[Swizec]

Now now, we Slovenians change that depending on who’s asking. Also time period.

Wanna talk economic prosperity, work ethic, and things of such nature? We’re Central European, basically German. Wanna talk partying, good food, sense of humor, and having fun? Proudly Balkan. Unless you want healthy food, then we are definitely Mediterranean. Oh good pizza and pasta? Yeah we’re basically Italian.

Funfact: It is unknown quite how large the Slovenian diaspora is because many emigrants wrote down “Austrian” before WW1 to escape slavic stereotypes in their new home.

[ChuckNorris89]

> economic prosperity .. basically German

> Slovenia

I don't know mate, if Slovenia was so prosperous, then their workers wouldn't be driving 2h/day commuting to work and study in Austria for the chance of making 2k Euros/month. Or just moving to Germany, UK, Ireland, etc. for more. Every slovene I talked to seemed very unhappy about the wages/CoL ratio back home.

[Swizec]

Oh it’s far more aspirational than real :D

With a tinge of “We work hard like the Germans! We’re not like those other people from the area. Please hire us”.

My understanding is that under Yugoslavia we were the most prosperous region by far. Then the export market collapsed and we realized “Shit, most of our economy is oriented towards former Yugoslavia!” and we started reorienting towards central europe.

But central europe has plenty other even cheaper markets to import from. So that’s been a problem.