking about their own long-term future.
But before I lose the thread, I would like to come back to the main point of this article, the future of the generation born in the 70ies, early 80ies. I would try to be concrete and schematic (something very difficult to me):
- With the change of regime, there was a need of newly educated working force. The old generation wasn’t good for many of the new posts of the new regime, some of them created with the arrival of foreign companies. Suddenly young generations (of the 70ies and early 80ies) had very good job opportunities, which in other countries only seniors have.
- Many of those young freshly employed have been enjoying better salaries than their parents, meaning that they have reached success in an early stage of their life. Of course, life has been difficult for many people, but a significant rate of young people has been very lucky and has had good opportunities and salaries. How many young people have a better car than their parents?
- Besides, many of them received support from their parents (like it used to be necessary during the communism) and got a free apartment, for example, a very common thing in Hungary which enormously eases their economic situation.
- So suddenly life became quite easy for them. Some of them may have experienced that they have everything they want without hardly any effort. Some of them don’t care much about the future because they never learnt how to do it, everything was quiet easy for them, they live the present, they have everything, more than they expected when they were kids, and they didn’t learn to have further ambitions because they are already better than their parents. They have provided themselves with all necessary (according to their parents) but they remain naïve and somehow scared before life.
- But future may be a little bit tougher, if they don’t learn to plan and care about it (which doesn’t mean adopting a catastrophist attitude, but having ambitions and fighting for it):
- The generation behind them may be an important competition in the labour market. They may be even better educated and the entrance of more people in the labour market will put pressure on salaries. Companies will be able to employ someone else, younger, cheaper and better prepared, so salaries will stop increasing.
- Also, the political situation has created a false reality in the country. The forint was too strong, so Hungary became suddenly expensive and people could buy foreign goods that some years before they could have not. Besides, people paid too little taxes in relation to what they got in exchange from the State. But the country’s economy had not grown as quickly as people’s purchasing power.
- Now they situation needs to be fixed, the state’s debt has increased a lot and it will need to be solved with more taxes and less benefits. People will have to work more to buy imported goods because Forint’s price has returned to the reality (the only way to be competitive, to export). Summarizing: more taxes, higher prices, less purchasing power.
- But one very important issue that affects youngsters is the retirement of their parents. On the one hand, the state won’t be able to pay the retirement of their parents, because it hasn’t enough money. Moreover, most of the aging people don’t have private pension plan, they never thought it was necessary. Besides, the living expectancy of the mature people is increasing significantly (better food and living conditions), and the birth rate is very low, which again it means the State won’t have money to pay pensions to retired people. Therefore, the people in the 20ies and 30ies now will have to provide for their parents, who will live long, too long....
- In the top of all, the young and casual generation will once feel like they need a family, which means much more expenses than living alone. And their parents won’t be able to help them anymore!
Well, this is just a catastrophist analysis, not to be taken too seriously, not to offend anyone (though I admit it sounds offensive). I just want to express some ideas (maybe a little bit provocative) that may be of some interest to someone. By the way, today I also went to the beach, fantastic weather, but it is going to change soon, so maybe it was the last day this year in Barcelona.
Despite I always complain about Hungarian pessimism, I would like to warn young Hungarians about what sort of future might be awaiting them. As some Hungarian friend just told me on the phone, none. Of course, that was a joke. I hope my warnings don’t cause more pessimism, but help to understand the situation and act with responsibility.
I have the feeling that some of the worst legacies of Communism in Hungary have been pessimism, fear and conformism, which still remain in Hungarian society. I have met many people that think this way: ‘If something may go wrong, it will surely go wrong, so why try it?’ or ‘There is nothing worse than failure, so let’s not try anything new, let’s not assume responsibilities if they involve risks’ or even ‘What we have is bad, but there is nothing we can do to change it, it is always someone else’s fault’. Other examples of this mentality would be ‘Never admit one’s mistake, because that is something very shameful...’. I think that this attitude I’m talking about comes from the lack of freedom of the communist times, the ban on new ideas or attitudes, the paternalism of the State. People were not the entire owner of their own future, so they didn’t think about it with responsibility and only tried to follow the way marked by the regime and not make mistakes. They had to be careful not to show themselves too much, to be too original. Also, some of these characteristics may also come from the mixture of the equalitarian and paternal system that some anthropologists say it is part of the Hungarian culture. But this is too difficult to me.
