AHC/WI: Economically prosperous USSR

[Otto Kretschmer]

What dos it take for the USSR and the rest of the Eastern Bloc to not fall back economically and technologically behind the west?

PoD after 1945

IMO more development of computer science would help. How to achieve that?

 

[garfieldleifrag]

Eastern Europe was already economically behind the west. When the Soviets took power, a supermajority of the population were illiterate peasants. The Soviets actually had faster economic growth than the USA for much of their existence, but they started so far behind there's no way they could have caught up. Absolute latest PoD for them to be as rich as the USA is before WWII, and even then it would be very unlikely (requiring everything to go right for the Soviets and almost everything to go wrong for the USA).

 

[Phalamus]

I think the problem is that centrally-planned economies, while performing good enough at delivering growth in things like resource extraction and heavy industry (which, in my understanding, largely drove Soviet economic development while they were doing well), falter when the time comes to transition to an advanced consumer economy, because the planners simply can't anticipate the increasingly complex needs of society. So you'd really need to address that, I suppose...

 

[Bellacinos]

Have Stalin die sometime in 1945 or early 1946 and have Beria ascend to power since I believe he was for reforming the USSR to a more capitalistic model and he wanted to trade Eastern Germany for a similar economic aid package as the Marshall plan and he wanted to trade with the west. How true this is about Beria I have heard conflicting information since dude was a monster but it seems like he didn't really like communism.

 

[Vinization]

Have Malenkov stay in power after Stalin's death instead of being ousted by Khrushchev. This avoids the economic disaster of the Virgin Lands Campaign, and IIRC he also argued for smaller investments on the military and more focus on agriculture - the Soviet economy's Achilles heel.

A later POD could be having the Liberman reform stick instead of being ended by Brezhnev.

 

[Namayan]

Eastern Europe was already economically behind the west. When the Soviets took power, a supermajority of the population were illiterate peasants. The Soviets actually had faster economic growth than the USA for much of their existence, but they started so far behind there's no way they could have caught up. Absolute latest PoD for them to be as rich as the USA is before WWII, and even then it would be very unlikely (requiring everything to go right for the Soviets and almost everything to go wrong for the USA).

This is much it.

The Soviets from 1946 to 1970 was growing 5.8% per annum. The US grew like 2.7% same time period. But they were too far behind. The Soviet per capita around 1946 was roughly similar to the US in 1850.

 

[garfieldleifrag]

Have Stalin die sometime in 1945 or early 1946 and have Beria ascend to power since I believe he was for reforming the USSR to a more capitalistic model and he wanted to trade Eastern Germany for a similar economic aid package as the Marshall plan and he wanted to trade with the west. How true this is about Beria I have heard conflicting information since dude was a monster but it seems like he didn't really like communism.

Why would economic liberalization help out the economy, when OTL it completely destroyed it? Yeltsin was so bad that he left power with a 2% approval rating.

 

[Catspoke]

Why would economic liberalization help out the economy, when OTL it completely destroyed it? Yeltsin was so bad that he left power with a 2% approval rating.

China and Vietnam are somehow threading the needle of autocratic communism with capitalism. (It can certainly go wrong though as you point out)

Trading East Germany for aid would provide some money to push mechanization of agriculture, rebuilding of war damage.

 

[Namayan]

Have Stalin die sometime in 1945 or early 1946 and have Beria ascend to power since I believe he was for reforming the USSR to a more capitalistic model and he wanted to trade Eastern Germany for a similar economic aid package as the Marshall plan and he wanted to trade with the west. How true this is about Beria I have heard conflicting information since dude was a monster but it seems like he didn't really like communism.

Why would economic liberalization help out the economy, when OTL it completely destroyed it? Yeltsin was so bad that he left power with a 2% approval rating.

In fairness, if they grew as fast as Japan(8-9% per annum) the soviets could surpass US by 1979. But that is a hypothetical whatif.

But that is a lot of structural changes needed including the soviet philosophy itself. Growing that fast would mean the USSR had to accept the USA was right since they literally have to give the US the keys to their economy like Japan.

The USSR will have to give a lot of concessions for those technical expertise from the USA to come to USSR and fuel their economy. It is similar to what happened to China in OTL. But that means the USSR has to accept US Hegemony for more than 30 years starting from 1946 rather than challenging USA.

If USSR don't, they probably wont grow as fast as Japan despite having a capitalist model and repeat whatever happened to Yeltsin's economy.

