It’s worth noting that the sudden acceleration in population loss wasn’t driven by a mortality surge or a plunge in fertility. Estonia’s natural rate of population loss actually improved significantly, and the country’s birth and death rates are more than respectable for Eastern Europe. The sudden plunge in Estonia’s population was driven by a large increase in emigration. That is to say, despite online business registration and fancy tech start-ups, increasing numbers of Estonians have decided that their futures are best pursued elsewhere. This is a fact that is curiously absent from The Economist’s narrative: why would people be abandoning such a fresh, dynamic, and innovative place? I would hazard a guess that it has something to do with the fact that tech start-ups (by definition) employ tiny numbers of people and are a very poor foundation for a country’s overall labor market.
Posted on: Wed, 17 Jul 2013 08:05:22 +0000
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