Both populations have a high work ethos and plead for multilinguism. However, unlike Flanders, Luxembourg is rather modest in promoting its 'native' language among newcomers, perhaps because of the low number of speakers. Luxembourg didn't apply for the recognition of Luxembourgish as a European language, whereas Irish and Maltese are now recognised European languages. The real language of Luxembourg is not Luxembourgish but trilinguism (Luxembourgish, French and German). The 'foreign' languages German and French are not foreign; they are part of daily life.
Luxembourg is very open to immigration. The reason is that Luxembourg believes immigration brings welfare. This is actually true for Luxembourg. Luxembourg knows very few integration problems compared to the neighbour countries, but the immigrants usually only move in after they found a job in Luxembourg, so that the employment rate of the newcomers must be close to 100%. On the real estate market, there is no balance between offer and demand, families usually buy their property at a price that reaches their pain threshold.
Due to the size of the country, the political and economic decision makers know each other well. This leads to very fruitful cooperation and fast decision making, not impeded by too much internal friction. As a result, Luxembourg has always been able to start industry reconversion in time and this is now happening again.
Luxembourg is quiet, rural and relatively sparsely populated. It is safe and secure and has low tax rates. The risk of being so quiet is for the politicians: the smallest detail in politics can grow to awful dimensions. Like (most) Belgians, Luxembourgers are European minded and plead for further European integration.
No comments:
Post a Comment