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DId the Soviet Union see historically unparraleled economic growth (lemmygrad.ml)

submitted 7 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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I see this claim made a lot: that the Soviet Union achieved economic growth that has never been seen before or after, so threw it at some angry Redditor. They brought up Japan/ South Korea from 1950-1990 and looking into it, it seems as though they are comparable, at least when using GDP South Korea actually does a lot better than the Soviet Union. Now this leaves out rapid Industrialization which I assume is what is meant with "unparraleled economic growth" and also GDP may not be the best indicator but it's still impressive. Of course Japan and SK were also subsidized by the US. Am I missing something? and does anyone have good sources on the growth of the Soviet Economy from 1921-1990?

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[–] [email protected] 0 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (1 children)

You are mistaken, at least partially.

The unprecedented growth of the USSR economy occurred under Stalin’s Five Year Plans from 1929-55, at 13.8% (minus 1941-45 during the war, which registered a minus 3.7%) over at 20 year period.

The numbers were calculated using gross national income from the Soviet archive as GDP was not calculated (at least not in the same way) during the Soviet times. Check out the Russian economics book “Crystal Growth” for more details.

For comparison with the other periods in the USSR and Russia:

The growth from the Tsarist Russian empire were 2.8% (1885-1906) and 5.2% (1908-13) respectively.

The NEP period (1921-28) also registered a high growth of 12.7%, but it was largely due to the recovery from an extremely low base that followed directly from the Civil War, and began to peter out near the end of the NEP period. From 1921-26, growth was 14.8% but it fell to 6.7% in 1927-28. (Note: WWI and the Civil War from 1914-20 saw a decline of -11.7%)

Stalin’s Five Year Plans were the true sustained economic growth model, which registered at 14.5% (1929-40) and then immediately after the war at 13.0% (1946-55).

Unfortunately, Khrushchev screwed up and the growth of the rest for the Soviet periods were pitiful:

7.8% from 1956-65;
5.3% from 1966-85;
0.3% from 1986-91.

Post-USSR period under Yeltsin saw a rapid decline: -12.0% (1992-94) and then -2.9% (1995-98).

Putin’s recovery were modest at best: 6.9% (1999-2008) then 1.0% (2009-19).

Note that post-1991 figures were calculated using GDP instead of gross national income (GNI), but the differences never exceeded more than 3%, so the comparison is still largely valid.

For comparison with other countries over a 20-year period:

USSR - 13.8% (1929-55) over 22 years (minus 1941-45)
Taiwan - 11.5% (1947-73) over 27 years
China - 10.4% (1983-2007) over 25 years
South Korea - 10.2% (1966-88) over 23 years
Japan - 9.7% (1966-89) over 24 years

Note that the difference between the USSR and Taiwan/China/South Korea is vast when you take into account the compound growth over 20+ years.

Note also that South Korea copied the Soviet Five Year Plans, among other things, to initiate its rapid economic growth model during the 1960s.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 7 months ago

You should be more careful with comparing GDP numbers. For instance, GDP numbers suggest that Russia's economy pretty much halved after 2014 due to sanctions, but most of this "loss" was simply the ruble's price dropping. Russia's industry did not collapse after 2014 like it did in 1991.