Question by Don’t call me dude: Just how long is the former East Bloc “going out of business sale” going to last?
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining. I collect military weapons, and the seemingly endless stream of WW2-era Soviet Mosin Nagant rifles, Polish Tokarevs, Yugo SKS rifles, Romanian AK clones, etc. has greatly enriched my collection.
Converted Soviet-era missiles now launch commercial satellites far cheaper than any shuttle or “next generation” launch vehicle that Obama’s space privatization scheme could possibly produce.
Ukrainian and Russian phage therapies, titanium crowbars, eastern European fertility clinics, fine optics, machinists’ equipment, vacuum-sealed grain — the stored production of the old East Bloc is still a major economic factor worldwide today.
My own former boss bought some very fine metalwork that would have cost $ 15K from an American firm. His supplier in an old East Bloc nation did the job for $ 10K and paid for the shipping.
How long can the former East Bloc nations continue to support themselves by selling off the stored wealth of the last hundred years? I mean, it’s been twenty years since the East Bloc fell.
How much stuff do they have left? What happens when it’s gone?
I’m not sure if this is politics or economics — so let’s see what Politics people have to say.
Best answer:
Answer by ol white biker
I’d like a old diesel sub! Don’t need to do anything but run, submerge, and hang out below the waves for awhile.
Know better? Leave your own answer in the comments!
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4 Responses
*Ahem* Buy American!!!!
Actually, I’ll take a 50 gallon drum of rice so I can hold out until the Revolution is over…what’s the going price?
They take credit or debit?
Posted on September 15th, 2011 at 4:50 am
Like any other going out of business sale, it’ll keep going until they run out or until nobody is interested anymore & they put it out on the boulevard with a “FREE STUFF” sign.
How much do they have left? Who really knows. They were kind of fanatical about stock piling, so I think its any body’s guess.
Posted on September 15th, 2011 at 4:57 am
how long will old friends ignore their old friends on facebook!?
Posted on September 15th, 2011 at 5:46 am
DCMD
The eastern Block was the original third world; declining relative to the west by the 16th century.
As such it was exploited as to labor, raw materials, resources,Cannon fodder, investment opportunities– the usual stuff.
As the Russian revolution broke that stranglehold on the people of the Soviet Union, the rest of the eastern Block after WW2 had a communistic developmental State, breaking that third world model for it’s own citizenry.
Parts of it were connected to the Industrial/imperialist west. The Czech republic and Parts of Poland for instance.
Yugoslavia, a pretty solid socialist country was a model of not for profit State capitalistic success{education, transportation,housing,health care et cetera] but as they declined imposing the washington consensus {neo Liberal reforms} they were bombed back to the stone age and Balkanized into small right wing banana republics by Bill Clinton.
The true winners of the cold war were the financial owners of the World { George Soros, Jeffery Sachs, Lawrence Summers} and the local oligarchs, often former Communist heads who are rich beyond their wildest dreams; they create a comprador class.
Strict laws against Organizing,unions, Strikes, independent Media are an unheralded aspect of their “Democratization.”
When Volkswagen moves to Czechoslovakia or GM moves to Poland they can get workers at one tenth of the wages of Workers in the Americas or Canada say, and they can be kept that way.
The Portions of the eastern block that were part of the industrial west Are returning to what THEY were.
And
The Eastern Block is being moved back into being what IT was.
A small segment of rich elites willing to do the bidding of the masters in the West and an impoverished laboring class kept in debt peonage..
The “going out of Business sale” will continue to the degree that this is completely accomplished short of revolution.
All of this is quite conscious and by design–Because if there are rules governing the New world order it is first: that the “service Areas” cannot be allowed an independent path– and secondly, like Yugoslavia, they cannot be economically success-full.
That’s even worse.
The above is factual– the next is speculative.
I suspect the ongoing impoverishment of the WEST, coming soon to a location near you– is in part the RESULT of communisms demise– an alternative economic model which, whatever one thinks of it, was seldom imperialist,provided free health care , education, guarenteed employment,housing, on and on..
Without THAT model {one sixth of the world} the masters of mankind are no longer skittish about dismantling the advances made by working class struggle in the nations of the west since the Russian revolution.
Including our own.
Would be interested in your own thoughts on this.
Hope that helped.
>>>>>Will M
Posted on September 15th, 2011 at 6:23 am
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