Global Migration

I was reading the New York Times today and I saw that Vermont is experiencing an exodus of young people.

The state is worried because a) it's bad for your image if you're losing population and b) there are fewer working people to pay for the services so beloved by the old folks at home.

Vermont, of course, is not alone. Lots of places at the periphery (you are so not at the centre of the universe, baby) have the same problem. Russia, Britain, the U.S., Africa, China -- all over the world, there's a perceptible shift in population from the rural hinterland to the urban centres.

It made me think of my beloved Northern Ontario, which has been wracked by youth out-migration for the last two decades.

Here's the difference, though. And it's an interesting one.

Vermont can take action to try to stem the tide of its young people. It can apply its ingenuity. It can call upon its people to rally 'round the cause. It can try its damnedness to stem the outflow. It may fail. But at least it can try.

Northern Ontario can do nothing but watch the lifeblood of its future slip away.

Vermont, you see, is a state. It has a governor. And a state legislature. And a voice in federal Congress and Senate. It has State Power.

With a population of 620,000 people. Count 'em. Six hundred and twenty thousand.

Northern Ontario, with a population of close to 800,000, has nothing. Even though it has way more people than little Vermont, it has no government to look out for it. Not even close to a state legislature. It has nothing. It has no counties. Even though it has districts, it has no district governments. It has no regional governments beyond municipalities. It has nothing but municipalities and the provincial government.

It is a big (800,000 square kilometres), sorry, democratic wasteland. No voice, no power, no nothing.

It can only sit, watch and hope that the provincial legislature in far-off Toronto -- which has problems of too many people in too small an area -- puts aside some time one day to consider the problems of the distant north.

About as likely as the wealthy West doing more than lip-service about the problems of Africa.

Lucky Vermont.

Poor Northern Ontario.

How sad.

Another democratic deficit.