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Poland is now among the 20 largest economies

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Re: Poland is now among the 20 largest economies

#771

Post by goobatrooba »

mrkaluzny wrote: post #769
nixon_why69 wrote: post #622

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why wouldn't the story be that they succeeded despite the shock therapy? Honestly asking, I am not an expert on Polish economy, but I heard bad things. Maybe all of those hardworking people could have done even better with a different macro strategy?

The rapid and successful conversion to market economy was the main reason we are where we are. Human cost was extremely high, crime went up quickly and lots of money was lost. I'd argue this was corrected by joining EU and by adjusting the plan to polish reality. What made it a success was also the social capital in Poland, a lot of people worked extremely hard to pull it off, but still high unemployment was alleviat…

Not to forget tens of billions in EU subsidies. Not trying to diminish the polish efforts, but not every country gets this opportunity of massive, predictable transfers without much conditionality.

I wonder how far Poland would be without the years of PiS corruption.

Re: Poland is now among the 20 largest economies

#772

Post by goobatrooba »

aksH21 wrote: post #709
jakozaur wrote: post #454

The story is longer: Poland was the first country to make a remarkable peaceful transition from a bankrupt, failed Soviet satellite state. The shock therapy, plus NATO and EU aspirations, paved the way. It is a story of a country that made a lot of the right decisions along the way. Managed to keep consistent high growth, not a pony trick or boom/bust mode. Poland should be a role model for many other countries. Reco…

Solidarność was funded by the West, though you may credit Polish/Eastern European capture of US foreign policy and the Polish Pope, too. It is true of course that they were the most persistent and brave. I don't think it would have been possible in East Germany for example, which ran a tighter regime until Poland managed the peaceful revolution.

I'm sure that some people claim that but I would be grateful for evidence that solidarnosc received significant material support from the west.

Re: Poland is now among the 20 largest economies

#773

Post by gib444 »

delis-thumbs-7e wrote: post #695
gib444 wrote: post #378

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Far north hemisphere, unite? A Canadian-British-Nordic partnership.

Britain, well… I’ll take Scotland, they’re sensible. But rest of you, we can’t just look what you are doing to yourself. Please Britain, get some help.

Hm Finland, with the 38th highest suicide rate in the world? Well above the UK, in 117th place. I think you need our help :(

Re: Poland is now among the 20 largest economies

#774

Post by goobatrooba »

VimEscapeArtist wrote: post #563

I live in Poland. This headline is misleading. Poland didn't build a top-20 economy. Western Europe and the US built their economy in Poland, because the labor is educated and cheap. There are almost no globally competitive Polish companies. The "growth" is branch offices of German and American corporations taking advantage of engineers who'll work for 40% of Berlin rates. Remove the foreign-owned sector and you're l…

There are plenty of polish companies, but like in Germany many are more in the middle of the spectrum, so they might be well known in their sector but not much beyond. I've seen e.g. plenty of polish building materials and furniture across shops on western Europe.

Re: Poland is now among the 20 largest economies

#775

Post by rasz »

deepriverfish wrote: post #218
H8crilA wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To explain the joke, a Żabka is like a 7-Eleven, but there is way more of them per unit of area. And they have more services in offer.

do they have good food, like in 7 eleven japan?

Sure. Recent Zabka food poster https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2F4... https://www.reddit.com/r/Polska/comments/1t7ci4h/my_apologie...

Re: Poland is now among the 20 largest economies

#776

Post by technate4eva »

jakozaur wrote: post #454

The story is longer: Poland was the first country to make a remarkable peaceful transition from a bankrupt, failed Soviet satellite state. The shock therapy, plus NATO and EU aspirations, paved the way. It is a story of a country that made a lot of the right decisions along the way. Managed to keep consistent high growth, not a pony trick or boom/bust mode. Poland should be a role model for many other countries. Reco…

[dead]

Re: Poland is now among the 20 largest economies

#777

Post by goobatrooba »

moondowner wrote: post #626
VimEscapeArtist wrote: post #563

I live in Poland. This headline is misleading. Poland didn't build a top-20 economy. Western Europe and the US built their economy in Poland, because the labor is educated and cheap. There are almost no globally competitive Polish companies. The "growth" is branch offices of German and American corporations taking advantage of engineers who'll work for 40% of Berlin rates. Remove the foreign-owned sector and you're l…

> Western Europe and the US built their economy in Poland, because the labor is educated and cheap. > There are almost no globally competitive Polish companies. Same issue in all southern and eastern European countries.

Grossly incorrect and unfounded. There are no Googles there, but there are plenty of mid tier companies delivering quality products. For a blatant example see e.g. Shelly in Bulgaria. Or depending on how you count South, e.g. Vinci or Eni or car producers in Italy.

And not everyone needs to succeed in industrial household names, that e.g. much of southern European economies come from tourism is not a bad thing.

Re: Poland is now among the 20 largest economies

#778

Post by RhysU »

severino wrote: post #109
mothballed wrote: post #13

They're scared shirtless of communism and statism, have recent enough memory of why, and went full sail on classical liberal economics. It worked.

I'd also be a classical liberal if I were getting 1 out of 4 euros of the EU taxpayers.

Doesn't check out. Not all recipients of US federal tax proceeds are classical liberal. It's a split.

Re: Poland is now among the 20 largest economies

#779

Post by bobthepanda »

standeven wrote: post #658
rayiner wrote: post #624

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> GDP/capita is often a relatively useless metric in modern times. "Often" is the wrong modifier. GDP/capita aligns very closely with material standard of living for the median person. If you look at the GDP/capita growth in India and China since 1990, or South Korea, Singapore, and Taiwan, since 1950, that reflects very real increases in material standards for ordinary people. There's two, relatively well-understood…

Isn’t GDP pretty easy to boost with deregulation and government overspending, at least in the short term? Neither of which benefits the people.

You can’t really keep that up over 35 years though, which is what Poland has achieved.

Re: Poland is now among the 20 largest economies

#780

Post by jmalicki »

Saline9515 wrote: post #746
jmalicki wrote: post #671

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The comments have already mentioned CD Projekt and elevenlabs which I would call world class companies even if not huge scale.

Cd Projekt made around 200M$ revenue last year. It's a small company by world standard.

Small, but exemplary, and given the context of the post and arguments, developing exemplary leading companies is a sign that Poland is developing a deep base beyond mere outsourcing, even if there are a small number and they're not huge yet.

It's like comparing a 6-year-old soccer player to Lionel Messi - you're looking at early signs of development, and the progress to getting there, not saying Poland is already there, but there are positive signs it is on that path.

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