suprising map showing how rich eastern europe used to be in 1965

**Virtuous** · 02-01-2013, 06:39 AM

aight, I was being modest

**Hochmeister** · 02-01-2013, 09:04 AM

Originally Posted by RussiaPrussia

its from an old west german schoolbook i own. It was released in the 1970s.

The numbers are Deutsche Mark, meaning gdp per capita in deutsche mark. As you can see eastern europe was as rich as japan, Italy, Austria and Ireland at the time. These light blue countries had a gdp per capita of 2500-5000 deutsche mark while the purple countries had a gdp over 5000 dm. Venezuela is also light blue and kuwait is purple its probably because both countries had much oil at the time and a smaller population meaning more wealth for fewer people.

You also can see how southern europeans were behind to northern states except for italy. The white countries are the poorest with a gdp per capita lower than 250 mark.

Madeleine Albright once said, that the Soviet economy had been the main threat for the USA, not Communism.
Gorbachev deliberately destroyed the Soviet economy and arose national hatred among Soviet citizens, as he approved later in an interview (he said he had always wanted to destroy the USSR and his deals approve it).

**Hochmeister** · 02-01-2013, 09:19 AM

Btw, in our days one needs to get 3,000$ a month to live like an average Soviet citizen used to live (education, health care, rates and fares etc).

The USSR had the 22nd position in Human Development Index in 1990 (according to the UN). Finland had this position in 2011 (Estonia was on the 33d position),

**RussiaPrussia** · 02-01-2013, 09:28 AM

Originally Posted by Hochmeister

Madeleine Albright once said, that the Soviet economy had been the main threat for the USA, not Communism.
Gorbachev deliberately destroyed the Soviet economy and arose national hatred among Soviet citizens, as he confessed later in an interview.

gorbachov was right the soviet union needed reform but jelzins massive privatization advocated by the west was what destroyed the former eastern european economies.

Communism is good to get your house in order, it probably was even the better system after the worldwar. You can see how eastern europe got even richer than spain or portugal which dident participate in ww2 while on the other hand the east was completely destroyed after ww2 and they got no marshal plan from america. And this is from west german book so they obviously are maybe even more biased to communism and underrate them maybe.

but the problem with communism is you wont reach a better living standard at some point unless you turn to a more state capitalist economy.
China made reforms much earlier and small ones not instantly but after time. They have massive population look how succeseful they are. European countries were much smaller and used to be much richer. If they would have made the same reforms like since the 70s they would be already richer than the west.

A mix of state and capitalism is the best system. The west is gonna fail too you need some state involvement not only as investor but also as profiteur. Because only the state can do things which need to be done and other projects, but the state needs also money and less taxes thats why it should be more involved and own companies as well like energy to afford these projects.

Its still funny how the highest structure every build here is still the fernsehturm in berlin done by east germany.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...res_in_Germany

today the berlin government cant even build an airport properly.

I hope russia never sells its energy, defense and other companies just look at them they have 10% debt and 13% taxes now compare that to america with 107 % debt and 40 to 53% taxes. Thats why russian economy gets bashed so much, the private companies are afraid of state capitalism.

**morski** · 02-01-2013, 09:29 AM

The big gap between West and East occured in the 90s, before the collapse of the Warsaw Pact and Comecon we were not that far behind.

**Onur** · 02-01-2013, 09:49 AM

EU and Eurozone caused countries like Spain and Italy to go down in terms of economics.

Especially after Eurozone, they have been reduced to the same status of countries like Greece, a total leecher of EU central bank loans and a consumer of German products. I read several articles in the web about how once strong Italian industry has been reduced to none, especially after Eurozone.

The enlargement of the economical gap between north and south Europe is a direct result of EU policies. All their economical policies created this massive gap.

**RussiaPrussia** · 02-01-2013, 09:59 AM

Originally Posted by Onur

EU and Eurozone caused countries like Spain and Italy to go down in terms of economics.

Especially after Eurozone, they have been reduced to the same status of countries like Greece, a total leecher of EU central bank loans and a consumer of German products. I read several articles in the web about how once strong Italian industry has been reduced to none, especially after Eurozone.

The enlargement of the economical gap between north and south Europe is a direct result of EU policies. All their economical policies created this massive gap.

yeah but they are also responsible, they wanted the euro to have lower interest rates on their debt while germany had higher one in the past when the euro was introduced. This is what happens if people were too greedy just like german companies wanted no down grates in the south the southern politicians wanted cheaper debt.

Italies industry is actually still bigger than uks and frances industry, they still have a lot of potential.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industr...ustrial_output