Re: Doubtful [was: [OT] Notes from a European traveller}

Mike L wrote:

[...]

A strange assumption. I neither fear nor dislike central or eastern
Europe. And if I did, I'd have hoped you'd know me well enough by now
to be pretty sure the feeling wasn't motivated by any kind of
chauvinism. It's simply that I can't easily believe that a unit can be
made comfortable and efficient with so many languages, and I'm worried
about the downward pressure on wages.

English is already establishing itself as the European "lingua franca",
not so much because of the (half-hearted) UK commitment to the EU but
because of the enormous global influence of the USA on nearly everything.
Most of the radio and television interviews with non-German speakers here
in Austria take place in English and are dubbed into German. A lot of the
stuff I have translated from German into English was intended for the
countries of Eastern Europe. Within the not so distant future, an
adequate command of English in addition to one's native language will be
a requirement for anyone claiming to be educated, and the more countries
and languages involved, the faster this process will be. Publishing
everything in every EU language will be even more of a nightmare for the
bureaucrats in Brussels than it is now, but it may well force them to
write their legislation etc. in simple language that normal people can
understand -- or stop writing so much.

During every run-up to the accession of more EU member states, the problem
of downward pressure on wages is taken up not only by thoughtful people
who are genuinely concerned, but also by all manner of anti-EU lobbyists
and Blut und Boden populists. Austria's former PR manager, Jörg Haider,
gathered many votes and much public sympathy by predicting that the
accession of Portugal to the EU in 1986 would result in thousands of
Portugese hairdressers packing their scissors, getting on their bikes and
heading east to shear the denizens of the Alps. They haven't arrived
yet -- but maybe they're cycling slowly.

Even if there is a problem to start with, the long-term effect will be
that the standards of living in the different member states approach a
similar level (which will mean similar wages everywhere) and, in the
medium term, the more developed countries will get rich selling to the
less developing countries all the electronic and other crap the
inhabitants of the latter have seen on American TV series and which they
are convinced they cannot do without.

--
Les (BrE)
.

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