B1 Global Crisis

During the world economic crisis, millions of people in Central Europe lost their jobs. At that time, few Central European countries had health insurance, unemployment benefi t or old-age pension schemes. Large numbers of unemployed people left the cities to return to the villages they came from, and took over the jobs that the Roma had been doing there. Many Roma were soon starving, and the local authorities had to pay for poor relief. Tensions rose, and many communities simply wanted to get rid of those poor and hungry people.