Earlier quoted context omitted.
Since Russia is subsidizing Belarus, they can start tightening the screws on Lukaschenko politically any time they want. Belarus is just one military exercise away from Russians taking over. Every time these countries have a big joint military exercise in Belarus there is possibility that Russian troops might not leave when the exercise is over.
>> there is possibility that Russian troops might not leave when the exercise is over. Why they would do that? Unless you organize a pro-West revolution like in Ukraine. It is possible but making people dirty poor and desperate can take a decade like in the latter case.
Belarus’s Soviet Economy
191–200 of 241 posts
Re: Belarus’s Soviet Economy
#192Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Belarusians love their potatoes I am a bit fascinated as to how this came to be from Ireland to Russia, given that the potato is native to the Americas, and thus was unknown in Europe before around 1500 CE.
"Traditional cuisine" is often more recent than we think. Tomatoes aren't native to Italy. Chilli peppers aren't native to India or Thailand.
Of course, both of those came over from the Americas, like the potato.
Re: Belarus’s Soviet Economy
#193Earlier quoted context omitted.
They sold oil and gas with discounts, pushed for economic union, gave preferences. Belarusian government did not do anything to help private businesses, attract investors, go to new markets and industries. To keep their power, they sold country. About “taking responsibility” - people actually take responsibility for their future, family, children. That’s why they migrate. One can only take responsibility over what th…
So now discounts and preferences are a bad thing suddenly? "Belarusian government did not do anything" How is that Russia's fault? "To keep their power, they sold country" What exactly did Russia get? Belarus is still a sovereign country. So you are saying that you would've stayed in Belarus if not for Russia?
Too many questions, my friend, shallow questions. And it seems like not for a good discussion, but for pushing your personal opinion, manipulations, or some agenda.
Please, do some research - on how a large country can make a small neighbour dependent on money injections, how they can ask to pay for credits with key state factories, keep hordes of agents and influencers in their governments, military, among politicians, on the history of Russian relations (btw, yesterday Finns remembered Winter War https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winter_War).
“So you are saying that you would’ve stayed in Belarus if not for Russia”
I never said that, bad try.
Re: Belarus’s Soviet Economy
#194In the beginning of 1990s, Belarus had more potential than Poland and Baltic states to become a strong prosperous democracy - it was a centre of electronics in USSR, had very good universities with mathematics, physics, electronics, engineering. It had developed textile industry, built heavy carriers, tractors. Sure, they needed innovations, market thinking, and transparent controlled privatization, but there were ho…
> made the country dependent on Russian markets, oil, gas, money What were their options when it came to oil and gas?
Develop other industries, rely less on money from oil refinement.
Re: Belarus’s Soviet Economy
#195Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't want to sound like a Negative Nelly but you all in this thread are swooning over a dictatorship with pretty awful human rights abuses.
You make the very common mistake of assuming a country with a dictator and human rights abuses is automatically a horrible place to be. Earlier this year I was in Sudan for a few weeks. Hands down the friendliest and kindest people I've ever met on earth. Much, much friendlier than Australians or Canadians. Open your mind, accept there are other ways to do things, and we can learn to improve our way of doing things.…
>Hands down the friendliest and kindest people I've ever met on earth
Anecdotally, Iranian people fall into the same category despite living under a despotic regime and severe sanctions imposed by the US.
Re: Belarus’s Soviet Economy
#196Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ukraine is listed as “mostly unfree” in the listing above, so no.
Ok so let’s look at the countries highest on the Economic Freedom index. Hong Kong tops the list right? It has what you would expect... Capital has flowed in and normally that would have pushed blue collar workers and children and elderly out, with people commuting 2 hours each way as in SF. But since these are islands, the poor live in coffin like shoebox apartments, far smaller than anything allowed in US cities. M…
China hasn't fixed poverty though. A lot of migrant workers are left out in pensions, getting as low as 80$ per month.
Moving to those ghost cities have wrecked an entire generation, as it seems.
Moving people out of poverty includes the pension challenge. Which is the hardest one and I'm pretty sure that the one-child policy didn't contribute well to that part.
Re: Belarus’s Soviet Economy
#197Re: Belarus’s Soviet Economy
#198Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ok so let’s look at the countries highest on the Economic Freedom index. Hong Kong tops the list right? It has what you would expect... Capital has flowed in and normally that would have pushed blue collar workers and children and elderly out, with people commuting 2 hours each way as in SF. But since these are islands, the poor live in coffin like shoebox apartments, far smaller than anything allowed in US cities. M…
China hasn't fixed poverty though. A lot of migrant workers are left out in pensions, getting as low as 80$ per month. Moving to those ghost cities have wrecked an entire generation, as it seems. Moving people out of poverty includes the pension challenge. Which is the hardest one and I'm pretty sure that the one-child policy didn't contribute well to that part.
No doubt about it, getting off the addiction to the pyramid for social security will require a lot of automation (Japan is dealing with this now). But it’s the only sustainable way forward.
Look, China may not have eradicated poverty but certainly it was able to make the average wages go up 5x a decade for 20 years. Could this be done by uncoordinated market activity of private actors? Perhaps, but the USA has never been able to pull it off so fast.
Now one can argue the US always had a far higher starting point so it ran into diminishing returns. And that is a fair argument.
But keep in mind USSR’s GDP grew faster than USA and they faced the aftermath of two world wars, lost 30 million people and also subsidized lots of other countries in the Warsaw Pact (their version of the Marshall Plan). Compare apples to apples, eg the GDP of Romania after it joined the Eastern Bloc vs Hawaii after it was annexed as the 50th state of the US. Or compare GDP growth of Georgia and Puerto Rico.
It’s not actually clear which system led to more economic prosperity, and as I said the USA had the advantage of oceans protecting it, the dollar was the reserve currency all around the world after Bretton Woods, and we could import cheap goods all year long by just printing dollars. That has a massive effect on prosperity.
Re: Belarus’s Soviet Economy
#199Earlier quoted context omitted.
Did you miss the bit about corruption in Ukraine?
Gee, I wonder why Belarus doesn't have this problem? I do business in Ukraine; I'm well aware of conditions on the ground there.
Belarus is reduced to a feudal family enterprise, with all resource allocation and import-exports tied in there. The system is thoroughly corrupt but with only one major stakeholder on the top.
Re: Belarus’s Soviet Economy
#200Earlier quoted context omitted.
You make it sound glamorous but as Lithuanian I found Minsk to be rather sad. I mean painting over manhole covers, destroyed architecture, national library that looks like giant bacteriophage that has robots inside but you still have to let babushka sign off a book, the town that looks like it has population of 100k, not 2M. It felt like a dead city with boring food and basically nothing to do. I agree the engineers…
Do you know any Lithuanian that thinks positively about Belarus?
Maybe some old pro-soviet folks (there are quite few). For others the mere ideas Russia now being next door is disgusting.