this post was submitted on 01 Aug 2024
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Well, these countries are still behind precisely because of communism. When communism fell, they were significantly behind. Now we are still behind countries like germany, france, england but at least we are getting closer to them.
Funnily enough, if you compare prices of goods relative to the wages, we are in a significantly better situation now than we were during previous regime…
How do you think they compared before communism? By the time of the Russian revolution, England, Germany and to a lesser extent France were the colonial and industrial powers of earth, with England having more than 100 years of industrialization and Germany more than 50. That's orders of magnitude more rich and developed than Estonia, Ukraine, Czechoslovakia or Poland at the time.
All the growth from 1920 to 1990 (or 1940 to 1990 for countries that joined communism in the WW2 or after), was carried out in an economy without exploiting third countries. What modern Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Estonia, Uzbekistan, Czech Republic, and Yugoslavia gained until 1990, was completely free of colonialism, it was through the sheer effort of the workers in those countries. If you compare that to the growth of England, France, Spain, or Germany in that century, their growth is so by engaging in either colonialism, of unequal exchange afterwards, i.e. exploiting the resources and labour or third countries (big chunk of Asia, most of Africa, and most of Latin America). Importing cheap agricultural produce and raw materials at bargain prices at the expense of the workers of the exploited countries, and reselling manufactured and otherwise high value added products at a premium capable of subsidising the rising working rights gained through unionization and labor movements (so, despite capitalism, and not because of it).
If you look at what happened since the 2000s, these formerly world-hegemon countries like France, England or Germany, simply have fallen behind. The GDP per capita of these countries barely has changed since 2008, which is about a decade and a half of stagnation. Capitalism working wonderfully, I see.
So basically you're forgetting about the advantage that western and central Europe already had at the beginning and at the mid of the 20th century when comparing those countries' levels of wealth and development becsuse of colonialism and industrialization. You're forgetting that they kept doing the exact same exploitative behaviours in their process of growth. You're forgetting that the improvements of the quality of life were done by workers fighting capitalism in unions. And you're forgetting that these same countries have been stagnant for the most part of the two last decades.
You are assuming that a country cannot improve its growth because of past and its success it determined purely by past events. By this logic, Greece would be the most advanced nation in the world because 3000 years ago they were powerful.
Then you write some bullshit that “supports” your idea.
By the way, this “theory” completely falls apart when you look at Germany. Before they were one state, then divided and after communism fell, they re-united. After the berlin wall fell, eastern part was in a far worse condition.
Nothing like that. I'm saying that industrialization is a gradual and long process, and by pure logic, some countries which started to industrialize 100+ years before others, had the advantage.
Far-worse condition by which metric? Sure, it was less developed industrially and economically (see my point about not participating in colonialism, which you don't seem to care about), but there was no unemployment and there was guaranteed housing for everyone. There were fewer, and worse quality, consumer goods, but is that how you determine the success of a system?
Regarding colonialism and unequal exchange, you don't seem to understand how important an effect it has. Importing cheap raw materials and exporting high added-value manufactured goods, is the most profitable thing you can do, but it implies unequal exchange, which drains the resources and labour of poorer countries and exploits them. If you're interested at all in the development of the economies of countries, you really should look into, and try to understand, the concept of unequal exchange. Otherwise, it's like saying "wow Rome was so powerful in 200BC" while ignoring that like half the workforce were literal slaves.
So you have just admitted it was worse. Thank you.