Quote:
Originally Posted by Acajack
I even noticed this as a kid. My parents were from small Acadian towns in the Maritimes that weren't in rich areas, but they were noticeably more vibrant than many neighbouring anglo towns. That's because the anglo towns had emptied out first. Now the emptying out trend has finally hit the Acadian towns, and they're being hit hard. The feeling of decline stings less in the anglo towns because they already bottomed out long ago. No one there (in the anglo towns) has memories of streets and parks filled with kids and parades in the streets as recently as the early 90s...
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Part of this must just be because there are more easy options if you speak English.
But an interesting angle is that an affinity for moving around is definitely part of the cultural DNA in a lot of Atlantic Canada, just as it seems to be in the British Isles. This probably started because so many people lived in port towns and worked in some sort of seafaring profession (which became empire building, banking, etc.). In inland agricultural regions people just settled down, farmed, and tried to get more adjacent farmland when possible. This is all less relevant in 2018 but there is still definitely a sense in Atlantic Canada that you are more successful if you move away (even if you do one day move back). In fact it is such a big phenomenon that people complain they cannot get hired for good jobs locally until they return after experience elsewhere.
One thing that's disappointing is how this has been interpreted as a negative thing in the rest of Canada. It also leads to a misleading picture of what people from Atlantic Canada are like because so many leave. Newfoundland may have a 14% unemployment rate but I doubt Newfoundlanders do!