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Closing The Collapse Gap: The USSR was better prepared than the US (2006)

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Re: Closing The Collapse Gap: The USSR was better prepared than the US (2006)

#11

Post by luckylion »

Hokusai wrote: post #4

Without agreeing with many points, the main thesis is true but just for one point: XXI century economies are less resilient to isolation than in previous centuries. We live in a more complex society and countries need each other more than before. Communication is cheap, transport is cheap so it makes sense to rely on other for your own need. So, this lack of preparedness is true for USA, but also for many countries i…

There's likely a difference between rural and urban parts of the same country as well in terms of preparedness. The less-prepared countries will likely also have very unevenly distributed population densities.

Re: Closing The Collapse Gap: The USSR was better prepared than the US (2006)

#12

Post by ltbarcly3 »

"This too will pass" -Captain Obvious

The US will eventually suffer a collapse, that seems like a safe bet. Then it will probably recover, become dominant again (at least somewhat), and collapse again. If we look at Rome, that cycle could continue for 500 years or more.

Wondering who is 'prepared' for a collapse is a weird way to think about it. If you are capable of taking steps to prepare for a collapse -- you wouldn't suffer a collapse.

Re: Closing The Collapse Gap: The USSR was better prepared than the US (2006)

#13

Post by jotm »

flohofwoe wrote: post #8
vasilipupkin wrote: post #3

yeah, except it's nonsense, Soviet Union was completely unprepared for collapse. It couldn't even survive Chernobyl.

East German here, so I don't know all that much of the details of Soviet society before the collapse (but my guess is that the situation wasn't all that different in all former socialist countries). I would agree that the (East German) state and government was entirely unprepared for its own collapse. But maybe the people were better prepared because they've been living at the brink of collapse for most of their live…

This "life always on the brink" preparedness is a major part of what's keeping poor European countries poor.

Everybody distrusts the government, they rely on each other, learn to do things themselves so they don't rely on others. So, money doesn't exchange hands, taxes don't get paid, GDP doesn't grow, more money doesn't get printed.

This is all in a very interconnected world with a mostly free economy, so outsiders just come and buy up everything because at the end of the day, money matters.

Instead of preparing for collapse, how about preparing for being united in work and life and start trusting and depending on each other more.

Re: Closing The Collapse Gap: The USSR was better prepared than the US (2006)

#14

Post by pmiller2 »

TomMckenny wrote: post #9

Another perhaps core issue is whether the party in power gets there by majority will or is there due to legalisms, archaic power distribution and voter suppression. The party that people didn't vote for is not likely to run anything in their interest.

I know you’re referring to Bush v. Gore and the 2016 electoral / popular vote inversion, both of which benefited Republicans. We’re there any scenarios in recent history of the sort that benefited Democrats? I can’t think of any.

That said, the solution to both of these is to abandon the Electoral College. This can be done either by Constitutional amendment, or by the agreement of a certain number of states [0].

What it wouldn’t fix is the huge body of campaign and election law and regulations that make it so there will always be exactly 2 major parties, starting with first past the post voting [1]. While Arrow’s Impossibility Theorem [2] practically guarantees we will have some paradoxical outcomes if we have 3 or more parties, even if we eliminate first past the post, I believe first past the post is one of the most anti-democratic practices we have in this country.

Finally, while this isn’t really a hard fact, it seems to me that parliamentary forms of government tend to last longer than presidential governments. Changing this in the US would be near impossible, requiring a Constitutional amendment, but it seems to me it is our best hope of lasting another 200 years.

—-

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Popular_Vote_Intersta...

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-past-the-post_voting

[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrow%27s_impossibility_theore...

Re: Closing The Collapse Gap: The USSR was better prepared than the US (2006)

#15

Post by mc32 »

luckylion wrote: post #11
Hokusai wrote: post #4

Without agreeing with many points, the main thesis is true but just for one point: XXI century economies are less resilient to isolation than in previous centuries. We live in a more complex society and countries need each other more than before. Communication is cheap, transport is cheap so it makes sense to rely on other for your own need. So, this lack of preparedness is true for USA, but also for many countries i…

There's likely a difference between rural and urban parts of the same country as well in terms of preparedness. The less-prepared countries will likely also have very unevenly distributed population densities.

