Voices of a decade
By : Juliet D. Golden
This is the second of a two-part series looking at how average Poles have fared during the decade-long economic transition. The following story examines how individuals are preparing for the next decade.
The concept of making do integral to his parents' generation causes Rafal Ratajek to cringe.
It is this idea that the 25-year-old travel agent, and much of his generation, has ardently rejected since the economic and political changes took hold 10 years ago. While his parents made do with the meager salary their generation often made at government-sponsored jobs, Ratajek said he would not allow himself, his wife and his 2-year-old child to lack in any basic, middle-class needs.
That idea prevents Ratajek from being able to live strictly on his monthly salary, pushing him time and again to look for other sources of funds to get by. "Every month I give out more money than I earn," said Ratajek, who would not reveal his monthly income. "I have to live. My son won't understand why he doesn't have diapers."
Like Ratajek, an entire generation of Poles is willing to place a bet that their earnings will be better in the future, and are willing to take on the short-term debt necessary to make ends meet now. As a result consumer credit growth has ballooned from 0.8% of gross domestic product (GDP) in 1991 to 4.3% of GDP in 1998. In 1993, for instance, average indebtness for a household was $100, and by 1998 it was $400 per household, according to an HSBC report from October 1999. At the same time, though, Poles' earnings are keeping pace, growing 13% in real terms since 1997.
That cycle of improvement is fueling a general belief among at least the middle and upper classes that there will be more resources tomorrow, a trend that marks a profound change in Polish mentality. In a country where chronic economic shortages caused people for much of the 1980s to barely make it through the day at hand, let alone think about tomorrow, a sense of optimism about the future was often lacking. But in the year 2000 Poles are not only planning for the future, but also taking the necessary financial and personal risks to improve their long-term situation.
"Before all people were ordinary people. Now if someone is ambitious and has a little bit of luck he can live well," Ratajek said. "Every person wants to reach the top. If times get hard, I don't want to tighten belts. Rather I want to prove myself."
In looking ahead, many Poles now have begun to question what the coming decades will hold for them. In a country that has experienced so much change in so little time, the answer is far from clear. "I know that in five years there will be a totally different world here, but I don't know what this world will look like," said Marcin Bodnar, 30, a restaurateur from Warsaw.
Despite the uncertainty, much of the population is assuming their country's economic situation will improve, and as a result are willing to make decisions today that will affect their lives a decade from now. Many more are looking to joining the European Union (EU), slated for 2003-2005, as key to continuing their country's advancement.
A new willingness to think about and plan for the future is apparent in the decisions much of the populace is making today. One example of this is the more than 8 million Poles who have already signed up to become members of private investment funds created under pension reform in 1999. At the same time, millions of individuals have plowed money into the Warsaw Stock Exchange (WSE). In terms of market capitalization, roughly 10% of all investment into the WSE stems from private individuals, with institutional investors comprising the rest.
But not all Poles are greeting the future with vigor. Along with economic opportunities comes social disparity, a gap that has particularly widened in certain fields. People interviewed for this article wondered what in the next 10 years would happen to the 25% of the workforce who are employed in the troubled sector of agriculture. Others expressed concern about the 12% of the working population currently unemployed and were afraid of how older generations, who lack well-honed business and language skills, will fare.
Responsible for all
Katarzyna Dziewulska, a 26-year-old travel agent who works with Ratajek, said she was worried about how her parents would cope once she moves out and sets up her own home. Right now she lives with her father, who is retired, and her mother, who brings in a small income from her job at a day care center. One-third of Dziewulska's monthly salary, which she also wouldn't reveal, is given to her parents to help shore up their meager earnings.
"I come from an average family. My parents can't maintain the standard of living they could a couple of years ago," Dziewulska said. "I am tied to them. I have to give them a small part of my salary. What will happen when I have my own family?"
Many in Dziewulska's generation carry the same burden, and the same choice. While their future, if they are educated, is fairly bright, the opportunities for their parents are decidedly limited. And this generation suffers another difficulty defining what exactly their future aspirations are. Growing up in families that had few choices, these 20- and 30-somethings are ill-equipped to chart a 10-, 15- and 20-year life plan.
