The Road to Ukrainian Independence, Part 1: th-cam.com/video/Al46hC30rjQ/w-d-xo.html The Road to Ukrainian Independence, Part 2: th-cam.com/video/WCAmFzuJG94/w-d-xo.html My Modern Ukraine Playlist: th-cam.com/play/PLNq3y0OU1_BZ74NnBBvzSKRQRfPR9d31b.html
I think your Mum was very enterprising and hard-working to bake lots of delicious pies and go out and sell them to people for their lunches. You must be very proud of her, and I bet her customers blessed her for providing her pies.
I was impressed how she found the way to earn money, experimenting with different recipes and building loyal customer base. She was very proud of her achievements.
So happy to be a subscriber here. Your videos are like windows piercing through the Iron Curtain that I remember as a younger man. So much insight! You do such a great job! Thank you!
@@UshankaShow Ukraine is a fictitious Soviet republic. It exists only because Soviet idiots (Putin and companies) cannot correctly present territorial claims. When legitimate power is established in Russia, Ukraine will disappear.
Part of Ukraine's issues in particular was that its leadership often delayed essential economic reforms. This ensured stagnation, as the former system was dismantled before a new one could be built, and red tape prevented the emergence of a functioning market. This was often done do avoid the necessary pains of shutting down obsolete industries.
The problem: elites in Ukraine thought they could do well on their own, only to found out that the supply chain was broken as a result of the collapse of the USSR.
I believe the supply chain was already falling apart before 1991. Gorbachev's reforms focused on profitability and socialist supply chain was not about that.
Nyet. The problem was that state industries were sold off piecemeal and often to people who had either no experience in that industry or if they did, they had no experience (interest?) in making them efficient and competitive private businesses.
It is kinda same reason why Latvia did relatively worse than other Baltic countries when it comes to industry. Like a lot of Latvian stuff was complicated military stuff for Soviet military and radio/electronics where key people were "evacuated" by KGB or left to West by themselves and those companies were led by Russian/Soviet loyalists, and other stuff was trains and cars (microbusses) which a small country in economic hardship do not really need to buy, or buy in large quantities, but they could not compete un the West and Russia was making it's own for local market... So one can say some of it could have been saved and since Ukraine is a way bigger country, more of such companies could be save to higher degree of success but for some only being back in huge block of countries would help. Like Ukraine also had some space/ballistic missiles industry then but the country was poor and without big power ambitions so that went down the drain obviously. In Russia at least they still agonized but were kept busy
There is a youtube video about Rigas microbus factory RAF, where employees compared their Latvia bus with new Renault Espace. And some agitated russian speaking worker says that whole factory lines should be taken to МЕТАЛЛОЛОМ. As they are not able, literally to mallet such quality bodyparts. There were presses, ofcource but loads of hammering was still needed.
That's one point apologists for the soviet Union tend to ignore; corruption, crime, drug addiction and prostitution was all going on long before 1991, just that a lot of it was either brushed under the carpet or state sanctioned. One example and we all know anecdote doesn't equal fact; I used to know a guy who worked in Shannon airport in the 1970s and 1980s and he used to say that the busiest times they had were when the Aeroflot or Cubana flights stopped over. They would have queues of people with stacks of dollars buying up cases of whiskey, perfume. cartons of cigarettes and consumer goods that would all end up on the black market. This was obvious state sanctioned corruption done by state officials (the only ones allowed to travel this freely) but entirely ignored by the sympathizers. This corruption meant that those in power during the communist era (whom the sympathizers lionize) came out of the USSR with the most wealth allowing them to finance and profit off new business or become the new oligarchy themselves. As for the privatizations; despite the propaganda we hear about 'shock therapy' the economic liberalizations in Russia and Ukraine happened much slower than in a lot of other post communist countries. This prevented the closure or modernization of inefficient businesses and continued the economic turmoil for longer than it should have continued. In Ukraine's case, I would blame the stratified political system where it became necessary to compromise to form stable governments meaning they were less ideologically driven and more pragmatic.
Usually common garden variety of tankies doesn't know or ignores the existence of Nomenklatura while talking about perceived equality (or even equity) in the USSR. Or ignores the people who could get wealthy through their job (like taxi drivers, waiters or sailors). Or Soviet organized crime. Hardcore or Stalinst tankies blame Khrushchev for all that crime and inequality (ignoring the fact that it existed even under Stalin too)
@@qZbGmYjS4QusYqv5 we forget that up till about 38 the Kremlin was dominated by Ukrainian Jews, then after 38 till Stalin’s death the Kremlin was dominated by Georgians. Finally from Stalin’s death to Bresnev’s death the Kremlin was dominated by Ukrainians, with both Krushev & Bresnev being Ukrainians. It’s really only these days that Russians dominate the Kremlin. Even before the Revolution the Czars were really German since Catherine.
Absolutely! Drugs became a big problem after Gorbachev alcohol campaign. When vodka and wine disappeared from store shelves, people went for hard stuff.
Lithuanian here. It is not that we removed communist apparatchiks all together. The story if more complex. The independence movement won the elections and declared independence in 1990, these guys were not communists and later became the conservative party (mostly). The communist split internally over the independence, the pro soviet rejected it and ended up being outlawed (after their coup attempt failed). While the pro independence ones became LSDP (social democrats) and later won the elections in 1992, before loosing again to conservatives. 90s were a mess but there was a widespread agreement on goals of joining NATO and EU, and that in the end saved us.
@@UshankaShow I think it was different for them - due to large numbers of russian speakers the independence movements and their successors seems to have remained in power longer. Also I wanted to thank you for your videos. It is fascinating to compare my childhood in the free Lithuania of the 90s to yours in the soviet union. All the things that have changed, and many that haven't.
Don't underestimate the importance of a strong agricultural sector. Here in the UK, our government is trying to destroy farming for reasons best known to themselves (personally, I suspect "insanity" may be a factor), so we're going to need to import our food from somewhere...
@@bettyswunghole3310 I think it's more important not to overestimate the importance of agricultural sector especially since that seems to be a lot more common. Britain already imports a ton of food. The only countries that seek self sufficiency are crazy ones like (Edit NK not NJ lol) NK. Leaving the EU and making food trade more complicated seems like a bigger problem. Ukraine is a lot more suited for agriculture then other nations due to a lot of fertile land but even then post war recovery will need a lot on higher profit sectors to be built up as well
@@bat9056 I'm not suggesting that we seek "self-sufficiency"...I think this is an unrealistic aim for the UK. However, to seek "total-dependency" doesn't strike me as a particularly good idea, either...especially when you consider how dependent the UK already is on imports in other sectors besides agriculture.
Funny that in the late 90's I took on-line Russian language lessons. Some of the linguist would share stories about how things were in the past (like you do) and we seemed to agree on one philosophy and that was that big government was bad government. Government corruption was like cancer.....it would present itself and then grow and grow until it destroyed the host from which it depended on.
Ironically without any big government, you're left to the mafia state. It still is, but consolidation of the mafias and centralizing power was what ended the bad 90s of Russia. The only ones who didn't need a government to protect them were the oligarch circles who knew what to do.
@@TheBucketSkillwith Putin, the mafia BECAME the state. His cronies completely de-industrialized Russia, & all state/oligarxh resources were directed to extracting natural resources & then stealing the revenues from the export of those resources
I think your father got "institutionalized" into the Soviet system and that is why he couldn't really adapt to the new reality after its collapse. It wasn't uncommon for middle aged and older people who spent their whole lives living under a certain set of rules and expectations to feel lost when it came to an end. It reminds me of the movie The Shawshank Redemption when Red gets paroled after being in prison for 40 years and doesn't feel like he can adapt to his new life in the outside world. You could possibly describe the Soviet Union as sort of a giant minimum-security prison, so it is not surprising that many people in the 1990s felt like Red when they got paroled from the USSR.
@@An1Kum It's all how you look at it. A prison, at least in America, gives you free housing, meals, and health care, but at the expense of personal freedom. You could say prison is a cozy home compared to living homeless on the streets, but most homeless people try to avoid going to prison.
@@FlintIronstag23 You are illiterate. Every country offers something to its citizens. USSR gave free housing and USA gives food coupuns and homeless shelter. Not much difference in my view.
I can vividly remember the discussion about new coat of arms for Ukraine and I remeber one, not that much different from 17:35. It did had Trident in the middle, but also the wheat bundels on the side. And they guys who were discussing it were like.. no no no, this is too much of Soviet Union symbol.
in slovakia i have the perception that 30% of people are still looking for values of everyone equal = equaly poor, 30% of people are for values of free choice (very broad term even anarchocapitalism), 30% will tell you same as in Russian federation "I am apolitical" = basicaly they decide the votes and finaly 10% of far right or far left agenda. still keeping in mind that we are looking at 60% of overall country population. whether i might be close to be right or to see a pattern i do not know, certain is that current prime minister sure is a -stan country iteration having him behind the rudder for 4th four year term even one got shorted and current one seems shakier than ever before. what a time to live life when comparing times your father or my father were young. repetative iterations of struggle for basic necessities or as my father used to say "wartime household". you mentioned having sentiment to save empty jars of conserved stuff - same is my fate. i can not comprehend how they can make profit selling produce in glass jars that cost to manufacture, then fill then with veggies or fruits that cost to produce and harvest and then we are free to dump the totaly usable glass jars as if it is paper tissue. economy of scale is a complicated term to get one's head around, still it is i think vastefull.
Because it was already collapsing under Socialism, just it was masked by the Socialist system. It's like the Hyperinflation that hit in the post Soviet era ie 90s. The currency was already hyperinflated before the collapse of the USSR but the Socialist regime had price fixing keeping the value of goods artificially low. Which is why you had plenty of money but nothing to spend it on. So when both Ukraine and Russia entered the world market they both suffered hyperinflation throughout the 90s. This is actually why I'm horrified when politicians or economist in the USA even consider the idea of State price fixing.
explanation of the level "democracy is good, therefore there is development." excluding the fact that the countries of Europe and the USA have been waging wars for resources, logistics routes and have had colonies for the last 300 years.
