In article
<ddfr-625DA6.20304223072008@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>, David
Friedman <ddfr@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> Someone wrote:
>
> > > > Wouldn't be better to ask people who experienced both
> > > > capitalism and socialism, i.e. the citizens of former
> > > > USSR and other socialist countries? Do they love
> > > > capitalism and democracy they have now, or do they
> > > > want the USSR back?
>
> I don't think people who live in the former USSR have yet experienced
> capitalism.
>
> Perhaps you should put the question to people in Estonia or the Czech
> Republic.
You are a bit confused.
Estonia is part of the former USSR, although it is not, technically
speaking, a successor state but rather one that was under Soviet
occupation.
In Russia proper, at least the large urban centers such as St. Petersburg,
Moscow, Nizhny Novgorod, Novosibersk, and Vladivostok, are booming centers
of industrial-strength robber-baron-type capitalism. If you enter Russia
through Finland, more than fifty kilometers from the border you see the
trucks loaded with Jaguars, BMWs, Mercedes-Benz's, and other luxury
automobiles, the same ones that have made the eight-lane Nevsky Prospect,
the main street in St. Peterburg, a case of 24/7 gridlock. The formerly
shabby border city of Vyborg shows clear signs that the money spreading
from St. Petersburg is beginning to have an impact on it.
The most significant development in Russia during the past ten years has
been the growth of a prosperous, generously spending middle class. Living
standards in Russia's main cities are clearly as high if not higher than
they are in the Baltic capitals, but this wealth has only begun to spread
to the countryside, for which reason Baltic living standards are still
statistically higher than those of Russia.
For informed discussion, see e.g.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/6420231.stm.
Regards,
Eugene Holman
|
