Kariņš's government promises to promote even faster depopulation of Latvia
According to polls, Western Europe is most concerned about climate change, but Latvia's biggest problem is depopulation. Not only from the national ethnic point of view that there are fewer and fewer Latvians in the world and we are a dying nation, but also from a purely practical, economic point of view.
There are too few people in Latvia to maintain and, above all, improve the existing infrastructure. For example, it is difficult for us to create a railway passenger transport network like the one in Western Europe, because there are simply not so many people who would travel on the notional Riga-Liepāja route on a daily basis. This is true not just for such large projects. It is difficult to open and maintain a shop, cafe, hairdresser shop if there is a shortage of people in the area.
The previous "success story" of Unity (Vienotība) caused a great deal of damage in this area, as a result of which not only Valdis Dombrovskis, the main "hero" of this story, went to Europe in search of money, but also many others. Before him, 100,000 to 200,000 beneficiaries of the "success story" went to the strawberry fields of England and Ireland. Now many of them have already moved up the career ladder, opened their small businesses, settled down, receive social guarantees there and are talking to their children more often in English than in Latvian. Some have returned, but many still cannot heal the resentment wounds and do not want to hear anything positive about Latvia.
A question may arise - but what does this have to do with Kariņš's government? A lot of time has passed since the previous wave of emigration and economic life in Latvia had almost returned to normal. Of course, you can always wish for better, and Uldis Rutkaste, an economist at the Bank of Latvia, has just published an article pointing out that due to the tight credit policy of our banks, the Latvian economy continues to lag behind its neighbors, but this is another topic.
Thus, until Covid, Latvia had a somewhat modest, but sustainable economic development, and the living standards of the workers in terms of purchasing power parity gradually approached the level of England/Ireland. Many emigrants returned and started their own small businesses. Covid dealt a heavy blow to the small businesses. This was the case around the world, and in many places, governments sought to at least partially compensate businesses for lost revenue. The Kariņš/Reirs government stood out with exceptional greed and nitpicking, but let's not talk about it this time either, because it is already in the past. Now the next blow to business is being made, and Kariņš promises more and more severe blows, which will further promote depopulation. What am I talking about?
In the first sentence of this article, I named the main problem of Latvia - the declining population at an already low population density. Here, the word "population" could be supplemented by the words "economically active". So it is not only the population that matters but also the economic activity of these people. Especially their consumption. If a person does not consume anything and lives on his own subsistence farm, then his contribution to the country's overall economy is quite insignificant.
In Latvia (as elsewhere in the West), the activity of unvaccinated people is being restricted. For example, such people cannot stay indoors in public diners, they cannot attend cultural and sports events. Considering that the proportion of unvaccinated people in Latvia is about half (among the economically active - about a third), it is clear that even partial exclusion of these people from economic circulation affects the business climate in the country. Many catering establishments are already laying off staff, as the number of customers has fallen significantly as the outdoor terraces have closed.
Another aspect must be taken into account here. Many of those who have a valid Covid certificate are not at all enthusiastic about the need to show it every time they enter any establishment, so they avoid such places if they can. However, Kariņš directly promises only to strengthen the restrictions for unvaccinated people.
In this way, he hopes to increase the attractiveness of vaccination and make life more difficult for the unvaccinated, including those who are disgusted by this dividing of people. From the point of view of vaccination coverage, he is probably right, and some stubborn people will give up and be vaccinated due to the burdens imposed. However, this “method” of Kariņš hits the economy hard, especially small businesses, which in turn pours water on the depopulation mill, because: 1) it reduces the desire of the emigrants to return to their homeland; 2) promotes frustration for those who have returned and started their own business, but are now considering leaving again; 3) gives the idea of emigrating to those who have been living here so far and have not wanted to go anywhere.
In general, no research is needed to understand that the only way to stop (reduce) depopulation at completely open borders is to bring the standard of living in Latvia closer to Western Europe. Anything that negatively impacts the economy contributes to the emigration of people. It can be argued here that all these restrictions are intended precisely to reduce human mortality and, consequently, depopulation. This is how it may seem on paper, but from a practical point of view, population dynamics are mainly influenced by the actions of economically active people of fertile age. Among them, Covid mortality is less common than death in car accidents, but they are the ones who create the business climate in the country. The exclusion of even some of these people from circulation will create insurmountable development gaps in the future for countries such as Latvia (with negative population dynamics and living standards below the EU average).
Fans of severe restrictions can say that other countries are introducing similar measures. In Italy, for example, the unvaccinated are subject to even harsher restrictions than those imposed on bandits/recidivists, i.e., the unvaccinated are basically left without a livelihood. But it is not for nothing that I started the article with the fact that in the Western world, the main problem of society is climate change and the amount of carbon dioxide emissions that are supposedly related to it.
According to this doctrine, people consume too much and thus generate both large amounts of emissions and waste. The number of people on the planet is also too big, and a non-violent reduction of this number is only to be supported. Although not specifically talked about in Western Europe, the actualization of climate problems is the reprogramming of society to the new paradigm - the fewer people, the better. The lower the consumption, the better. It can even be said that the opinion is gradually being changed by 180 degrees, because what was considered bad until recently - low birth rate and low consumption - is now acknowledged as good.
The new, ever-increasing Covid restrictions fit precisely into this new thinking matrix, and as the world tends to adapt, the same song is being sung by our globalists, the Kariņš/Pavļuts' clique. Unfortunately, these interests of globalists are completely opposite to the interests of the Latvian people.