Nearly 60 jobs will disappear from libraries in Estonia's counties in the new year. At the same time, 25 new jobs will be created at the National Library in Tallinn. That is what will happen if the draft amendment to the Public Libraries Act sent by the government to Parliament receives majority support from MPs.

After that, it would hardly be surprising if the next step were a bill proposing the closure of most county libraries altogether. That would make it possible to eliminate the heating and electricity costs of several hundred buildings or rooms, as well as the salaries of at least a thousand library employees.

On the outskirts of Tallinn, a single giant warehouse could be built cheaply, bearing a sign reading "Estonian Central Book Repository." People interested in reading would place orders for the books they wanted via a phone app. Robots and nimble human hands would assemble the orders, and courier companies would deliver the borrowed books to the nearest parcel locker in the reader's home area. Once read, the book would be returned to the same location.

With the help of hired PR consultants, the government would have to convince people that such a system was introduced in their own best interest, to provide better service. Since the number of people reading printed books will continue to decline in the future, and most e-books and audiobooks can be downloaded online, the financial savings would grow year by year. No library, no librarian, no expenses.

Since each year fewer and fewer residents remain in the counties, Excel spreadsheets will increasingly show just how expensive public services per capita outside the capital have become. This, in turn, is fertile ground for new ideas about what else could be cut back and how to save money.

But let's set irony aside. Under the draft Public Libraries Act, the funding for the salaries of four state-funded positions at each county library would be withdrawn and used instead to create 25 new jobs in the capital to do the same work. If a local government wants to keep those jobs, it would have to pay for them from its own budget — that is, give up something else.

This planned move regarding libraries stands in stark contrast to the syrupy rhetoric politicians use in the counties during parliamentary election campaigns. None of them say that once in power they will move jobs from county libraries or other institutions to the capital. Instead, they promise to bring more life back to the regions, to channel more state and European Union investment there, to increase the state's presence, and offer other grand-sounding but mostly hollow bait to win votes.

At the end of April, after conducting an analysis, the National Audit Office concluded that the national action plan for Southeast Estonia — which was supposed to give the region special attention — looks nice on paper but has almost no connection to real life. The plan approved by the government has not influenced the actions of ministries, and little has improved in Southeast Estonia. The National Audit Office noted that roughly the same can be said about the action plan for Ida‑Viru County.

Moving state-funded library jobs from the counties to the capital does not numerically affect a large number of people, but symbolically it carries strong significance. Until now, politicians have consistently talked about relocating state jobs out of Tallinn. That plan has not borne much fruit, and for the most part, salaries in state institutions are still paid to residents of Tallinn and its surrounding areas.

Take the Unemployment Insurance Fund, for example. While it has reduced its total number of employees in recent years from about 1,000 to 750, the lion's share of those jobs are still located in Tallinn, even though more than half of Estonia's unemployed live outside Harju County.

A similar pattern can be seen in many other state institutions. The central authorities tend to believe that people in the capital know better what is good and right for Võru County, Ida‑Viru County, or Lääne County.

People in every region, as local patriots, try to stand up for the interests of their town or village and explain why it is a good place to live. But when the central government, through deliberate decisions, consistently removes jobs from those places, ignores local opinions, and as a result leaves fewer and fewer residents and users of services behind, even the most optimistic and enterprising people become discouraged. That makes it all the easier to harvest votes in elections with populist slogans.

If the current composition of Parliament were to pass the Public Libraries Act in the form it left the government, what kind of campaign rhetoric would candidates from the governing parties bring to the counties less than a year later?

Or is it still possible, when processing draft legislation and making decisions, to take greater account of their impact on local life? The concentration of people in larger cities is a global trend that is difficult to reverse. Still, the state should try to slow this trend through its policies, rather than adding fuel to the fire.

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