First of all, my apologies for quite a messy post, I am in some hurry today.
I think its hard tp compare life from the soviet union to that in the west during the 20th century because of the different priorities of each system. In the soviet union, the vast majority of people (those not belonging to the political elite or other groups deemed 'priviledged' by the state) were accorded the exact same level economic privilege: luxuries were few, you didn't always have enough food, you had to wait in lines, but everybody (save those mentionned above) was in the same boat.
OK, since this is the history forum, and I like asking questions in here, here is one:
Why doesn't it make much sense to directly compare the USSR and its satelites with the so-called West?
Answer below.
So when you see stalinists still parading through the streets of moscow talking about the 'good old days', I think that for the most of them, life was better under soviet rule.
You think that all the new poor in the former Soviet Bloc are stalinists?
Actually many a stalinist did quite well, just turning rightwing-jacobine (or freemarketeer, if you like that better) overnight.
But if you applied those same practices to Russia today, more than a few people would have to take a large 'paycut' in order to even out the economic classes and raise the standard of living of the poor.
So what?
Certainly - I see them all the time. I believe that two or three hundred people sleep on the streets of London every night. Not that many, perhaps, but there are many, many more living in temporary accomodation or squats that are not much better.
Exactly. Even affluent England can't give all its citizens a decent life.
Luceafarul
Maybe you know a bunch of commies?
No I don't. Not that I see that that is disqualifying in any way. On this board I run into a host of fanbois of capitalism when discussing Western political issues, but I try to take their opinions just as seriously.
Actually my wife is Polish. She comes from a family of academics, who never seemed to go through such suffering. And before somebody pulls out the communist card, none of them were in any way aligned to the Communist Party. As a matter of fact, since they are both of Baltic origin, and belonged to those from the Eastern part who were forcibly resettled in the West, one can easily understand that.
But still. Even if my-father-in-law experienced certain difficulties with his company due to this, and even if my-mother-in-law being a psychiatrist (she knew quite a few "poor" dentists, by the way) could have earned even better if she had joined the party, they lived quite comfortably with both cars, phone and a house with four walls.
But I also know more than one with less glorious occupations. And many of them struggle in this new glorious era of freedom and Christianity. Housing is expensive, food is expensive, health care costs more, and unemployment is high. Higher education is more or less reserved for those who come from opulent families nowadays. While not being stalinists, quite a few of them thought that life was easier before in many ways.
Well, in Romania, during late communist regime, when it was most harsh here, the following things were NORMAL:
My dear friend, I hope you understand that your country was an anomaly. Ceausescu was a tinpot dictator who ruled in a Roman Emperor fashion; he even showed nepotist tendencies and had praetorians.
When Kapuscinski Published his book, "The Shah of Shahs", wich depicted the gruesome condition in Iran during the rule of the Shah, some thought it to be a hidden description of Poland in those days.
Then those some are morons. And yes, I have read plenty of Kapuscinski including that one. He is one of my favourite writers.
You should watch the movie "Good bye Lenin", nice German comedy about the time of the fall of the Berlin Wall.
I have seen it. I don't see your point, though.
My moms first (only) car that she got after years of waiting in 1982, was a black Fiat 126P. Crappy deathtrap.
Yes yes, I got carried away, it was not that difficult to get a car, at least not in the eighties. Bit edgy right now...
In the eighties? You are aware that a lot of things happened then, don't you?
In south america phones didnt really become easy to get till the late 80´s
I think the people in eastern europe didnt have the luxuries of wealthy west euro countries, but for sure were not "poor"
For comparison, the gdp per capita of the Soviet Union in 1987, was the same as that of Mexico or Chile nowadays, around 8.000 dollars, which 20 years ago was more than nowadays.
Other commie countries, Czechslovakia and East Germany, were singnificantly wealthier than the SU
Bravo! Finally somebody got it. And that is the answer to the question above.
It makes no sense to compare the USSR and the countries in the Eastern Bloc with those in the West, simply because contrary to what many seem to believe, history didn't start in 1945. In comparison with the former colonial powers in the West, the Eastern and a large part of Central Europe was poor and underdeveloped. A comparison with Latin America, while also that being a bit problematic, seems more reasonable.
Oh everyone I knew in Poland was poor alright.
Then either you didn't know too many or your definition of poor is quite different than mine.
Sad part is that all these people had parents who had decent jobs.. such as teachers, dentists, etc.
Dentists poor? No way, Jose.
But of course, language is always revealing. Personally I find any job "decent".
But I seem to have made an observation which is a bit disturbing; namely that nobody whines more than people from the former Soviet bloc and nobody seems to be more indifferent to the plight of people elsewhere. I have known among others people who where tortured by the Shahs secret police, people who served long years in Turkish prison, people who ran away from Pinochet, but rarely you could find the same self-centerism and lament in falsetto as the typical run-of-the-mill Central European academic. There is certainly food for thought in that.
