Comment by kakacik | Hacker News Reader

Comment by kakacik | Hacker News Reader

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No, globalization gave them as a nation a chance and they mostly didn't do any serious effort to use that. Its 1000 little decisions here and that that led to some post-soviet-sphere countries to thrive, while others stumble and generally gain prosperity mostly from being dragged into it via EU membership. Ie specifically Slovakia is / used to be a big car factory for whole EU due to low salaries. Not really something to build long term success on, ie if Ukraine would join EU all of those foreign factories would move even further east.

Sure, we can blame politicians which were mostly bad to worse and stole everything that was previously state-owned (meaning everything). But folks kept voting for them in similar fashion you describe so this is the result, its trivial to 'buy' votes with relatively low budget. I mean current PM has very tight and visible connections to Italian 'Ndrangheta mafia, he or people around him did a contract murder of reporter looking into that. He didn't ever faced jail and is back being PM like there is no tomorrow. There is only so much blame one can point outwards, you can't be dumb / do dumb shit and expect long term marvels of prosperity on Switzerland's level.

Lived in both of those countries, and they look exactly as they should given overall population efforts towards hard work, honesty, rule of law and so on. If US would be a nation of slackers and thieves it would also look very differently to how it is.

> and they mostly didn't do any serious effort to use that.

Those countries who were fresh from behind the iron curtain were really dealt a bad hand. They had lived in a "protective bubble", albeit a very unsustainable one and suddenly were thrown in the ocean surrounded by sharks looking for an easy meal. Almost every one of those people found themselves desperate but "inexperienced" and unprepared for the new world, every politician was absolutely blown away by the fortune they could make, and every other country jumped on the opportunity to make money. Like shooting fish in a barrel.

For every politician who took a bribe, someone who already had money paid it. That money didn't come from inside those poor countries. This leveraging of poorer countries never stopped. That's how some countries get a better deal than others when the EU adopted the Euro, for example. But it's never been so bad as back then because it's incredibly rare that entire countries find themselves exiting a time capsule, just ready to be exploited by people who already know how the game is played.

This reminds me of two things. The people who always think others are poor because they're lazy, and the people with perfect hindsight and no pressure judging that Captain Sully could have landed the plane back on the runway instead of the Hudson.

Well, yes and no. This is valid across 2 decades, not something that happened over 6 months after iron curtain fell. And in some way it continues till today, rule of law is still pretty weak for example and politicians often sidestep laws valid for everybody else. Thats really indefensible and completely on population, not some evil forces outside conspiring to harm.

Also, most corruption, or ie sale of factories worth billions for thousands/millions was mostly to local people, not outsiders.

> something that happened over 6 months after iron curtain fell

That's how you think it went, huh? Six months and every country and person got over the decades of communism like they never existed? Six month was just enough for the euphoria to wear off.

If reading a book gave you 1 million HN karma everyone would jump on it. Instead it just makes people more educated. Here, gift link [1], check out what did most countries manage to achieve before say June 1990.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolutions_of_1989

> No, globalization gave them as a nation a chance and they mostly didn't do any serious effort to use that.

Sure buddy... That's why the country is full of german supermarkets, french banks, german factories, etc. They totally were not accepted in EU just to milk the low ages at all.

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