Hopeful news emerging from the Czech press today about the drastic increase in the number of Czech plumbers, carpenters, and au pairs returning to Cesko after extended stints abroad in more prosperous, more democratic EU nation-states.

A perplexing statistic -- which, in fact, made me go back and ponder precisely *what* some of our Czech and Slovak confreres are doing out in there in lands further to the West -- was rife with humour.

One Czech man quoted in the MfD (Mlata Fronta Dnes article I'd read -- and for our foreign readers, it translates roughly into "Brave Young Front," which, again in the Czech(oslovak) historical context, totally makes sense) -- who worked at a German abattoir over approximately eight years, recently returned home, earned just a single 50 eurocent pay raise over his entire time there. Since the MfD reporter in question furnished no additional details, my imagination ran amok: exactly why this man chose *not* to switch jobs earlier, given how they so meagrely respected his slicing and dicing talents, is beyond me. A statement about Czech assertiveness in the workplace, perhaps? I guess, in the best of Habsburgian Teutonic traditions, and in the words of one of my Romanian colleagues, Czechs, like their German cousins, believe that everyone has a boss.

Though none of this is neither here nor there. The wherewithal and total lack of confidence of the majority of of our underachieving Czech youngsters is not the point of my post.

What is, however, of issue here is the case of expatriates, and the reasons why expatriates continue to arrive in the Czech lands in 2008 and beyond. Moreover, what keeps them here?

::: BUZZ!!! :::

Give up? Survey says: "It's the economy, stupid!" (a Clinton-esque turn of phrase).

While Goldfinger-style opportunity-seeking still abounds, these days it has less to do with the dirty "byznys" of the early-'90s perpetrated most by our neighbours from the East who took due advantage of our society's near-total lack of respect for Czech administrative and judicial structures on the part of our local society.

These days, corporate and other entrepreneurial investments are generally (and this is really being generous!) "cleaner." Formal career postings the presently lure expatriates over to our fair lands offer much more in the way of professional advancement and higher remuneration, much more than they'd ever earn in their Western backwaters (egs. Iowa, Ohio, Saskatchewan) from whence they hail.

In the latter half of the new century's first decade, Westerners moving to the Czech capital now have to aggressively compete with not only their own sort, but now they're faced with the additional challenge from an upwardly-mobile young Czech business set who can do the job as good as they can -- in many cases even better than the average carpetbagging Western shlockmeister manipulated by colonial dreams of grandeur. And this, my friends, is precisely what the Czech engineers of our accession into the EU back in the late nineties partly envisioned...and partly *couldn't* envision. (Once you let the cat out of the bag, it's always hard to predict where things will end up).

Another word about statistics: while the common perception is that the number of Czechs working abroad in the EU is extraordinarily high, the facts tell a different story.

For our readers from abroad -- had you realized that the absolute number of Czech citizens working abroad doesn't exceed 80,000 persons? Okay, give or take another 20,000 or so young Czechs who live in crowded slum-style attic apartments in provincial British or Irish dungholes, smoking cheap cigarettes, commiserating in small Czech and Slovak coffee klatches, candoodling together -- boyfriend and girlfriend, that is, after long hard days at the office without showering, eating 3 square meals a day at Mickey D's in a way even Mr. SuperSize Me -- Morgan Spurlock himself -- would be poppa-proud of, and frequently doing very little during their non-work hours but criticize the failings of British or Irish (or, fill in with your favourite Western EU Bete Noire's name) society at large. And don't giggle! I know someone who was a part of this failed Czech wave of British work flight, and she told me that's what she and her comrades used to do. She left with high hopes. Came back like a sad-sack loser with her tail between her legs. Even her "friends" and parents told her so.

So this basically means it's mostly much ado about nothing! The media has apparently blown the entire emigration agenda totally out of proportion, making it out to be larger than it actually is. What's 80,000 citizens in reality?

Spittle in a bucket. Not many people, to be frank.

What's patently clear is the Czech economy is on fire. Ablaze, even. Euro, euro, where art thou?

In the immortal words of Joe Pesci: fuggedaboudit!