@@Notrusbot USA has not fought wars for resources, outside of preventing monopolization of resources by way of closed economies or cartels. Only non-capitalist economies like Mercantile or Socialist economies care about creating autarky on resources for example. Because Trading with non-Socialist countries is evil and Mercantilism was an old obsolete way of looking at economics a remnant of the old European way of trade. Which is why the old Empires literally just fell apart, after the realized free trade was superior to occupation/colonization. This was the primary reason the USA got involved in WWII because actions like Japan/Germany actually broke down international trade, as both Japan and Germany tried to create Autarky. USSR did the same as well, spreading it's influence mostly to create it's own sphere of influence closed off from the rest of the world at the time. USA's involvement in South America in the 19th/early 20th Century was the same way, the USA sought to kick out European Empires from the Americas, and open up trade within the Americas which ironically benefited everyone and most definitely South America. 30-80s Latin America was a paradise until Cartel Lords, Dictators, Communist rebellions, and Socialist politicians ruined it one country at a time. Ironically even the "Oil" War of 1991 (Desert Storm) vs Iraq was in response to Iraq invading Kuwait which Kuwait because they destroyed their domestic economy. Kuwait was also one of the only Arab nations that didn't join OPEC which was is a oil Cartel. Ironically most Arab countries also joined the USA in this campaign. Arab forces were actually tasked with liberating the Capital for political reasons, being it was considered most fitting that Arab troops should liberate Kuwait City. Basically USA didn't get involved to monopolize resources of any kind but got involved to keep trade open preventing monopolization of resources. Every other war the USA was involved in were not Oil Wars in the Middle East. Despite the memes/stereotypes. Now European Empires, ya that's a different story, but as I already mentioned the USA stood up against Empires. Whether run by Monarchs, Fascist or Marxist. And yes the USSR was an Empire. You can argue the USA is an empire, but the USA isn't a colonial Empire, but more of a soft power, financial empire. USA only really has military access to nations that ironically just want USA military protection, and in some cases the USA even pays the governments for access to say a port, and some facilities. Which isn't Colonialism, and honestly isn't exactly an Empire per se. Currently today Russia is perhaps the best example of a Modern Empire in the traditional sense because it occupies entire countries that are considered parts of the "Federation" that are not Russian. They're not allowed to leave either, those that have tried were met with brutal military force. PS before you mention nations like Iran and how the USA supported a coup there. It's because National Bolshevism, Marxism, Socialism and Nazism were the most popular ideologies within Arabia, so you can see the USA's worry when Iran decided to make exclusive trade deals with the USSR early in it's fledgling Democracy.
@@citricdemon It's not about fixing prices. after 1953 there was a systemic problem in the organization of the economy of the USSR + corruption. I was generally surprised that most Westerners, including Warsaw Pact countries, have no idea that in the USSR there were state organizations that calculated prices, the cost of paying for services and were engaged in improving production productivity
@Alte.Kameraden The difference between direct war and support for the separatists has different meanings for you, but the meaning is the same and leads to the same results. that is why you consider it necessary to separate the war for resources and the “exclusive trade relations” that, as a rule, appear after supporting the separatists. such examples as the Panama Canal, banana wars, Kuwait, Taiwan are nothing more than the aggressive policy of the United States. It’s especially funny how you wrote about the fact that South America has benefited from cooperation with the United States. the concept of the “big stick” introduced by Roosevelt speaks for itself of how this relationship developed. Moreover, waging direct wars is expensive and leads to reputational losses, for example, you can say that the United States did not wage wars for resources and access to resources, but the fact that the United States did everything to get these resources is a different story
Don't take this the wrong way, but... "smuggling vodka" and "honest work" don't seem to go together in my world :) But otherwise, I like your channel. Greetings from fellow former USSR sufferer from Estonia :)
he wasn't saying that smuggling vodka is honest work.. but people who didn't smuggle vodka and had the character traits he described @ 22:47 could still get a job
The big problem with transition to capitalism that many people fail to mention was that there were simply too many unreasonable laws and rules. It was impossible to do business and comply with all the rules. Therefore, no business in the 90s was 100% legal. That was the biggest factor in the high crime rate.
Getting to poland to smuggle vodka, tabbaco and butter... I am still doing. But as a Czech citizen. But seroiusly, my girlfriend told me exactly what you have described. She fled for the same reason as others, but their parrents used to work in Czechia for more than 8 years prior to war. I have met a lot of Ukranians on Czech building sites, doing hard manual labour, while they have told me, that they were profesors, IT specialists, teachers, surgeons... And they told me, that in half a year they will have more money than in 2 years in Ukraine. In fact, now, Czech economy is dependent on Ukrainan labor force. Parents of my girlfirend used to work here for half a year and could have up to half a year of vacation. But that is not all. She also told me, that if you want some "normal things" like in europe, like proper education, healthcare and goods... you have to pay a lot extra. Bottom line is: Ukranians used to fled their country way before war for economical/political reasons.
"Paying extra" for better education and healthcare is what you usually get when you have an officially "free" education and healthcare, but your country is too poor to provide for it.
A contributing factor would be supply chains. Factories in the Ukrainian SSR used raw materials, components and machinery from the rest of the Union (and vice versa). Then the Union breaks up and suppliers are now in Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia are now on the other side of a border and have to go through customs and are subject to tariffs. This adds more expenses to factories which are already obsolete, facing strong foreign competition and having a collapsing market and means that fewer of them can make it. The more fold, the less customers they have.
@@UshankaShow have you done anything on folk lore from the soviet union and before? I get the impression that Ukraine has a deep drawer of historical beliefs and boogiemen. Cheers for your work Sergei 👍
Thanks for the great information and personal experiences. All to often, many get caught up in what they have read or believe based on faulty information, mainly because they lack any real experience.
19:34 He sure does know a lot about a country he’s not from, during a time he didn’t exist in! What does it feel like when someone tells you about your own past like they know more about it?
from my point of view, all the promise that i hoped and held for the people of the former soviet bloc with the fall of the Wall, were dashed, when the middle managers of the soviet system just threw up their hands and capitulated to the invasion of the what i call the dogs of capitalism. the populations of those countries were completely unsuspecting and totally unprepared for what was coming their way. the resulting chaos and poverty paved the way for the rise of people like tsar vlad the intriguer/invader, Orban, Duda and other regressive sorts.
The USSR had passed that point of building a consumer diven economy in the late 1920s and opted for a heavy industry and military driven economy instead. In the 1980s, Soviet economy was already built to make things nobody wants in very inefficient ways.
@@Mario_N64 no, there was a huge difference - China in 1980s was a pre-industrial country with predominantly rural population while Soviet Union was already industrialised and urbanized. To put it simply, China did industrialization the right way while USSR chose the wrong way and went this way for 60 years.
Yes. I live in Vinnytsia, which was heavily "Sovietized". In the villages in this region, it's all Ukrainians. In the city - lots of Russians. The young people, too young to know the USSR, are often the most proud of their Russian identity - sometimes they even refuse to speak Ukrainian although they know different foreign languages, and they teach their children only Russian "for their future." I would say, the older generations who have nostalgia also have some bad memories. But the younger people only have the good stories about when grandpa was an army commander and grandma was a university rector, and their family were important people.
I don't know where this myth came from that Baltic states abolished the communist party, carried out lustration, fired all soviet bureaucrats and so on. It was stated openly that lustration will not be carried out, because members of the independence movement were informants of the KGB. A couple of ministries were created from nothing, but almost everything else stayed the same.
Right, I’m going to have to go back and watch the first two parts first. I’ll just say now that it seems that this past couple of years appear to have been somewhat of a disaster for Ukraine.
Realistically, who else could have handled the situations better other than those former communist bureaucrats? Just like how General Patton said while he was military governor of Bavaria, he needed former NZ's to pull telephone cables.
In 1928 Trotsky warned that the Soviet Union could be brought down by not just by war but also by cheap capitalist goods. That's why the whole idea of building Socialism in one country was utopian. Stalin betrayed the revolution and as Fidel Castro stated the Soviet Party never properly dealt with the injustices of the Stalin era.
Ironic given that Trotsky was War Commissar during the Polish Soviet war, invading what's now Ukraine, Poland and Belarus though thankfully stopped before he could spread the revolution further.
@@michaelwarenycia7588 Stalin is the commander who refused the order to advance given at the time the Trotsky and Red army reached the gates of Warsaw. Had the revolution reached Germany than the Soviets would have had a contiguous economic area that included an advanced capitalist nation. Capitalism has the problem of greedy ruling classes using war to advance their competing economic interests. That was the whole reason the Russian revolution occurred. In the US Labor leader Eugene Debs was imprisoned for opposing the Imperialist war. The same thin happened to the American Trotskyist in 1940. The Stalinists applauded FDRs action at the end of the war instead of shaking the hands of the monopolists they were sent to prison for 5 year terms.
Lithuania also elected ex-communist's which ruled under Soviet Union. They rebranded party to socialdemocrats but it was the same underneath it was old "Red Barons" who gain strategic companies for free in process of privatization.
@@robertvonschumann7297 got any proof beside "Tucker Carlson said so"? Comparing to trillion dollar corruption in China, Russia and United States corruption in Ukraine is small fish
I think Russia took the first place in corruption race but they had so much more to steal. Azerbajan is anorher interesting case to study. Ruling Aliyev family is controlling the entire economy
@@UshankaShow not these days, I know who involved in transport in all 3 former Soviet Slavic republics. He says that Ukraine was the only place where baksheesh was required for 100% legit business. Do note that even before things escalated in Feb 22, Russia’s GDP per capita figures were 5 times higher than Ukraine.
You have reinforced to me the resilience of humans despite the destruction of Marxism. Those allowed to operate in meritocracy can survive and thrive with hard work and dedication. Those that wallow in laziness and victim-hood remain in misery. The world will be a better place when the victims stop murdering and stealing from the survivors...
Ironically been stuck on “Happy Nation” by Ace of Base. Your thoughts on the subject matter of song Sergei given it came out in 1993? Always got the impression it was commentary on the social / political climate you described in this video.
you didn't reach a quality by making everyone poor. You reached quality by not allowing peoples to die of poverty. It's not like there was a large segment of the working class that was wealthy and made poor.
