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Editor's note: The following text is a transcription of a genuine conversation had by Larry Burchall.

"As Bermuda's economy continues to change and expand, the percentage of jobs held by non-Bermudians will increase. Eventually we'll reach a point where non-Bermudian jobholders will reach 45 per cent then head to 50 per cent. We're heading towards the 40 per cent mark now.

Simple human social dynamics show that when a changing human balance reaches a critical point, something happens to restore the most desirable balance. This has already happened. It last happened when we over-ran ourselves with tourists in the 1980s. Us lot responded by getting snarly and grumpy. Same thing happened in the 1960s when black Bermudians felt that they were being overloaded with 'whites'. Black Bermudians snarled and rioted until that re-balanced. Strikes me that the next snarl will be at our non-Bermudian jobholders. Strikes me that the snarl point may be damn close. Strikes me that the snarling is already audible."

Some People will be snarly no matter what we do. The question for me is whether they will blame us for their snarliness? I think yes in the sense that we permit the new workers to come in. But if we stop them from arriving, there will be a hue and cry from those who want to ride the boom.

"What we are actually doing, but unfortunately (ignorantly?) not actually recognizing, is that we are actually engaged in a process of social engineering that's camouflaged as economic change. The snarliness is coming because Bermudians are not going to be able to share in the same way, and get the same degree of reward, as they got from Tourism.

From 1946 to 1986, us lot didn't do too much snarling because we were too busy making so much money. We only got snarly when, with our pockets full, our mortgages paid off, our kids educated; we suddenly got tired of 'all those damn tourists' clogging up our streets as Tourism peaked at 630,000 arrivals in 1987. We had a monumental clash of peaks as Tourist peak clashed with economic and social change peaks."

For instance, do we call a halt to the Southlands development and tell them to wait until the heat goes out of the economy at which time they may be building a hotel to service a declining market?

"This kind of progress slowing decision is never economically practicable. So we cannot say 'No'."

One thing we should not forget is that the correction will come whether we act or not. The question for us is how to bring about a correction without sending the economy into a tailspin the result of which may be worse than the correction, which will certainly arrive from the natural interaction of our economy with that of the Global economy.

"Correction? I don't think that we need any kind of correction at all. What we need is adjustment. Rapid adjustment. Economic change is coming. That economic change will bring massive social change. In a large economy, economic change is very difficult to manage. Either Jumeirah or a new insurance company comes and sets up - or it doesn't. There's no halfway point. We can neither manage nor control the decisions taken by an amorphous mass of global investors whose only motive is that a good profit should appear twelve months hence.

So we cannot really manage the pace of economic change. But Bermudians and Bermuda can make the adjustments in Bermuda's education systems, in some Bermudian cultural values, and in some Bermudian political strategies. These are things that we Bermudians can and do control and manage."

This is a difficult problem. It's one that neither the PLP as government nor the UBP as opposition have had any experience in handling as a government.

"Dear me! Dear me! Same thing could be said for Winston Churchill and the Brits in May 1940. Or Dame Jennifer Smith at midnight on November 9, 1998. 'Difficult problem?' Rise to it! Rise to it!"

I will certainly concede that you have every right to be concerned and the ultimate outcome could be even worse than your most dire predictions. A soft landing may very well be out of our hands to bring about.

"Do we just end like this? 'Fata Ferunting' into the future? With all these 'bright people' picking up whacking great six-figure sums in their annual pay packets, we're jus' gonna' roll over, stick our heads in our nice pink sands, stick our soft sweet Bermudian arses in the air, and wait for whatever comes poking?"

Larry Burchall is the author of 'Fine as Wine. From coloured boy to Bermudian Man.[[In-content Ad]]

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