On April 15 The Royal Gazette carried a long article, captioned, “Learning from the Caribbean”.

It maintained that Bermudians should not view the Caribbean independent governments as “failures” simply because their standard of living is so much lower than ours, and that Bermudians have much to learn from the Caribbean countries and “from their mistakes”.

The conclusion was that blacks will do better economically in an independent Bermuda. Unfortunately, no data was advanced to support that opinion and, even worse, a major truth was omitted: the majority of blacks in the Caribbean do much worse, economically, than do Bermudian blacks.

If “What is past is prologue”, the data below demonstrate that Independence will bring a lower standard of living to Bermuda, period! Let's consider some cold, hard facts:

Can you name the 15 members of Caricom (your would-be bedfellows) or cite their average income or unemployment levels?

Some of these countries don't publish data often, if at all, and some massage the data in a PR fashion; so, more objective third-party sources are often the best. According to www.nationmaster.com, which gives per capita income data as adjusted to its US dollar purchasing power, here's the list, excluding “Associates” and “Observers” (with the average annual per capita income in parentheses): Antigua/Barbuda ($9,232); Bahamas ($15,237); Barbados ($9,427); Belize ($2,728); Dominica ($3,304); Grenada ($4,062); Guyana ($2,373); Haiti ($1,400); Jamaica ($2,691); Montserrat ($3,130); Saint Lucia ($3,816); St. Kitts/Nevis ($7,708); St. Vincent/Grenadines ($2,715); Surinam ($1,748); and Trinidad/Tobago ($7,071).

Some of these countries misleadingly report higher incomes (without adjusting them to US$ in their individual currencies or in the “eastern Caribbean dollar” (EC$ or XCD, which was 2.68:1 US dollar on April 16, 2004): e.g., Jamaica reports $22,629 average income, but it now takes 60 Jamaican dollars to equal US $1.

The 15 members of Caricom, based on the above data which is typically from 1998 or 1999, have a US dollar income of $5,109 per capita per country - with an unknown amount of same coming from drugs and other crimes.

The bottom ten, or two-thirds, of these Caricomers have a combined average per capita income of the princely sum of $2,787. If these average incomes were computed based on total population, rather than by country, the averages would have been much lower, as Haiti and Jamaica have by far the most people.)

Under Independence, the politicians have prospered, but the people have suffered. Converting an ant-sized volcanic rock into “countries” has proven to be an economic failure - for the people.

In stark contrast, according to www.cia.gov, “Bermuda enjoys one of the highest per capita incomes in the world” with a per-capita income of $35,200 or roughly seven times the average of the Caricom members - the fifth highest income in the world (behind Luxembourg, Switzerland, Japan and Norway - see www.nationmaster.com.)

The World Bank now estimates that Bermuda has risen to No. 2 in the world (www.worldbank.org). Whoever said, “If it ain't broke, don't fix it”?

A number of the Caricom members have the appearance of incipient bankruptcy (e.g., Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Montserrat, Surinam). By way of comparison, the two US averages $23,220 and the UK $24,628, while the world-median is $1,800.

Without listing all of the details, Caricom's members average about 15 percent unemployment versus Bermuda's 4.5 percent. (Of course, if Bermudians would work for Caricom's average $5,000 wage, there would be zero unemployment here.)

The adage, “You're only as strong as your weakest link” comes to mind. Caricom is virtually all weak links, compared to Bermuda.

Mr. Calvin J.M. Smith concludes that there are benefits from “interisland trade” and from “conventions... trade unions, businesses and sporting events”, but he neglects to name any advantage, and since when do countries need to join alliances to compete in sports?

These Caricom folks have one-seventh of our average income; they don't have the money to trade etc. with us, and we surely don't want their currencies; their individual and collective weakness can only pull Bermuda down, and the 1,000-plus air-mile distance to the Caribbean renders the logistics of “interisland” anything ludicrous.

Mr. Smith's bald conclusions, therefore, vaporise for want of data like a hallucinatory apparition.

It seems more important to learn “about” the Caribbean countries than “from” them. The standards of living, the levels of education, the number of high profile corporations, and the international reputations of the Caribbean Independents (sometimes “Caricomers” herein) are light years below Bermuda's.

Bermuda should be teaching Caricom, not the other way around. Going “Independent” has elevated the standards of living of those who control the Caricom governments, but it has had the opposite effect upon the people.

The Caricom members are lost in a sea of red ink of their own creation, and most are dependent upon rapidly diminishing aid from the US and Great Britain - aid that Caricomers would never share with Bermuda.

Moreover, the international reputations of the Caribbean independents can tell us volumes about the results of independence by tiny islands: the reputations of the Caricomers have fallen to an all-time low.

Today, the world's great nations are systematically closing their doors to the residents of all suspicious nations (specifically naming Caricomers, which are widely derisively dubbed “Banana Republics” and classified by the CIA (in CIA Factbook 2000) as hotbeds for drugs, money laundering, migrating illegal aliens into the US, tax dodging and other crimes), as noted in the CIA's webpage on The Bahamas).

Bermuda has its own drug and crime problems to be sure, but it can only sink lower (in the eyes of America and others) by joining the Caricom daisy chain.

“Guilt by association” is a sad fact, but it is a fact: if Bermuda does not soon disengage from the unsavory Caricom elements, the fleas from the dogs of Caricom will surely infect Bermuda's still relatively bite-free skin, and too many flea bites can kill any dog.

According to the CIA, the unemployment rates of the 15 are: 11 percent, seven percent, ten percent, nine percent, 20 percent, 12.5 percent, nine percent, 67 percent, 15 percent, six percent, 16 percent, 4.5 percent, 22 percent, 17 percent and 11percent.

Under intense scrutiny of America and other world police, shouldn't we eschew those ancestral ties and concentrate on emulating our increasingly more elevated roots in Bermuda?

Bermuda has 300 years of history, 100 more than the US; let's celebrate those roots. Isn't it our duty to improve ourselves and to emulate the best models among us, whatever they are, rather than to slavishly accept a lesser lineage?

We are not our ancestors; we have earned something better. Let's profit from it, rather than strive to return to the economic privations, drugs, civil riots, etc. that now plague our ancestors' Caribbean progeny.

Mr. Calvin J.M. Smith is spot on when he says “[The experience of our Caribbean neighbours can be most instructive.”

Indeed, Bermuda must learn what NOT to do: It should not emulate countries whose leaders pompously feign importance (while sharing the spoils of office with a handful of insiders), as their governments struggle to stay afloat despite being awash in debt and international crime - all of which makes their countries increasingly viewed as outcasts by the world's major powers.

Yes, Bermuda has much to learn from and about the Caribbean.

For those interested in researching this and similar data, helpful websites include: www.nationmaster.com; www.cia.gov/cia; www.ssrc.org; www.caricom.org; www.usaid.gov/caribbean; http://countrystudies.us/carribbean-islands, and related links.)