Romanian here. The girls that in communism dated foreign students were working for the secret services. I don't think that prostitution like we knew it today existed back then. Everything was controlled by the state so you couldn't do what you please. After the fall of communism Romania elected also a former communist Ion Iliescu. He won with 89%😂. We had some disidents like Doina Cornea but she didn't run for president . She was not widely known in the whole Romania. Not like Lech Walesa in Poland. Actually ,with the exception of the Baltic states, Poland and Czecoslovakia the other former communist states had former communist s as leaders😅
The "foreign" (or valyutnaya ("for currency")) prostitution was indeed controlled by KGB. Usual one was controlled by the Soviet mafia or Soviet police. Only in the 80s journalists were allowed to talk about it PS I vividly remember watching one of the "criminal" programs (probably "Человек и Закон", "Human And Law") somewhere in 1988. The bunch of "working girls" were arrested by the Vice department. They said a girl in one night got paid substantially more then my mom got in a month of honest work on the factory. That was shocking to say the least
@@UshankaShow I wonder what I would have been capable of doing if I had been in your position. I would like to think that I woudl have been like you or your mother, but I am not certain that I woudl have been.
Was going to make a joke about Ukraine being doomed the second it rejected Levko and his handlebar moustache but I just read his wiki page and yeah, maybe not lol
You go from one extreme to another. I assume that a lot of people simply did not know on what to do as well as different products are no longer desired so production (work) stops. In the GDR a similar situation due to job obselecense amongst other things.
Well G7 countries economics run on millitary industry AND colonization of countries which don't have millitary. Good book about anglo-saxs colonialism Endless Holocausts
Colonization? What do you call what Russia did to its neighbors between 1917 and 1991, and again today, when they invaded, occupied, enforced alien economic and value systems which the natives didn't like, and made Russian language mandatory for higher education and government work? On top of that, genociding and deporting locals while moving in Russians to do higher status jobs, like bureaucrats, police, university professors, KGB...
To get a solid understanding one would have to dip into the taboo topic of IQ statistics - I am not brave enough for that. Few random comments: 1) For me the most successful post-communist countries are Estonia, followed by Slovenia. 2) The rise of Poland surprised me, in the 1980s Poles had reputation for dishonesty and work-shyness. Today Poland is overcoming Czechia. 3) The worst is/was Albania, there was even a large armed riot after a pyramid scheme failed sometime in the 1990s, people died. 4) Ukrainians who immigrated to Canada and USA have for most part integrated well. 5) The West botched the end of the Cold War by not providing enough help and guidance. The case of East Germany is worth studying.
the central European countries had 40 years of communism. The old generation there had still experience the times before and the memory of a "normal" economic system was still preserved. Ukraine, Russia, Belorus had 74 years of communism and a much harsher form. Nobody alive could remember the times before this system, especially with that bad life expectancy. So they had no idea what to do, when suddenly they weren't receiving orders anymore. Just one annecdote: why did Sergey smuggle vodka from Poland to Ukraine? Because in Poland they were at least producing vodka.
Basically, in much of Eastern Europe, state property was transferred to ex-Communists and criminals who had no interest in keeping staff or producing products. But that was what the U.S. wanted.
No, Chornovil was an idealist and had strange ideas about federalization and other bullcrap that would have made the country even more ineffective than it was
Capitalism is Built. Created, Infused into a culture and ultimately, when everyone is in a Social agreement, Corruption will be minimized. Capitalism isn't just a gift that will work for everyone. Just look at the wars, conflicts that created the System we have in the USA. It takes Generations and a society/culture that is compatible. Even in Korea, with "capitalism", It took them Decades to shake off their dictatorship.
I don't disagree with your first paragraph. _'Even in Korea, with "capitalism", It took them Decades to shake off their dictatorship.'_ You need to substantiate that. What vestiges needed to be shaken off and when did it take place? By law, Chun was limited to one 7-year term to end in late '87. He wanted to amend the Constitution to allow a second term, and this was rejected after mass public demonstrations. Chun was forced to release Kim Dae-Joong from prison and make reforms such as limiting the presidency to one 5-year term. Korea had a multi-party legislature during Chun's rule. The December '87 election saw former general Roh defeat two so-called pro-democracy leaders, Kim Young-Sam (YS) and Kim Dae-Joong (DJ). Roh won just just under 37% of the vote, but because it was first-past-the-post system there was no run-off between the two top vote winners. Had it been like France's system, it's likely YS would have won the run-off. Under Roh the national curfew was lifted, some economic liberalisation occurred, the KCIA was removed from the press offices, etc. State-ownership of the broadcast channels was relaxed. YS was elected president next after his party and Noh's party merged, giving Noh a parliamentary majority during his rule and promising YS the party's support for the '92 election. At the end of his term was the Asian financial meltdown. DJ was elected. Most economic liberalisation came from the demands of the IMF. DJ relaxed censorship still remaining, for example on music. I recall all Sex Pistols albums were allowed to be sold above ground and The Beetles songs such as 'Revolution' were permitted to be broadcast. It should be said of these had been available even during the Chun admin in the massive and thriving blackmarket economy. There was even blackmarket cable TV. My next door neighbour was a member of the national assembly and at the end of the lane to our homes in Seoul was a black market shop. The blackmarket was very much above ground, which means the law ignored because enforcement was practically non-existent. The only crack down on the blackmarket I ever saw was after Korea was required to lift its ban on foreign rice and replace it with a quota when it joined the WTO in '95. This crack down lasted a few months and was a performance to appease upset farmers. At most the vestiges of the dictatorship lasted a dozen years, but these had been unraveling in the earlier years. There was suspicion of the internet in the early days and one's online access was charged per minute that was very expensive, but once Korea saw how much money was being made that ended and the country digitalised rapidly. The remaining censorship is about North Korea mostly (a state of war still exists) though I can access pro Nork websites hosted overseas, for example in Japan, without needing a VPN. Same for pro Nork youtube channels. Porno is censored and those websites blocked. The demands for censorship today more often come from the left such as feminists and other grievance groups. And one can't visit NK without gov't permission. Plenty of Koreans visiting and doing business with China and Vietnam though. My wife's family's company has branches in Shanghai, HCM, and Hanoi for about 25 years so far. And Korean citizen children may not attend foreign-owned schools in Korea, though there are a few loopholes. If your claim hinges on corruption, plenty of that exists in countries that are not ruled by dictators.
@@gagamba9198 TL;DR. As a US Citizen, I hear all the time that the USA is this, or that, or this... Trust me. We know. Use less words. It's ok. He was a dictator. embrace it. it was, not is.
@@michaelbarbarich3965 Minimized in comparison to the other economic models.. Bet you're one that would say that Ukraine isn't the #2 ranked most corrupt country in Europe..
@@michaelbarbarich3965 You do realize that the MOST CORRUPT societies are those in the former countries where socialism/communism was once the governing mechanism, right? Globally speaking, in actually capitalistic and social democratic/capitalistic societies are consistently the countries with the LEAST CORRUPTION on the globe. NOTE: its important to understand that "least" or "less" does NOT mean "none"
22:56 approximately. none of my friends?a lot of my friends,some of my friends myself included got into drugs. I think you said none but listened to it four times and don't know what you really said. "Myself included" is not generally used in English with the word none. I think you meant to say None of my friends or I got into drugs. They way it was worded made it sound like you got into drugs. Pretty sure that's not correct.
Ушанка, посмотри на Вики чем была Операция "Аэродинамик". И после ещё можно полистать книжку "Украинские буржуазные националисты", 1963. По факту, эта страна никогда не задумывалась как независимая и суверенная... Это временный продукт в столкновении 2-х цивилизаций. Как у нас на глазах Л/ДНР сделали на ровном месте, вот так же и Украина - только масштабы больше.
А можно почитать и книги тех, кто воевал в лесах, не совковую пропаганду. Как например “Армия без страны” Тараса Бульбы-Боровца. Но для этого надо понимать украинский язык.
@@UshankaShow "Аэродинамик" - это операция западной алфавитной конторы, так скажем "see eye hey". Если вы понимаете о чём я. 😉 И документы по ней давно в открытом доступе, как исторические.
It's happened everywhere, even if this world is ruled by reds or fascists, either stinky or religious or to say whoever it is, it won't fix the problem anyway.
This is the summary (more like an excuse, but hey Its just my opinion) Here’s a 30-point summary of the video: 1. **Background Context**: The speaker recounts Ukraine’s path to independence in 1991 after the Soviet Union's dissolution, focusing on challenges post-independence. 2. **Speaker's Profile**: Sergei Sputnikov, born in Kyiv in 1971, lived in independent Ukraine until 1998 before moving to the U.S. 3. **Late Soviet Ukraine**: Ukrainian nationalism resurged in the late 1980s during Gorbachev's perestroika. 4. **Declaration of Sovereignty**: Ukraine declared sovereignty in 1990 and independence in 1991, breaking from the Soviet Union. 5. **Optimistic Expectations**: Many Ukrainians believed independence would lead to economic prosperity by retaining resources previously sent to Moscow. 6. **Economic Reality**: Post-independence hopes were dashed as Ukraine’s GDP plummeted to 40.9% of its 1990 levels by 1998. 7. **Economic Collapse**: The transition to capitalism caused a swift economic downturn, with industries failing to compete globally. 8. **Military-Dependent Economy**: Soviet Ukraine’s economy heavily relied on military production, which collapsed with the end of the USSR. 9. **Outdated Infrastructure**: Ukrainian industries were technologically outdated and struggled against Western competition. 10. **Comparison to the West**: Goods like Lada cars became inferior to imported used vehicles from Europe. 11. **Loss of Soviet Market**: Ukraine lost its largest customer, the Soviet military-industrial complex. 12. **Leadership Continuity**: Former communists, like Leonid Kravchuk and Leonid Kuchma, retained power in independent Ukraine. 13. **Communist Legacy**: Former Soviet officials dominated government roles, hampering genuine reforms. 14. **Baltic States Comparison**: Unlike Ukraine, Baltic nations barred former communists from power and recovered faster. 15. **Social Stratification**: Post-independence saw the rise of a wealthy elite and a struggling working class. 16. **Crime and Corruption**: Capitalism introduced new challenges, including organized crime, corruption, and economic disparity. 17. **Personal Examples**: The speaker shares anecdotes of acquaintances who either succeeded or struggled during the transition. 18. **Prostitution and Crime**: Issues like prostitution existed even during Soviet times but became more visible post-independence. 19. **Adaptation Challenges**: Many Soviet citizens struggled to adapt to a free-market system due to a lack of entrepreneurial experience. 20. **KGB and State Control**: The Soviet system ensured stability but suppressed initiative and innovation. 21. **Economic Inequality**: While some thrived, others faced dire poverty, highlighting the uneven effects of capitalism. 22. **Generational Divide**: Younger Ukrainians adapted more easily, while older generations struggled with the transition. 23. **Rural Challenges**: Farmers and rural workers faced significant adjustments, with some adapting successfully. 24. **Cultural Shifts**: Ukrainians retained Soviet-era symbols and mentalities in their governance and culture post-independence. 25. **Delayed Reforms**: Ukraine lacked its own constitution until 1996 and adopted reforms slowly. 26. **National Identity**: Ukraine struggled to define its national symbols and identity, influenced by its Soviet past. 27. **Economic Success Stories**: Despite hardships, some individuals and small businesses flourished. 28. **Travel Freedom**: Independence allowed people to travel and explore opportunities abroad. 29. **Personal Struggles**: The speaker recounts his own challenges, from smuggling goods to working multiple jobs to make ends meet. 30. **Hope Amid Challenges**: Despite hardships, independence opened doors for personal and national growth, with some benefiting from the shift to a market economy.