Pawel Dytrych, 20, knows one thing: having a university degree better ensures that he will be able to provide well for himself and any future family. He is not quite sure, however, what he wants to study. The grandson of pensioner Helena Dziedzic (mentioned in the previous article), Dytrych knows that his parents and grandparents expect him to take advantage of the education they were denied. As a result, Dytrych is busy taking sample matura exams, the test that all secondary students must pass to gain admittance to a university.
"For sure I am going to study. I like the fact that people who study earn more money," Dytrych said. "They don't pay these days for physical labor, but for mental work."
That's something Dytrych knows first hand. Lacking a university degree, his father has supported the family as a fruit and vegetable vendor in an open market. In the last year, sales have dwindled with the opening of a Carrefour shopping mall nearby.
That means that the family income is less stable and that Dytrych's father may be forced to look for other ways to supplement his income. "There aren't any other options," Dytrych's grandmother said.
A university education is not something Dytrych's father was able to enjoy. Raised by a single mother who needed her children to help support the family, Dytrych's father didn't have a chance to get a better start.
As a pharmacy clerk, Dytrych's grandmother's base salary was not enough to feed their family of three and under the socialist system there weren't many opportunities to boost income levels, barring excursions abroad working on the black market in Western Europe. Pensioner Dziedzic laments the limited choices available to her son.
"At the time, it was zl. 700 a month and that was it," she said, clearly upset at the memory. "How could he go to school? He had to go to work."
Betting on the future
To give their kids a better future, Poles are planning more, but also willing to stretch themselves financially in the mid-term. They are also becoming savvier in financial instruments to help get them through the hard times. While the generation under communism was limited to what was available, the new generation is busy taking loans, buying on installments and maxing out credit cards to buy what they want now.
"I have every credit card available on the market," travel agent Ratajek said.
Ratajek so relies on access to credit that he recently moved his account to a new bank after his old bank would not issue him an additional card because he had exceeded his credit limit.
Years ago, Ratajek would have just walked away frustrated. Now, however, he surveyed several of the newly opened retail banks until he found one that would meet his needs. "I moved to another bank," he said. "I settle everything over the phone."
Even the pensioner Dziedzic gets herself into debt. Her small two-room apartment that she bought six years ago has been completely refurbished through a series of purchases on installment plans. In May, the pensioner will have new plastic windows and a balcony door paid for after a year of paying one-fourth of her zl. 800 monthly pension to installments. "It's hard. I have payments, but I am grateful," Dziedzic said.
Not everybody is focusing on immediate gratification, however. Adam Stracha, a 54-year-old driver for a former collective farm (PGR) near Olawa, is hoping that he and fellow farm owners will eventually turn their beleaguered agriculture enterprise around. He said that ideally the farm, which is now owned by him and 100 other former employees, would eventually become profitable enough to sustain each of its owners. "I won't have much from this," Stracha said. "But even though things are difficult that doesn't mean that we have to stand still."
Big brother EU
For most of the Poles interviewed for this article, the fastest way to improve their standard of living is to join the EU. To do that, however, the population will likely have to vote in a referendum on the issue, and its passage is far from guaranteed.
The government has spent the last several years preparing its negotiating position for union accession. Those talks, particularly concerning issues such as agriculture, free movement of labor and land sales, are expected to be trying. But the real battle may be on the home front.
Cyclical opinion polls show that support for joining the EU is dwindling. Whereas in May 1996 80% of Poles backed the idea of entering the EU, in November last year that number fell to 59%, according to Centrum Badania Opinii Spolecznej (CBOS).
Indeed, Edmund Korynek, a 43-year-old carpenter from Wroclaw goes so far as to predict that Poles will turn down the offer. "Society was deceived by the government about entering the EU. The government hasn't explained what it's all about," he said. "I myself don't know what good for me will come out of our joining the EU."
Like many, he fears that Poland will submit to all of the EU's requests, such as open markets and free land sales, which currently are restricted. In return, though, he is afraid Poland will be treated as a second-class citizen its populace unable to work in Western Europe markets and its goods still barred from Western markets because of their perceived inferior quality.
"We are lowering ourselves to them. We are begging them to take us in. I don't see why," Korynek said. "We are opening up markets to them and what are they opening for us, practically nothing."
Stracha the truck driver, however, disagreed. He said that EU entry and the ensuing regulations and quality standards were the best way of budging rural Poland out of its malaise.
"I don't see any other way. We will be with the best and we will have to match up to them," Stracha said. "One shouldn't look toward those who are worse off one should look to where it's better."