A consequence of that is a need to follow orders, a strong effort to be within the main stream, and a lack of vision and responsibility towards the future. The future is decided by external rules, but never questioned by oneself. Of course, I am exaggerating in order to explain my ideas. But what I want to say is that people are uncomfortable with making their own decisions and are not used to thinking about their own long-term future.
But before I lose the thread, I would like to come back to the main point of this article, the future of the generation born in the 70ies, early 80ies. I would try to be concrete and schematic (something very difficult to me):
- With the change of regime, there was a need of newly educated working force. The old generation wasn’t good for many of the new posts of the new regime, some of them created with the arrival of foreign companies. Suddenly young generations (of the 70ies and early 80ies) had very good job opportunities, which in other countries only seniors have.
- Many of those young freshly employed have been enjoying better salaries than their parents, meaning that they have reached success in an early stage of their life. Of course, life has been difficult for many people, but a significant rate of young people has been very lucky and has had good opportunities and salaries. How many young people have a better car than their parents?
- Besides, many of them received support from their parents (like it used to be necessary during the communism) and got a free apartment, for example, a very common thing in Hungary which enormously eases their economic situation.
- So suddenly life became quite easy for them. Some of them may have experienced that they have everything they want without hardly any effort. Some of them don’t care much about the future because they never learnt how to do it, everything was quiet easy for them, they live the present, they have everything, more than they expected when they were kids, and they didn’t learn to have further ambitions because they are already better than their parents. They have provided themselves with all necessary (according to their parents) but they remain naïve and somehow scared before life.
- But future may be a little bit tougher, if they don’t learn to plan and care about it (which doesn’t mean adopting a catastrophist attitude, but having ambitions and fighting for it):
- The generation behind them may be an important competition in the labour market. They may be even better educated and the entrance of more people in the labour market will put pressure on salaries. Companies will be able to employ someone else, younger, cheaper and better prepared, so salaries will stop increasing.
- Also, the political situation has created a false reality in the country. The forint was too strong, so Hungary became suddenly expensive and people could buy foreign goods that some years before they could have not. Besides, people paid too little taxes in relation to what they got in exchange from the State. But the country’s economy had not grown as quickly as people’s purchasing power.
- Now they situation needs to be fixed, the state’s debt has increased a lot and it will need to be solved with more taxes and less benefits. People will have to work more to buy imported goods because Forint’s price has returned to the reality (the only way to be competitive, to export). Summarizing: more taxes, higher prices, less purchasing power.
- But one very important issue that affects youngsters is the retirement of their parents. On the one hand, the state won’t be able to pay the retirement of their parents, because it hasn’t enough money. Moreover, most of the aging people don’t have private pension plan, they never thought it was necessary. Besides, the living expectancy of the mature people is increasing significantly (better food and living conditions), and the birth rate is very low, which again it means the State won’t have money to pay pensions to retired people. Therefore, the people in the 20ies and 30ies now will have to provide for their parents, who will live long, too long....
- In the top of all, the young and casual generation will once feel like they need a family, which means much more expenses than living alone. And their parents won’t be able to help them anymore!
Well, this is just a catastrophist analysis, not to be taken too seriously, not to offend anyone (though I admit it sounds offensive). I just want to express some ideas (maybe a little bit provocative) that may be of some interest to someone. By the way, today I also went to the beach, fantastic weather, but it is going to change soon, so maybe it was the last day this year in Barcelona.
posted by Marcal | 19:11
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