you didn't reach a quality by making everyone poor. You reached quality by not allowing peoples to die of poverty. It's not like there was a large segment of the working class that was wealthy and made poor. Also material conditions shape behavior. An empty stomach is as much an influence as a gun to the head.
Same thing happened with Russia's capitalism experiment and it was a disaster. I really think people are making a big mistake trading their culture for convenience capitalism. As time goes on, I see how it decays the human soul.
What culture? Fake state-mandated Marxist one? Nobody cared about that culture. It was stillborn. People got tired of abject poverty and all-around deficit. We went back to our national pre-Bolshevik cultures.
"trading their culture for convenience capitalism." You need to study more history if you think communism and Russian language are "their culture" for Ukrainians, Latvians, Georgians, Estonians etc
@@michaelwarenycia7588 Ukrainians traded their culture in when they decided to let a bunch of Azov nazi thugs take over their government during the Maidan, that's history written in stone.
It’s my understanding that Poland introduced capitalism slowly and let people got used to it while Russia and I assume Ukraine had the shock therapy which overnight made everything capitalist. It’s not strange that people grown up in socialism cannot adapt from one day to another. The shock therapy that was an idea introduced by American economists was responsible for much of the misery.
There was an attempt by Gorbachev to introduce reforms gradually with the aim of creating a hybrid type system. The problem was there was a coup and afterwards voices calling for more rapid reforms in order to prevent another coup took the lead ( most notably Yeltsin) .
Although Poland was one of the slower ones so were Russia and Ukraine. They all dragged their feet mainly because their state enterprises were so huge. There are still huge parts of Russia's economy that are state owned or private in name only. If you look at the EU now; the 2004 members with the strongest economies are the ones who liberalized the quickest but also had the advantage of having much smaller state enterprises and a more flexible economy ........... Apart from Hungary who regressed after Orban to now being a drain on everyone's resources.
My understanding is that Poland went through shock therapy even sooner en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balcerowicz_Plan#Comparative_statistics And that it's relative success in Poland (GDP stopped shrinking and started growing again pretty quickly but large unemployment and other problems lasted for many years until joining the EU) helped convince other countries to try it. That said while shock therapy wasn't necessarily the best or wisest course its important to note it wasn't enforced it was bought in by the national governments who were in many cases already in a significant emergency and desperate. The Soviet and many other post communist economies were already collapsing even before/without the collapse of the USSR and the idea was to try to shorten transition. Also its important to note in places where it failed the worst leading to rise of oligarchs it was local corruption that did the most damage.
They started slow in Poland in the early 80s. After the Berlin Wall collapse they went all in on the shock therapy. So several years before comrade Sergey's smuggling operations it were Poles who smuggle all kind of goods out of Soviet Ukraine. That's why Ukrainians were so reluctant to introduce shock therapy. We had bad examples of Poland and Russia
Actually almost all former socialist countries had their economy shrunken. This is called a success? Starvation increased in Bulgaria, corruption sky rocketet etc. Poverty went up. Communists in Ukraine was the biggest party even after 1991. Nowadays people can buy more stuff but for lended money in a bank. That is actually poverty!
@UshankaShow Yes it was in the 80's. People died of starvation in the nineties there. In Russia 7,7 million people died of starvation, alcoholism, disease, crime etc in the nineties.
Yes, evreywhere people starve, even if at tiny numbers, For example, 1.61 per 100.000 americans starve, So yes, no country ever had 0% starvation.@@UshankaShow
yeah, glory to none of your country, none of your garbage system, rubbish politic, none of your stinky religious, neither your crappy ideology, also say no to your USSR fools.
Basically not. Once again, I had been liviing in independent Ukraine for 7 years, 1991 - 1998 as a citizen of Ukraine, not as an employee of American Embassy. So I know what I'm talking about.
@UshankaShow You are talking like an outsider. There is nothing Ukrainian or Russian about you. You may have born there but that link is dead because you made a choice to exchange it for McDonald's and old BMW. You are so naive to understand that people in USSR wanted that life. It was they who built it , not Lenin or Stalin. It degenerated after death of Stalin and they wanted a change but they have had western sponsored capitalism in 90s and it was terrible. You try to be authority and you have no connection with your own people. Better stay away from it.
You should be using the word "independence" more ironically. When the International Monetary Fund runs your economy they ensure that you collapse to the point of being nothing more than a colony of international financiers and a raw material exporter. An IMF "success" story typically involves the currency collapsing in value, businesses shutting down, poverty increasing dramatically, and the death rate going up.
You can't build free market economy overnight in the former communist state which was corrupted way before the independence especially when it's being sabotaged by half of the elites
![[Live สด] การออกรางวัลสลากกินแบ่งรัฐบาล งวดวันที่ 16 ธันวาคม 2567](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/dNTiBBthKgQ/mqdefault.jpg)
The Road to Ukrainian Independence, Part 1:
th-cam.com/video/Al46hC30rjQ/w-d-xo.html
The Road to Ukrainian Independence, Part 2:
th-cam.com/video/WCAmFzuJG94/w-d-xo.html
My Modern Ukraine Playlist:
th-cam.com/play/PLNq3y0OU1_BZ74NnBBvzSKRQRfPR9d31b.html
I think your Mum was very enterprising and hard-working to bake lots of delicious pies and go out and sell them to people for their lunches. You must be very proud of her, and I bet her customers blessed her for providing her pies.
I was impressed how she found the way to earn money, experimenting with different recipes and building loyal customer base. She was very proud of her achievements.
So happy to be a subscriber here. Your videos are like windows piercing through the Iron Curtain that I remember as a younger man. So much insight! You do such a great job! Thank you!
Thank you kindly!
@@UshankaShow Ukraine is a fictitious Soviet republic. It exists only because Soviet idiots (Putin and companies) cannot correctly present territorial claims. When legitimate power is established in Russia, Ukraine will disappear.
Part of Ukraine's issues in particular was that its leadership often delayed essential economic reforms. This ensured stagnation, as the former system was dismantled before a new one could be built, and red tape prevented the emergence of a functioning market. This was often done do avoid the necessary pains of shutting down obsolete industries.
The problem: elites in Ukraine thought they could do well on their own, only to found out that the supply chain was broken as a result of the collapse of the USSR.
"elites in Ukraine".
Aka, THE ELECTORATE.
"elites in Ukraine".
Aka, THE ELECTORATE.
I believe the supply chain was already falling apart before 1991. Gorbachev's reforms focused on profitability and socialist supply chain was not about that.
Nyet. The problem was that state industries were sold off piecemeal and often to people who had either no experience in that industry or if they did, they had no experience (interest?) in making them efficient and competitive private businesses.
It had no business being independent back then, in such a sudden manner.
It is kinda same reason why Latvia did relatively worse than other Baltic countries when it comes to industry. Like a lot of Latvian stuff was complicated military stuff for Soviet military and radio/electronics where key people were "evacuated" by KGB or left to West by themselves and those companies were led by Russian/Soviet loyalists, and other stuff was trains and cars (microbusses) which a small country in economic hardship do not really need to buy, or buy in large quantities, but they could not compete un the West and Russia was making it's own for local market... So one can say some of it could have been saved and since Ukraine is a way bigger country, more of such companies could be save to higher degree of success but for some only being back in huge block of countries would help. Like Ukraine also had some space/ballistic missiles industry then but the country was poor and without big power ambitions so that went down the drain obviously. In Russia at least they still agonized but were kept busy
There is a youtube video about Rigas microbus factory RAF, where employees compared their Latvia bus with new Renault Espace. And some agitated russian speaking worker says that whole factory lines should be taken to МЕТАЛЛОЛОМ. As they are not able, literally to mallet such quality bodyparts. There were presses, ofcource but loads of hammering was still needed.
@@Tegelane5 sounds a bit like the British car and motorbike industry in the 60/70's then...
I saw "Red Heat"! I thought every in Soviet swimming pools had to be naked!
in East Germany - yes
But hardly in an American movie.
@@j3lny425 ...it was meant to be a humorous remark...don't take it seriously.
That's one point apologists for the soviet Union tend to ignore; corruption, crime, drug addiction and prostitution was all going on long before 1991, just that a lot of it was either brushed under the carpet or state sanctioned.
