Some say Reagan won the Cold War...

[Dr Strangelove]

Wow! We won the war on terror... Oh, wait...

The commies were just as good at terror as al-qaeda ever was. Remember Bader-Meyerhoff? Brigate Rose? PLO? How many "Wars of Liberation" were they running in the 1970's? Back in the 1920's and 1930's thery were ripping up central and eastern Europe. They even invented child suicide bombers.

[Dr Strangelove]

In fact, one cannot apply the same logic to the Western and Soviet economies. Even if the Soviet GDP was formally (PPP) ~$2 trillion, the bulk of the economy was noncompetive on the world market. The debt of ~$200 billion must be compared just against the competitive part of the economy, and not against the whole GDP PPP. After all, it is only the former part that could be used to handle foreign debt. If we compare it in this way, the debt of ~$200 billion was catastrophic for the Soviet economy, especially given the plummeting of oil prices in the 1980s.

On the other hand, I agree with you as far as the role of releasing the repressed ideas in the collapse of the Soviet Union is concerned.

The Soviet economy doubled from 1985 to 1990. I thought that was mostly due to privatization allowed by Gorbachev. Even though oil prices dipped from 1986 t0 1990 they never dipped below pre-OPEC levels. Anyway, I thought that the Soviet's main eneergy export product in this period was gas. Also I don't have any information on balance of payments nor the extent of privatization.

[Dinner]

I remember my aunt bringing me back some keep sakes from the USSR in the mid-80's. She worked (and still works) for Coca Cola and as part of Gorbachev's liberalizations several large western companies were invited in to start operations in the Soviet block including Coca Cola. She told me the bottling operation was fully modern though they had difficulty getting supplies and raw materials plus there was the problem that Rubles were next to worthless and not fully convertable so it was next to impossible to repatriate profits. Still, Reagan had asked US companies to take part in Gorbachev's liberalization effort as a sign of good faith so they put up the money and tried to make things work. If I recall correctly the first McDonald's had just opened in Moscow too and she said there was no way in hell she was waiting 2-3 hours in line for a fast food burger but she said curious Moscovites waited in such lines every day and were willing to spend a fair amount of cash just to get a taste of some western food even if it was just McD's.

[Dinner]

In fact I think I still have that Russian fur hat in a box over at my parent's house some where. She bought in the 80's at some street market where regular Russians sold stuff kind of like a swap meet.

[giblets]

The Soviet economy doubled from 1985 to 1990. I thought that was mostly due to privatization allowed by Gorbachev. Even though oil prices dipped from 1986 t0 1990 they never dipped below pre-OPEC levels. Anyway, I thought that the Soviet's main eneergy export product in this period was gas. Also I don't have any information on balance of payments nor the extent of privatization.

Whoah, it doubled in five years? Could you provide the source where you read that?

[Fake Boris]

You tell me. You're the dumb**** who brought the irrelevant issue of "fixed" costs (whatever the **** you meant by that) into this discussion.

Right.

Military contractors need a job.
People need healthcare.

Government spendings are never "lost", there's always a marginal benefit in them, the money flows back.
Though practically speaking it is better to distribute spendings where the benefits are direct; otherwise you're having a hamster run in a wheel.

*You* said: "Soldiers need to be paid anyway".

If you ever had a point, you should have said "military contractors" instead.

[Tupac Shakur]

Government spendings are never "lost", there's always a marginal benefit in them, the money flows back.

[Dr Strangelove]

Whoah, it doubled in five years? Could you provide the source where you read that?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_the_Soviet_Union

Scroll down the page until you get to "1970 - 1990".

[giblets]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_the_Soviet_Union

Scroll down the page until you get to "1970 - 1990".

Okay, so this is what you're talking about?

Spoiler:

I think this is supposed to be nominal GDP? I think the estimates of Soviet GDP that use constant dollars don't show such a large increase in a few years.

You can see a difference at this page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:So...per_capita.gif

Spoiler:

GDP per capita, constant prices:

Nominal (?) per capita GDP:

[Fake Boris]

Government spendings are never "lost", there's always a marginal benefit in them, the money flows back.

If you wanna be a troll, you should still try to drop a hint of intelligence every once in a while - so that people have a chance to notice, however subtle such hints may be.

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