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Bulgarian roads

Started by bing101, September 17, 2024, 12:10:34 PM

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bing101



Chris

I didn't watch the whole hour-long video, but Bulgaria has several specific problems.


Almost all traffic to Turkey from Europe travels through Bulgaria. This includes a lot of fatigued drivers, there are a lot of stories of people from Turkish background driving to Edirne or Istanbul in one day from Germany or the Netherlands. That could be a 20+ hour ride. Truck traffic to Europe is not only originating in Istanbul, but also from much farther into Turkey. It's not really uncommon to see Turkish trucks from cities near the Syrian border.

Bulgaria has hit a lot of problems developing its road network. It has an extremely unstable government, next month will be the 7th parliamentary election since 2021. The country is not very effective in getting EU funding for road upgrades. The gap between Romania and Bulgaria in that aspect is growing rapidly.

Bulgaria has an outright population collapse. The birth rate is extremely low and almost all younger people migrate to other European countries for work, due to the low wages in Bulgaria. Its population decline is one of the worst in the world, from 9 million in 1988 to 6.4 million today. Its population declined by 1 million in just the last 10 years alone, which erodes the Bulgarian tax base and workforce.

The incomes in Bulgaria have not benefited from the economic boom across Eastern Europe in the past 10 years. Usually, Romania and Bulgaria are considered to be 'very similar' and always rank last on many EU indicators. However, Romania and Bulgaria are culturally, linguistically and economically very different. The average gross wage in Romania is now almost 50% higher than in Bulgaria.

So while Bulgaria struggles, Romania is growing rapidly, leaving Bulgaria farther and farther behind on most EU indicators.



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