One example and we all know anecdote doesn't equal fact; I used to know a guy who worked in Shannon airport in the 1970s and 1980s and he used to say that the busiest times they had were when the Aeroflot or Cubana flights stopped over. They would have queues of people with stacks of dollars buying up cases of whiskey, perfume. cartons of cigarettes and consumer goods that would all end up on the black market. This was obvious state sanctioned corruption done by state officials (the only ones allowed to travel this freely) but entirely ignored by the sympathizers.
This corruption meant that those in power during the communist era (whom the sympathizers lionize) came out of the USSR with the most wealth allowing them to finance and profit off new business or become the new oligarchy themselves.
As for the privatizations; despite the propaganda we hear about 'shock therapy' the economic liberalizations in Russia and Ukraine happened much slower than in a lot of other post communist countries. This prevented the closure or modernization of inefficient businesses and continued the economic turmoil for longer than it should have continued. In Ukraine's case, I would blame the stratified political system where it became necessary to compromise to form stable governments meaning they were less ideologically driven and more pragmatic.
Usually common garden variety of tankies doesn't know or ignores the existence of Nomenklatura while talking about perceived equality (or even equity) in the USSR. Or ignores the people who could get wealthy through their job (like taxi drivers, waiters or sailors). Or Soviet organized crime.
Hardcore or Stalinst tankies blame Khrushchev for all that crime and inequality (ignoring the fact that it existed even under Stalin too)
@@Whatshisname346 how come these capitalist values penetrated socialist countries ?
@@qZbGmYjS4QusYqv5 we forget that up till about 38 the Kremlin was dominated by Ukrainian Jews, then after 38 till Stalin’s death the Kremlin was dominated by Georgians. Finally from Stalin’s death to Bresnev’s death the Kremlin was dominated by Ukrainians, with both Krushev & Bresnev being Ukrainians. It’s really only these days that Russians dominate the Kremlin. Even before the Revolution the Czars were really German since Catherine.
Absolutely! Drugs became a big problem after Gorbachev alcohol campaign. When vodka and wine disappeared from store shelves, people went for hard stuff.
Please! You wanna play a Jew game? Putin has plenty of Jewish blood, my man. Good try, though
Thank you, that's a real life story, it educates people.
Lithuanian here. It is not that we removed communist apparatchiks all together. The story if more complex. The independence movement won the elections and declared independence in 1990, these guys were not communists and later became the conservative party (mostly). The communist split internally over the independence, the pro soviet rejected it and ended up being outlawed (after their coup attempt failed). While the pro independence ones became LSDP (social democrats) and later won the elections in 1992, before loosing again to conservatives.
90s were a mess but there was a widespread agreement on goals of joining NATO and EU, and that in the end saved us.
Very interesting, thank you! Any idea about your Baltic neighbors?
@@UshankaShow I think it was different for them - due to large numbers of russian speakers the independence movements and their successors seems to have remained in power longer.
Also I wanted to thank you for your videos. It is fascinating to compare my childhood in the free Lithuania of the 90s to yours in the soviet union. All the things that have changed, and many that haven't.
lol. goals of joining eu and nato was injected into baltics and americans would never grant you an independence like moscow did, that's the history!
Thanks for posting these videos, interesting stuff.
My pleasure!
Don't underestimate the importance of a strong agricultural sector. Here in the UK, our government is trying to destroy farming for reasons best known to themselves (personally, I suspect "insanity" may be a factor), so we're going to need to import our food from somewhere...
Blackrock possibly
Global deep state plan to reduce useless eaters worldwide not my words. 😅 Putin is not part of this plan.
ukrainians didn't understand that. look at vietnam agriculture is it's backbone and it's the one that got them out of the mess of the 80's.
@@bettyswunghole3310 I think it's more important not to overestimate the importance of agricultural sector especially since that seems to be a lot more common. Britain already imports a ton of food. The only countries that seek self sufficiency are crazy ones like (Edit NK not NJ lol) NK. Leaving the EU and making food trade more complicated seems like a bigger problem. Ukraine is a lot more suited for agriculture then other nations due to a lot of fertile land but even then post war recovery will need a lot on higher profit sectors to be built up as well
@@bat9056 I'm not suggesting that we seek "self-sufficiency"...I think this is an unrealistic aim for the UK.
However, to seek "total-dependency" doesn't strike me as a particularly good idea, either...especially when you consider how dependent the UK already is on imports in other sectors besides agriculture.
Funny that in the late 90's I took on-line Russian language lessons. Some of the linguist would share stories about how things were in the past (like you do) and we seemed to agree on one philosophy and that was that big government was bad government. Government corruption was like cancer.....it would present itself and then grow and grow until it destroyed the host from which it depended on.
Ironically without any big government, you're left to the mafia state. It still is, but consolidation of the mafias and centralizing power was what ended the bad 90s of Russia. The only ones who didn't need a government to protect them were the oligarch circles who knew what to do.
@@TheBucketSkillwith Putin, the mafia BECAME the state. His cronies completely de-industrialized Russia, & all state/oligarxh resources were directed to extracting natural resources & then stealing the revenues from the export of those resources
Wonderful video, I’m thoroughly enjoying your channel!
Glad you enjoy it!
I think your father got "institutionalized" into the Soviet system and that is why he couldn't really adapt to the new reality after its collapse. It wasn't uncommon for middle aged and older people who spent their whole lives living under a certain set of rules and expectations to feel lost when it came to an end. It reminds me of the movie The Shawshank Redemption when Red gets paroled after being in prison for 40 years and doesn't feel like he can adapt to his new life in the outside world. You could possibly describe the Soviet Union as sort of a giant minimum-security prison, so it is not surprising that many people in the 1990s felt like Red when they got paroled from the USSR.
Rumor still around those middle aged and old still Soviet to this day….
Great point! I forgot to mention that movie. Red was the prison Dodo bird let back into the wild.
@@FlintIronstag23 or USSR was like a cozy home and capitalism was a wild uncertain dangerous jungle.
@@An1Kum It's all how you look at it. A prison, at least in America, gives you free housing, meals, and health care, but at the expense of personal freedom. You could say prison is a cozy home compared to living homeless on the streets, but most homeless people try to avoid going to prison.
@@FlintIronstag23 You are illiterate. Every country offers something to its citizens. USSR gave free housing and USA gives food coupuns and homeless shelter.
Not much difference in my view.
I can vividly remember the discussion about new coat of arms for Ukraine and I remeber one, not that much different from 17:35. It did had Trident in the middle, but also the wheat bundels on the side. And they guys who were discussing it were like.. no no no, this is too much of Soviet Union symbol.
in slovakia i have the perception that 30% of people are still looking for values of everyone equal = equaly poor, 30% of people are for values of free choice (very broad term even anarchocapitalism), 30% will tell you same as in Russian federation "I am apolitical" = basicaly they decide the votes and finaly 10% of far right or far left agenda. still keeping in mind that we are looking at 60% of overall country population. whether i might be close to be right or to see a pattern i do not know, certain is that current prime minister sure is a -stan country iteration having him behind the rudder for 4th four year term even one got shorted and current one seems shakier than ever before. what a time to live life when comparing times your father or my father were young. repetative iterations of struggle for basic necessities or as my father used to say "wartime household". you mentioned having sentiment to save empty jars of conserved stuff - same is my fate. i can not comprehend how they can make profit selling produce in glass jars that cost to manufacture, then fill then with veggies or fruits that cost to produce and harvest and then we are free to dump the totaly usable glass jars as if it is paper tissue. economy of scale is a complicated term to get one's head around, still it is i think vastefull.
Because it was already collapsing under Socialism, just it was masked by the Socialist system. It's like the Hyperinflation that hit in the post Soviet era ie 90s. The currency was already hyperinflated before the collapse of the USSR but the Socialist regime had price fixing keeping the value of goods artificially low. Which is why you had plenty of money but nothing to spend it on. So when both Ukraine and Russia entered the world market they both suffered hyperinflation throughout the 90s. This is actually why I'm horrified when politicians or economist in the USA even consider the idea of State price fixing.
explanation of the level "democracy is good, therefore there is development." excluding the fact that the countries of Europe and the USA have been waging wars for resources, logistics routes and have had colonies for the last 300 years.
@@Notrusbotyour argument doesn't clearly explain what your position is
@@Notrusbot USA has not fought wars for resources, outside of preventing monopolization of resources by way of closed economies or cartels. Only non-capitalist economies like Mercantile or Socialist economies care about creating autarky on resources for example. Because Trading with non-Socialist countries is evil and Mercantilism was an old obsolete way of looking at economics a remnant of the old European way of trade. Which is why the old Empires literally just fell apart, after the realized free trade was superior to occupation/colonization.
This was the primary reason the USA got involved in WWII because actions like Japan/Germany actually broke down international trade, as both Japan and Germany tried to create Autarky. USSR did the same as well, spreading it's influence mostly to create it's own sphere of influence closed off from the rest of the world at the time.
USA's involvement in South America in the 19th/early 20th Century was the same way, the USA sought to kick out European Empires from the Americas, and open up trade within the Americas which ironically benefited everyone and most definitely South America. 30-80s Latin America was a paradise until Cartel Lords, Dictators, Communist rebellions, and Socialist politicians ruined it one country at a time.
Ironically even the "Oil" War of 1991 (Desert Storm) vs Iraq was in response to Iraq invading Kuwait which Kuwait because they destroyed their domestic economy. Kuwait was also one of the only Arab nations that didn't join OPEC which was is a oil Cartel.
Ironically most Arab countries also joined the USA in this campaign. Arab forces were actually tasked with liberating the Capital for political reasons, being it was considered most fitting that Arab troops should liberate Kuwait City.
Basically USA didn't get involved to monopolize resources of any kind but got involved to keep trade open preventing monopolization of resources.
Every other war the USA was involved in were not Oil Wars in the Middle East. Despite the memes/stereotypes.
Now European Empires, ya that's a different story, but as I already mentioned the USA stood up against Empires. Whether run by Monarchs, Fascist or Marxist. And yes the USSR was an Empire.
You can argue the USA is an empire, but the USA isn't a colonial Empire, but more of a soft power, financial empire. USA only really has military access to nations that ironically just want USA military protection, and in some cases the USA even pays the governments for access to say a port, and some facilities. Which isn't Colonialism, and honestly isn't exactly an Empire per se.