Very good point. Russia is a good example of this. Despite our economic embargoes / sanctions the majority of the population goes on without a beat. Some in big cities surely miss some things, but overall the Obama and Trump sanctions get shrugged off. China would suffer a lot more if the same sanctions were imposed.

Re: Closing The Collapse Gap: The USSR was better prepared than the US (2006)

#16

Post by nopriorarrests »

Hokusai wrote: post #4

Without agreeing with many points, the main thesis is true but just for one point: XXI century economies are less resilient to isolation than in previous centuries. We live in a more complex society and countries need each other more than before. Communication is cheap, transport is cheap so it makes sense to rely on other for your own need. So, this lack of preparedness is true for USA, but also for many countries i…

Russia totally recovered by any metric you can pick, from household income to average life expectancy. Heck, moscow in 80's looked like dumpster fire. Now it looks like a proper european capital city.

EDIT: to prove my point, russian life expectancy from fed -- https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=qTgj

Re: Closing The Collapse Gap: The USSR was better prepared than the US (2006)

#17

Post by huffmsa »

The US at the federal level, maybe.

But it'll likely just fracture into smaller regional Nations made up of the states.

Worst case, it's 50 separate nations.

Especially now that we'll likely see a shift back towards state level autonomy, with the federal government's bungling of the SARS2 pandemic.

The US is decentralized to begin with, the USSR was not. Decentralized systems fare better in collapse situations.

Re: Closing The Collapse Gap: The USSR was better prepared than the US (2006)

#18

Post by flohofwoe »

jotm wrote: post #13
flohofwoe wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

East German here, so I don't know all that much of the details of Soviet society before the collapse (but my guess is that the situation wasn't all that different in all former socialist countries). I would agree that the (East German) state and government was entirely unprepared for its own collapse. But maybe the people were better prepared because they've been living at the brink of collapse for most of their live…

This "life always on the brink" preparedness is a major part of what's keeping poor European countries poor. Everybody distrusts the government, they rely on each other, learn to do things themselves so they don't rely on others. So, money doesn't exchange hands, taxes don't get paid, GDP doesn't grow, more money doesn't get printed. This is all in a very interconnected world with a mostly free economy, so outsiders…

I agree, but at least looking back that was pretty much the only way to keep going. The government wasn't able to solve (or even recognize) the problems of the "ordinary people", so the people had to deal with solving the problems themselves. Of course this will never be as effective as having an actually functional government, and it will lead to corruption in all levels of society.

Re: Closing The Collapse Gap: The USSR was better prepared than the US (2006)

#19

Post by pmiller2 »

aidenn0 wrote: post #10
TomMckenny wrote: post #9

Another perhaps core issue is whether the party in power gets there by majority will or is there due to legalisms, archaic power distribution and voter suppression. The party that people didn't vote for is not likely to run anything in their interest.

1. It's disingenuous to suggest that a party that regularly exceeds 45% of the popular vote is the party that people "didn't vote for" 2. The military boondoggles have continued uninterrupted since the collapse of the USSR almost regardless of who is in charge. G.W. Bush ran on a platform of not getting involved in foreign entanglements the way Clinton did, then Obama ran on a platform of not getting out of the entan…

Re: military boondoggles, the US has been at war for over 222 years of its existence, at least in the sense that it was involved in at least one war in each of 222 different years since 1776: https://freakonometrics.hypotheses.org/50473

Re: Closing The Collapse Gap: The USSR was better prepared than the US (2006)

#20

Post by vbezhenar »

jotm wrote: post #13
flohofwoe wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

East German here, so I don't know all that much of the details of Soviet society before the collapse (but my guess is that the situation wasn't all that different in all former socialist countries). I would agree that the (East German) state and government was entirely unprepared for its own collapse. But maybe the people were better prepared because they've been living at the brink of collapse for most of their live…

This "life always on the brink" preparedness is a major part of what's keeping poor European countries poor. Everybody distrusts the government, they rely on each other, learn to do things themselves so they don't rely on others. So, money doesn't exchange hands, taxes don't get paid, GDP doesn't grow, more money doesn't get printed. This is all in a very interconnected world with a mostly free economy, so outsiders…

It's hard to trust thieves who demonstrably ignore laws when it suits them.
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