YucaLandia
Jul 8, 2011, 1:00 AM
Post #7 of 8
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Re: [La Isla] Better Lives for Mexicans Cut Allure of Going North
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What a fun discussion !
Mexico is ______. Mexican's are ________. Mexico used to be ________. Mexico should be ______.
Is it possible that Mexico is so diverse that one can point to significant exceptions and contradictions to any and all generalizations about Mexico and Mexicans?
The fertility rate differences are significant, especially when contrasting rural vs urban areas here in the Sureste. Yucatan's fertility rates have been the highest in Mexico since at least 1970 (4.3 kids per woman), and that had fallen to just 3.9 kids/mujer by 2000, but there are big disparities between women in the countryside and pueblos vs the 400,000 women in Merida. Lots of 1 or 2 child families in the city vs 6 - 10 child families in the country. Still, Yucatan's population doubled between 1970 and 2000 as our henequin industry was seriously declining, causing lots of people of Mayan heritage to move from the countryside, doubling Merida's and Cancun's populations. Even though commerce has grown dramatically in Merida and standards of living are much higher than in the past, our 18-30 yr olds are seriously under-employed.
The 2% figure for indigenous University enrollment also does not fit our burgeoning university student population here. A simple survey of the % of brown faces at my wife's university (UADY) and at my sister-in-law's university, and close friends' other universities show at least 60% (if not 80%) of our university students would be officially considered Natives by US standards. Maybe El Universal goes by some 87% or higher blood quantum (nonsense) standard to qualify someone as "indigenous" ( indigenous = 7 "full blood" Native great-grandparents?) to get their 2% indigenous population estimate? El Universal's charges of serious discrimination and racism against "indigenous" students just don't seem to hold water based on the student bodies of Yucatan's universities. What do expats see in other areas? All white and only white students?
Maybe each person's perspective on Mexico is more a reflection of that individual's world-views, than they are broad truths about what "Mexico" and "Mexicans" are. Or maybe 30% of any group is a significantly large number?
If 70% are thriving or doing ok, and 30% are living week-to-week, is it a healthy society or a society doing poorly?
2/3 of American families were renters before 1950, living week to week on the their paychecks, and the Universities were basically closed to blue-collar families, but would people consider the USA of that era as backwards and poor? Did the 30% of Americans who owned property mean that America was an affluent nation?
Over 95% of Mexicans (in homes) actually own their homes vs the US, where most people's homes are owned by the banks (having a $100K - $500K mortgage means you don't actually own the home). Which is more healthy, a society where the average adult carries $9,000 dollars of unpaid monthly credit card debt at 14% interest and who don't own the cars they drive, or is a cash-and-carry society where people actually own their cars, their homes, have no personal debts, but don't "own" as much stuff - better?
Is it better to have a government that has big cash reserves and whose bonds are ranked in the top 5 in the world - with 30% of its populace living week-to-week, or is it better to have a government with near 100% debt/GDP and nearly $15 trillion in obligations that it will likely never pay back, and a populace who has the biggest personal debt levels in the world?
Both of our daughters live and work in the USA, while we live and work here, so, we see opportunities on both sides of the border. We know lots of locals who have returned to Yucatan in the past 3 years, after working for years in the USA, along with lots of people who stayed here doing what-ever work they can to find work. Things don't have to be dyadic (Rich/Poor, Black/White, Pretty/Ugly, Fat/Thin). Reality is often paradoxical, and the Mexico we know is marvelously diverse.
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Read-on MacDuff
E-visit at http://yucalandia.wordpress.com/
(This post was edited by YucaLandia on Jul 8, 2011, 1:16 AM)
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