Currently today Russia is perhaps the best example of a Modern Empire in the traditional sense because it occupies entire countries that are considered parts of the "Federation" that are not Russian. They're not allowed to leave either, those that have tried were met with brutal military force.
PS before you mention nations like Iran and how the USA supported a coup there. It's because National Bolshevism, Marxism, Socialism and Nazism were the most popular ideologies within Arabia, so you can see the USA's worry when Iran decided to make exclusive trade deals with the USSR early in it's fledgling Democracy.
@@citricdemon It's not about fixing prices. after 1953 there was a systemic problem in the organization of the economy of the USSR + corruption.
I was generally surprised that most Westerners, including Warsaw Pact countries, have no idea that in the USSR there were state organizations that calculated prices, the cost of paying for services and were engaged in improving production productivity
@Alte.Kameraden The difference between direct war and support for the separatists has different meanings for you, but the meaning is the same and leads to the same results. that is why you consider it necessary to separate the war for resources and the “exclusive trade relations” that, as a rule, appear after supporting the separatists. such examples as the Panama Canal, banana wars, Kuwait, Taiwan are nothing more than the aggressive policy of the United States.
It’s especially funny how you wrote about the fact that South America has benefited from cooperation with the United States. the concept of the “big stick” introduced by Roosevelt speaks for itself of how this relationship developed.
Moreover, waging direct wars is expensive and leads to reputational losses, for example, you can say that the United States did not wage wars for resources and access to resources, but the fact that the United States did everything to get these resources is a different story
Don't take this the wrong way, but... "smuggling vodka" and "honest work" don't seem to go together in my world :) But otherwise, I like your channel. Greetings from fellow former USSR sufferer from Estonia :)
he wasn't saying that smuggling vodka is honest work.. but people who didn't smuggle vodka and had the character traits he described @ 22:47 could still get a job
@@hasidila188 Snuggling Vodka is bad ?
The big problem with transition to capitalism that many people fail to mention was that there were simply too many unreasonable laws and rules. It was impossible to do business and comply with all the rules. Therefore, no business in the 90s was 100% legal. That was the biggest factor in the high crime rate.
Getting to poland to smuggle vodka, tabbaco and butter... I am still doing. But as a Czech citizen.
But seroiusly, my girlfriend told me exactly what you have described. She fled for the same reason as others, but their parrents used to work in Czechia for more than 8 years prior to war.
I have met a lot of Ukranians on Czech building sites, doing hard manual labour, while they have told me, that they were profesors, IT specialists, teachers, surgeons... And they told me, that
in half a year they will have more money than in 2 years in Ukraine. In fact, now, Czech economy is dependent on Ukrainan labor force. Parents of my girlfirend used to work here for half a year and could have up to half a year of vacation. But that is not all. She also told me, that if you want some "normal things" like in europe, like proper education, healthcare and goods... you have to pay a lot extra. Bottom line is: Ukranians used to fled their country way before war for economical/political reasons.
"Paying extra" for better education and healthcare is what you usually get when you have an officially "free" education and healthcare, but your country is too poor to provide for it.
Thats a good way to put it "communism" give u security & stability and capitalism give u options. Gotta risk it for the biscuit.
Communism gives you illusion of stability and security. Capitalism gives you an illusion of choice
@@qZbGmYjS4QusYqv5 "in capitalism man exploits man, in socialism it's the opposite"
A contributing factor would be supply chains.
Factories in the Ukrainian SSR used raw materials, components and machinery from the rest of the Union (and vice versa). Then the Union breaks up and suppliers are now in Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia are now on the other side of a border and have to go through customs and are subject to tariffs. This adds more expenses to factories which are already obsolete, facing strong foreign competition and having a collapsing market and means that fewer of them can make it. The more fold, the less customers they have.
Great series Sergei 🇬🇧
Thanks!
@@UshankaShow have you done anything on folk lore from the soviet union and before? I get the impression that Ukraine has a deep drawer of historical beliefs and boogiemen. Cheers for your work Sergei 👍
I have one about common superstitions:
th-cam.com/video/NNX7aAsmxV0/w-d-xo.html
Thanks for the great information and personal experiences. All to often, many get caught up in what they have read or believe based on faulty information, mainly because they lack any real experience.
19:34 He sure does know a lot about a country he’s not from, during a time he didn’t exist in! What does it feel like when someone tells you about your own past like they know more about it?
I kinda got used to it by now but it's bewildering, to say at least. An astounding level of ignorance.
"One of my former classmates opened a car wash and was doing fine." How about his 50 employees, how were they doing? That's the problem.
They got a job instead of being unemployed. I doubt 50, maybe two or three.
Greatly enjoyed this video! Sending thanks from Kalamazoo!
Awesome! Thank you!
back in primary school in 1994 I learned that Ukraine was going to be surely a major power in the region within 5 years...
Well when you no longer have to be a party member to be corrupt corruption will go up.
from my point of view, all the promise that i hoped and held for
the people of the former soviet bloc with the fall of the Wall, were dashed,
when the middle managers of the soviet system just threw up their hands and
capitulated to the invasion of the what i call the dogs of capitalism.
the populations of those countries were completely unsuspecting and
totally unprepared for what was coming their way.
the resulting chaos and poverty paved the way for the rise of people like
tsar vlad the intriguer/invader, Orban, Duda and other regressive sorts.
The big Soviet problem was the failure to transition to a consumer driven economy in the 70s, like China did.
And a lot of money eaten up by military and kgb.
The USSR had passed that point of building a consumer diven economy in the late 1920s and opted for a heavy industry and military driven economy instead.
In the 1980s, Soviet economy was already built to make things nobody wants in very inefficient ways.
@сырпошехонский So did China, but they changed course.
@@Mario_N64 no, there was a huge difference - China in 1980s was a pre-industrial country with predominantly rural population while Soviet Union was already industrialised and urbanized. To put it simply, China did industrialization the right way while USSR chose the wrong way and went this way for 60 years.
@сырпошехонский In 1984, China had already launched its first satellite.
10 million ethnic Russians residing in ukraine that's what went wrong
Yes. I live in Vinnytsia, which was heavily "Sovietized". In the villages in this region, it's all Ukrainians. In the city - lots of Russians. The young people, too young to know the USSR, are often the most proud of their Russian identity - sometimes they even refuse to speak Ukrainian although they know different foreign languages, and they teach their children only Russian "for their future." I would say, the older generations who have nostalgia also have some bad memories. But the younger people only have the good stories about when grandpa was an army commander and grandma was a university rector, and their family were important people.
I don't know where this myth came from that Baltic states abolished the communist party, carried out lustration, fired all soviet bureaucrats and so on. It was stated openly that lustration will not be carried out, because members of the independence movement were informants of the KGB. A couple of ministries were created from nothing, but almost everything else stayed the same.
The people who seem to think that implementing capitalism is as easy as flipping a switch are equally as frustrating as they are entertaining
corruption.
Yes, by former commies that remained in power. They only knew how to steal
Right, I’m going to have to go back and watch the first two parts first.
I’ll just say now that it seems that this past couple of years appear to have been somewhat of a disaster for Ukraine.
Realistically, who else could have handled the situations better other than those former communist bureaucrats? Just like how General Patton said while he was military governor of Bavaria, he needed former NZ's to pull telephone cables.
very interesting as always did you ever visit Odessa?
In 1928 Trotsky warned that the Soviet Union could be brought down by not just by war but also by cheap capitalist goods. That's why the whole idea of building Socialism in one country was utopian. Stalin betrayed the revolution and as Fidel Castro stated the Soviet Party never properly dealt with the injustices of the Stalin era.
Ironic given that Trotsky was War Commissar during the Polish Soviet war, invading what's now Ukraine, Poland and Belarus though thankfully stopped before he could spread the revolution further.
@@michaelwarenycia7588 Stalin is the commander who refused the order to advance given at the time the Trotsky and Red army reached the gates of Warsaw. Had the revolution reached Germany than the Soviets would have had a contiguous economic area that included an advanced capitalist nation. Capitalism has the problem of greedy ruling classes using war to advance their competing economic interests. That was the whole reason the Russian revolution occurred. In the US Labor leader Eugene Debs was imprisoned for opposing the Imperialist war. The same thin happened to the American Trotskyist in 1940. The Stalinists applauded FDRs action at the end of the war instead of shaking the hands of the monopolists they were sent to prison for 5 year terms.
They did not do a gradual transition
Lithuania also elected ex-communist's which ruled under Soviet Union. They rebranded party to socialdemocrats but it was the same underneath it was old "Red Barons" who gain strategic companies for free in process of privatization.
Look into land value tax and what happened when "georgists" visited the collapsing ussr.
It's good that you make a lot of goods, but you have to have customers and sell it at price where a profit can be made
The old system apparatchiks simply became oligarchs.
Uktaine could be rich country but because of cottuption is not
Communists building capitalism = corruption
@ the biggest in UA
@@robertvonschumann7297 got any proof beside "Tucker Carlson said so"? Comparing to trillion dollar corruption in China, Russia and United States corruption in Ukraine is small fish
I think Russia took the first place in corruption race but they had so much more to steal. Azerbajan is anorher interesting case to study. Ruling Aliyev family is controlling the entire economy
@@UshankaShow not these days, I know who involved in transport in all 3 former Soviet Slavic republics. He says that Ukraine was the only place where baksheesh was required for 100% legit business. Do note that even before things escalated in Feb 22, Russia’s GDP per capita figures were 5 times higher than Ukraine.
You have reinforced to me the resilience of humans despite the destruction of Marxism. Those allowed to operate in meritocracy can survive and thrive with hard work and dedication. Those that wallow in laziness and victim-hood remain in misery. The world will be a better place when the victims stop murdering and stealing from the survivors...
Pronouncing capitalism as sounding like “capitualism” adds an amusing twist to listening to this presentation.
Ironically been stuck on “Happy Nation” by Ace of Base.
Your thoughts on the subject matter of song Sergei given it came out in 1993? Always got the impression it was commentary on the social / political climate you described in this video.
