We are poor because we don’t have entrepreneurs. People in Bulgaria are mostly employees, proletarians. We never take the initiative, we always wait for someone else to do it.

I found a great article at Steve Olson’s blog entitled Seeing the World Through Entrepreneurial Eyes, in which he describes the most typical characteristics of people who don’t have entrepreneurial eyes and I can see that they are too common for our society and clearly explain why we became the poorest country in Europe. Here they are:

• Us vs. Them Mentality. We’ve been taught to think like this from the first grade at school. We, the workers, the poor, the underdogs, the unhappy are better than Them – the businessmen, the exploiters, the rich, the Party leaders, the politicians. And the best we can do is to sabotage them by not doing our jobs, not fulfilling our tasks, not voting, not paying taxes.

• Retirement Thinking. I know many people who started thinking about retirement in their forties, i.e. about 20 years earlier. They are making their plan for what they are going to do after they retire. But why don’t they make plans to do something now? It’s because most of the people are afraid. They think they have the obligation to work 40 years to make some income, to feed their families but not chasing their dreams. They plan to do something for themselves only after retirement when they will be old, weak, and probably ill but not now when they are young, healthy, and strong.
• Naysayers. I don’t know other people more pessimistic than Bulgarians. If someone comes up with an idea, there will be ten people who will tell him that the idea is not worth it and is just a waste of time and effort. There is no bigger obstacle to the innovation and progress than the negative thinking in which we are the greatest specialists.
• Money and Jobs. The common notion is that people should work something to make money. It doesn’t matter if you don’t like it, you just have to work to make your income. The real entrepreneurs do something because it’s good, it helps people, and because they like to do it. “Entrepreneurs don’t start businesses for the money. Money is the result of the game. The game is creating businesses. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, but the fun is seeing what works.”, said Olson.

You can find the whole article here.