Mainly Spain's brain drained...

... not to the plain. It drained to Mexico. h/t hbdchick b/c of course.

To this day Andalucía is the dumb part of Spain. María del Carmen Pérez-Artés was pondering how long that's been going on; to which end, she's turned to the census. She noticed a preponderance of thirty- and thirty-five-year-olds among the Spaniards contributing thereto. Rather than assuming something like on The Orville where the Spanish Church was just bumping off kids born in unlucky years (which I might actually suspect of Irish clergy cf. Connell, Irish Peasant Society 1968); maaayyybe the excess were actual thirty-three year olds who were crap at maths.

Pérez-Artés thinks she's found where the smart people went. The New World, as it happens, took in a lot of Andalucianos; some Castilians as well (presumably army-colonels or their sixteenth-century equivalent) but mostly the south coast. Their destination shook out to be Mexico most of all. That was deliberate: Mexico took most of Spain's investment in education. The Spaniards newly-arrived reported their ages - well, firstly as being in their twenties, because that's adventurers for you - but more importantly to nonrounded integer years, like "23" and not "uhh like twen'y or summing señor?".

This may be because Mexico, unlike (say) the Caribbean and Argentina, already came with crops as were native and with native inhabitants who'd spent, what, nine thousand years farming them. Spanish-born farmers had little to contribute to Mexico so didn't go there. Instead Mexico got Spanish engineers, soldiers - and ecclesiasts. Yeah priests and bishops can't marry but deacons can, and so can church-employed laymen. The Caribbean meanwhile got overlords and Argentina got cowboys (and, later, Italians).

So far so reasonable. It is, then, of interest that the Andes didn't get this investment. (The Guarani of Paraguay somewhat excepted.) Was it that the Andes cost more for a Spaniard or even a Panamanian to get there? The Spaniards in the Andes were notably piratical, to the point the Church felt it needed to send missions to the whites over there.