The song felt like an expression of the "End of History" mood of that time.
you didn't reach a quality by making everyone poor. You reached quality by not allowing peoples to die of poverty. It's not like there was a large segment of the working class that was wealthy and made poor.
Romanian here. The girls that in communism dated foreign students were working for the secret services. I don't think that prostitution like we knew it today existed back then. Everything was controlled by the state so you couldn't do what you please.
After the fall of communism Romania elected also a former communist Ion Iliescu. He won with 89%😂.
We had some disidents like Doina Cornea but she didn't run for president . She was not widely known in the whole Romania. Not like Lech Walesa in Poland.
Actually ,with the exception of the Baltic states, Poland and Czecoslovakia the other former communist states had former communist s as leaders😅
The "foreign" (or valyutnaya ("for currency")) prostitution was indeed controlled by KGB. Usual one was controlled by the Soviet mafia or Soviet police. Only in the 80s journalists were allowed to talk about it
PS I vividly remember watching one of the "criminal" programs (probably "Человек и Закон", "Human And Law") somewhere in 1988. The bunch of "working girls" were arrested by the Vice department. They said a girl in one night got paid substantially more then my mom got in a month of honest work on the factory. That was shocking to say the least
LOL. You might as well have written that there was no blackmaket in communism. Good joke!
On paper Ukraine shouldn't have been able to fail as an independent state.
On paper the Soviet Union should last 10,000 years. It lasted 69.
@@UshankaShow I wonder what I would have been capable of doing if I had been in your position. I would like to think that I woudl have been like you or your mother, but I am not certain that I woudl have been.
Finding yourself out of your comfort zone is always a mixed bag. 😊
Was going to make a joke about Ukraine being doomed the second it rejected Levko and his handlebar moustache but I just read his wiki page and yeah, maybe not lol
You go from one extreme to another. I assume that a lot of people simply did not know on what to do as well as different products are no longer desired so production (work) stops. In the GDR a similar situation due to job obselecense amongst other things.
Well
G7 countries economics run on millitary industry AND colonization of countries which don't have millitary.
Good book about anglo-saxs colonialism
Endless Holocausts
Colonization? What do you call what Russia did to its neighbors between 1917 and 1991, and again today, when they invaded, occupied, enforced alien economic and value systems which the natives didn't like, and made Russian language mandatory for higher education and government work? On top of that, genociding and deporting locals while moving in Russians to do higher status jobs, like bureaucrats, police, university professors, KGB...
To get a solid understanding one would have to dip into the taboo topic of IQ statistics - I am not brave enough for that. Few random comments: 1) For me the most successful post-communist countries are Estonia, followed by Slovenia. 2) The rise of Poland surprised me, in the 1980s Poles had reputation for dishonesty and work-shyness. Today Poland is overcoming Czechia. 3) The worst is/was Albania, there was even a large armed riot after a pyramid scheme failed sometime in the 1990s, people died. 4) Ukrainians who immigrated to Canada and USA have for most part integrated well. 5) The West botched the end of the Cold War by not providing enough help and guidance. The case of East Germany is worth studying.
the central European countries had 40 years of communism. The old generation there had still experience the times before and the memory of a "normal" economic system was still preserved.
Ukraine, Russia, Belorus had 74 years of communism and a much harsher form. Nobody alive could remember the times before this system, especially with that bad life expectancy. So they had no idea what to do, when suddenly they weren't receiving orders anymore.
Just one annecdote: why did Sergey smuggle vodka from Poland to Ukraine? Because in Poland they were at least producing vodka.
Everybody was equal. They were all poor, except for a few at the top who were stealing everything.
Basically, in much of Eastern Europe, state property was transferred to ex-Communists and criminals who had no interest in keeping staff or producing products. But that was what the U.S. wanted.
The US did not give a s**t over Eastern Europe in the 90s.
I disagree, if Vyacheslav Chernobyl was elected as president of Ukraine things likely would’ve gone differently.
No, Chornovil was an idealist and had strange ideas about federalization and other bullcrap that would have made the country even more ineffective than it was
@@qZbGmYjS4QusYqv5 there would be no civil war in a federalized country
Capitalism is Built. Created, Infused into a culture and ultimately, when everyone is in a Social agreement, Corruption will be minimized. Capitalism isn't just a gift that will work for everyone. Just look at the wars, conflicts that created the System we have in the USA. It takes Generations and a society/culture that is compatible.
Even in Korea, with "capitalism", It took them Decades to shake off their dictatorship.
I don't disagree with your first paragraph.
_'Even in Korea, with "capitalism", It took them Decades to shake off their dictatorship.'_
You need to substantiate that. What vestiges needed to be shaken off and when did it take place?
By law, Chun was limited to one 7-year term to end in late '87. He wanted to amend the Constitution to allow a second term, and this was rejected after mass public demonstrations. Chun was forced to release Kim Dae-Joong from prison and make reforms such as limiting the presidency to one 5-year term. Korea had a multi-party legislature during Chun's rule. The December '87 election saw former general Roh defeat two so-called pro-democracy leaders, Kim Young-Sam (YS) and Kim Dae-Joong (DJ). Roh won just just under 37% of the vote, but because it was first-past-the-post system there was no run-off between the two top vote winners. Had it been like France's system, it's likely YS would have won the run-off. Under Roh the national curfew was lifted, some economic liberalisation occurred, the KCIA was removed from the press offices, etc. State-ownership of the broadcast channels was relaxed. YS was elected president next after his party and Noh's party merged, giving Noh a parliamentary majority during his rule and promising YS the party's support for the '92 election. At the end of his term was the Asian financial meltdown. DJ was elected. Most economic liberalisation came from the demands of the IMF. DJ relaxed censorship still remaining, for example on music. I recall all Sex Pistols albums were allowed to be sold above ground and The Beetles songs such as 'Revolution' were permitted to be broadcast. It should be said of these had been available even during the Chun admin in the massive and thriving blackmarket economy. There was even blackmarket cable TV. My next door neighbour was a member of the national assembly and at the end of the lane to our homes in Seoul was a black market shop. The blackmarket was very much above ground, which means the law ignored because enforcement was practically non-existent. The only crack down on the blackmarket I ever saw was after Korea was required to lift its ban on foreign rice and replace it with a quota when it joined the WTO in '95. This crack down lasted a few months and was a performance to appease upset farmers.
At most the vestiges of the dictatorship lasted a dozen years, but these had been unraveling in the earlier years. There was suspicion of the internet in the early days and one's online access was charged per minute that was very expensive, but once Korea saw how much money was being made that ended and the country digitalised rapidly. The remaining censorship is about North Korea mostly (a state of war still exists) though I can access pro Nork websites hosted overseas, for example in Japan, without needing a VPN. Same for pro Nork youtube channels. Porno is censored and those websites blocked. The demands for censorship today more often come from the left such as feminists and other grievance groups. And one can't visit NK without gov't permission. Plenty of Koreans visiting and doing business with China and Vietnam though. My wife's family's company has branches in Shanghai, HCM, and Hanoi for about 25 years so far. And Korean citizen children may not attend foreign-owned schools in Korea, though there are a few loopholes.
If your claim hinges on corruption, plenty of that exists in countries that are not ruled by dictators.
@@gagamba9198 TL;DR. As a US Citizen, I hear all the time that the USA is this, or that, or this... Trust me. We know.
Use less words.
It's ok. He was a dictator. embrace it. it was, not is.
"corruption is minimized"
Oh my sweet summer child.
We live in the era of Citizens United, and regulatory capture.
Your opinion is complete nonsense
@@michaelbarbarich3965 Minimized in comparison to the other economic models..
Bet you're one that would say that Ukraine isn't the #2 ranked most corrupt country in Europe..
@@michaelbarbarich3965 You do realize that the MOST CORRUPT societies are those in the former countries where socialism/communism was once the governing mechanism, right? Globally speaking, in actually capitalistic and social democratic/capitalistic societies are consistently the countries with the LEAST CORRUPTION on the globe. NOTE: its important to understand that "least" or "less" does NOT mean "none"
22:56 approximately. none of my friends?a lot of my friends,some of my friends myself included got into drugs. I think you said none but listened to it four times and don't know what you really said. "Myself included" is not generally used in English with the word none. I think you meant to say None of my friends or I got into drugs. They way it was worded made it sound like you got into drugs. Pretty sure that's not correct.
😊 Obviously, I didn't get into drugs. Neither my friends
None of his friends nor he himself. Happy now?
Glad to see you're still making videos Mr. John Wayne Cheeseburger.
Watching it now, but I'm sure it's excellent as always.
Cheers 🍻
🇺🇦🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮
overdose on russian media. get well
Ушанка, посмотри на Вики чем была Операция "Аэродинамик".
И после ещё можно полистать книжку "Украинские буржуазные националисты", 1963.
По факту, эта страна никогда не задумывалась как независимая и суверенная... Это временный продукт в столкновении 2-х цивилизаций.
Как у нас на глазах Л/ДНР сделали на ровном месте, вот так же и Украина - только масштабы больше.
А можно почитать и книги тех, кто воевал в лесах, не совковую пропаганду. Как например “Армия без страны” Тараса Бульбы-Боровца. Но для этого надо понимать украинский язык.
@@UshankaShow "Аэродинамик" - это операция западной алфавитной конторы, так скажем "see eye hey". Если вы понимаете о чём я. 😉 И документы по ней давно в открытом доступе, как исторические.
Sergiej,there is a big difference from capitulism (surrender) and capitalism you are often saying capitulism.
That’s capitulation
So inspiring that your going back to Ukraine to volunteer! Oh wait, your still hiding from conscription :/ stunning and brave!
It’s called corruption 🤣
It's happened everywhere, even if this world is ruled by reds or fascists, either stinky or religious or to say whoever it is, it won't fix the problem anyway.
Not nagging, but it's pronounced as capital (money) ism. Not capitulate (surrender/give up) ism.
This is the summary (more like an excuse, but hey Its just my opinion)
Here’s a 30-point summary of the video:
1. **Background Context**: The speaker recounts Ukraine’s path to independence in 1991 after the Soviet Union's dissolution, focusing on challenges post-independence.
2. **Speaker's Profile**: Sergei Sputnikov, born in Kyiv in 1971, lived in independent Ukraine until 1998 before moving to the U.S.
3. **Late Soviet Ukraine**: Ukrainian nationalism resurged in the late 1980s during Gorbachev's perestroika.
4. **Declaration of Sovereignty**: Ukraine declared sovereignty in 1990 and independence in 1991, breaking from the Soviet Union.
5. **Optimistic Expectations**: Many Ukrainians believed independence would lead to economic prosperity by retaining resources previously sent to Moscow.
6. **Economic Reality**: Post-independence hopes were dashed as Ukraine’s GDP plummeted to 40.9% of its 1990 levels by 1998.
7. **Economic Collapse**: The transition to capitalism caused a swift economic downturn, with industries failing to compete globally.
8. **Military-Dependent Economy**: Soviet Ukraine’s economy heavily relied on military production, which collapsed with the end of the USSR.
9. **Outdated Infrastructure**: Ukrainian industries were technologically outdated and struggled against Western competition.
10. **Comparison to the West**: Goods like Lada cars became inferior to imported used vehicles from Europe.
11. **Loss of Soviet Market**: Ukraine lost its largest customer, the Soviet military-industrial complex.
12. **Leadership Continuity**: Former communists, like Leonid Kravchuk and Leonid Kuchma, retained power in independent Ukraine.
13. **Communist Legacy**: Former Soviet officials dominated government roles, hampering genuine reforms.
14. **Baltic States Comparison**: Unlike Ukraine, Baltic nations barred former communists from power and recovered faster.
15. **Social Stratification**: Post-independence saw the rise of a wealthy elite and a struggling working class.
16. **Crime and Corruption**: Capitalism introduced new challenges, including organized crime, corruption, and economic disparity.
17. **Personal Examples**: The speaker shares anecdotes of acquaintances who either succeeded or struggled during the transition.
18. **Prostitution and Crime**: Issues like prostitution existed even during Soviet times but became more visible post-independence.
19. **Adaptation Challenges**: Many Soviet citizens struggled to adapt to a free-market system due to a lack of entrepreneurial experience.
20. **KGB and State Control**: The Soviet system ensured stability but suppressed initiative and innovation.
21. **Economic Inequality**: While some thrived, others faced dire poverty, highlighting the uneven effects of capitalism.
22. **Generational Divide**: Younger Ukrainians adapted more easily, while older generations struggled with the transition.
23. **Rural Challenges**: Farmers and rural workers faced significant adjustments, with some adapting successfully.
24. **Cultural Shifts**: Ukrainians retained Soviet-era symbols and mentalities in their governance and culture post-independence.
25. **Delayed Reforms**: Ukraine lacked its own constitution until 1996 and adopted reforms slowly.
26. **National Identity**: Ukraine struggled to define its national symbols and identity, influenced by its Soviet past.
27. **Economic Success Stories**: Despite hardships, some individuals and small businesses flourished.
28. **Travel Freedom**: Independence allowed people to travel and explore opportunities abroad.
29. **Personal Struggles**: The speaker recounts his own challenges, from smuggling goods to working multiple jobs to make ends meet.
30. **Hope Amid Challenges**: Despite hardships, independence opened doors for personal and national growth, with some benefiting from the shift to a market economy.
you didn't reach a quality by making everyone poor. You reached quality by not allowing peoples to die of poverty. It's not like there was a large segment of the working class that was wealthy and made poor. Also material conditions shape behavior. An empty stomach is as much an influence as a gun to the head.
I agree! In Soviet Russia, people died from starvation not from poverty. And I was talking about EQUALITY, not QUALITY.
@ autocorrect
Because corruption. That's it end of story.
Yes. Communists building capitalism = corruption
Rather capitalism then systematic ethnic genocide
Congrats they get both.
@@rudysmith1552you mean Russia's invasion? I don't think that is caused by capitalism
30+yrs gone, the USSR is STILL cranking out tank(ie)s
But very few, they don't make enough in a month, that they lose In a day. 😂
Same thing happened with Russia's capitalism experiment and it was a disaster. I really think people are making a big mistake trading their culture for convenience capitalism. As time goes on, I see how it decays the human soul.
What culture? Fake state-mandated Marxist one? Nobody cared about that culture. It was stillborn. People got tired of abject poverty and all-around deficit.
We went back to our national pre-Bolshevik cultures.
Communism was never a true "culture". It was a political theory that was forced upon the people in an attempt to mold them into something different.
As opposed to what instead that's better?
"trading their culture for convenience capitalism." You need to study more history if you think communism and Russian language are "their culture" for Ukrainians, Latvians, Georgians, Estonians etc
@@michaelwarenycia7588 Ukrainians traded their culture in when they decided to let a bunch of Azov nazi thugs take over their government during the Maidan, that's history written in stone.
111k
It’s my understanding that Poland introduced capitalism slowly and let people got used to it while Russia and I assume Ukraine had the shock therapy which overnight made everything capitalist. It’s not strange that people grown up in socialism cannot adapt from one day to another. The shock therapy that was an idea introduced by American economists was responsible for much of the misery.
There was an attempt by Gorbachev to introduce reforms gradually with the aim of creating a hybrid type system. The problem was there was a coup and afterwards voices calling for more rapid reforms in order to prevent another coup took the lead ( most notably Yeltsin) .
Although Poland was one of the slower ones so were Russia and Ukraine. They all dragged their feet mainly because their state enterprises were so huge. There are still huge parts of Russia's economy that are state owned or private in name only.
If you look at the EU now; the 2004 members with the strongest economies are the ones who liberalized the quickest but also had the advantage of having much smaller state enterprises and a more flexible economy ........... Apart from Hungary who regressed after Orban to now being a drain on everyone's resources.
My understanding is that Poland went through shock therapy even sooner en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balcerowicz_Plan#Comparative_statistics
And that it's relative success in Poland (GDP stopped shrinking and started growing again pretty quickly but large unemployment and other problems lasted for many years until joining the EU) helped convince other countries to try it. That said while shock therapy wasn't necessarily the best or wisest course its important to note it wasn't enforced it was bought in by the national governments who were in many cases already in a significant emergency and desperate. The Soviet and many other post communist economies were already collapsing even before/without the collapse of the USSR and the idea was to try to shorten transition. Also its important to note in places where it failed the worst leading to rise of oligarchs it was local corruption that did the most damage.
They started slow in Poland in the early 80s. After the Berlin Wall collapse they went all in on the shock therapy. So several years before comrade Sergey's smuggling operations it were Poles who smuggle all kind of goods out of Soviet Ukraine.
That's why Ukrainians were so reluctant to introduce shock therapy. We had bad examples of Poland and Russia
Why didnt Ukraine join West after USSR? With Belarussia only ones not to.
Kremlin worked hard to keep Ukraine away from the EU all those years
Did the West offer though? The West was fretting more about nuclear and chemical weapons stash in the new states.
@@qZbGmYjS4QusYqv5 They weren't offering... but that never stopped Poland either, lol
Actually almost all former socialist countries had their economy shrunken. This is called a success?
Starvation increased in Bulgaria, corruption sky rocketet etc. Poverty went up. Communists in Ukraine was the biggest party even after 1991.
Nowadays people can buy more stuff but for lended money in a bank. That is actually poverty!
Starvation increased? Do you mean there was starvation in the socialist Bulgaria already?
@@UshankaShow Lmao, guy thought he had a burn brewing, but ended up getting burned himself. Tankies gonna tank.
@UshankaShow Yes it was in the 80's. People died of starvation in the nineties there. In Russia 7,7 million people died of starvation, alcoholism, disease, crime etc in the nineties.
Yes, evreywhere people starve, even if at tiny numbers, For example, 1.61 per 100.000 americans starve, So yes, no country ever had 0% starvation.@@UshankaShow
Slava Ukraini
What went wrong was they brought capitalism to Ukraine lol glory to the USSR!
yeah, glory to none of your country, none of your garbage system, rubbish politic, none of your stinky religious, neither your crappy ideology, also say no to your USSR fools.
well, Socialism had painfully died everywhere. They had to switch to the only working system, dear commie troll
This is basically an American speaking about Ukraine.
Except showing some old pictures.
😂😂😂😂
Basically not. Once again, I had been liviing in independent Ukraine for 7 years, 1991 - 1998 as a citizen of Ukraine, not as an employee of American Embassy. So I know what I'm talking about.
@UshankaShow You are talking like an outsider. There is nothing Ukrainian or Russian about you. You may have born there but that link is dead because you made a choice to exchange it for McDonald's and old BMW. You are so naive to understand that people in USSR wanted that life. It was they who built it , not Lenin or Stalin. It degenerated after death of Stalin and they wanted a change but they have had western sponsored capitalism in 90s and it was terrible.
You try to be authority and you have no connection with your own people. Better stay away from it.
What a dhuhmbh statement.
Slava Rossiya
No.
+15 roubles, comrade
You should be using the word "independence" more ironically. When the International Monetary Fund runs your economy they ensure that you collapse to the point of being nothing more than a colony of international financiers and a raw material exporter. An IMF "success" story typically involves the currency collapsing in value, businesses shutting down, poverty increasing dramatically, and the death rate going up.
Still beats the six-year Russian Civil War with 12 million dead after Bolsheviks came to town
@UshankaShow That was another Wall Street financed gang of killers.
So is modern Russia a success? Or China? Or Soviet Union borrowing crap ton of money from the West to buy food since the times of Khrushchev?
No kidding 😄 I thought Lenin was financed by Germany, that was desperate to get Russia out of the war
@UshankaShow Alexander Parvus who was selling weapons for both Vickers and Krupp convinced the German General Staff to ship Lenin to Russia.
Because TRUE capitalism have not been tried in Ukraine ?? 😀 .. got it ? got it ?
Could a former Communist know how to build capitalism?
You can't build free market economy overnight in the former communist state which was corrupted way before the independence especially when it's being sabotaged by half of the elites
@@UshankaShow its a TRUE SCOTSMAN joke. !
@@bluedragontoybash2463 Who's that?
But what about other former communist countries, like Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Croatia, Poland?