 

[Johnrankins]

The problem in the 90's was it happened too late and happened a little too quick. The big monopolies needed to be broken up. Each building should initially be its own enterprise. The enterprises consisting of less than 25 workers simply should be partnerships with ownership split equally among them. Larger firms issue stock with 5 grades A,B,C,D,and E distributed equally among workers. No stock can be sold until the end of the first year with various public education programs to show how stock works. At the end of the year grade A stock can be sold, at the end of the second B stock can be sold, C after the third and so on. The initial stock price is at book value.

As far as during the Cold War period itself I think at the very least it needs to dump the Five Year Plans and adopt Market Socialism. Not having real prices really hurts you. The earlier this happens the better.

 

[marathag]

Trading East Germany for aid would provide some money to push mechanization of agriculture, rebuilding of war damage

A few more factories making Tractors is more useful than more T-54/55 required for Cold War Sabre rattling

 

[marathag]

n fairness, if they grew as fast as Japan(8-9% per annum) the soviets could surpass US by 1979. But that is a hypothetical whatif.

Japan relaxed under the shade provided by the US Nuclear umbrella, with a tiny military.
USSR near totally focused on the Consumer Sector could have been an awesome thing to see happen.
May Day Parades showing of the 'New for 1960' Automobiles.
And so on.

 

[Aghasverov]

The problem in the 90's was it happened too late and happened a little too quick. The big monopolies needed to be broken up. Each building should initially be its own enterprise. The enterprises consisting of less than 25 workers simply should be partnerships with ownership split equally among them. Larger firms issue stock with 5 grades A,B,C,D,and E distributed equally among workers. No stock can be sold until the end of the first year with various public education programs to show how stock works. At the end of the year grade A stock can be sold, at the end of the second B stock can be sold, C after the third and so on. The initial stock price is at book value.

As far as during the Cold War period itself I think at the very least it needs to dump the Five Year Plans and adopt Market Socialism. Not having real prices really hurts you. The earlier this happens the better.

If a system of market pricing could lead to a Ruble that was freely convertible with western currencies, that could be a huge benefit as well, so long as inflation were kept at manageable levels and hyperinflation averted...

 

[Namayan]

Japan relaxed under the shade provided by the US Nuclear umbrella, with a tiny military.
USSR near totally focused on the Consumer Sector could have been an awesome thing to see happen.
May Day Parades showing of the 'New for 1960' Automobiles.
And so on.

That is right.

That is why in order to USSR do that, they have to give up almost everything in OTL. I did mention accept US Hegemony.

That situation I mentioned requires USSR not to challenge USA. No iron curtain, no wars, no communist sponsorship, no Cuban missile crisis. Pax Americana in 1946 upto 1979. The USSR have to replicate what China did, inner problems and revolts like Tiananmen are fine, while everything outside USSR will become US sphere of influence including every nation under the Iron curtain.

 

[KarmaPolice]

Have Stalin die sometime in 1945 or early 1946 and have Beria ascend to power since I believe he was for reforming the USSR to a more capitalistic model and he wanted to trade Eastern Germany for a similar economic aid package as the Marshall plan and he wanted to trade with the west. How true this is about Beria I have heard conflicting information since dude was a monster but it seems like he didn't really like communism.

I have a perfect plausable date of POD; October 1945.

Stalin had a mild stroke in that May, and suffered a serious heart attack in October. In a reversal of the timeline of the AH 'Twilight of the Red Czar' [where his '53 stroke was in another's presence, and thus he survived] Stalin's coronary happened while alone, and in a position where he fell over and cracked his skull [bathtub? desk? tiled floor?]. By the time The Father Of Peoples is found, it is too late; the cranial internal bleeding has felled him.

First thing I'm going to say is this; Beria will be suspect #1 [did he fall or was he whacked?]. Plus, nobody liked the [redacted]. He's a gonner.

The problem in the 90's was it happened too late and happened a little too quick. The big monopolies needed to be broken up. Each building should initially be its own enterprise. The enterprises consisting of less than 25 workers simply should be partnerships with ownership split equally among them. Larger firms issue stock with 5 grades A,B,C,D,and E distributed equally among workers. No stock can be sold until the end of the first year with various public education programs to show how stock works. At the end of the year grade A stock can be sold, at the end of the second B stock can be sold, C after the third and so on. The initial stock price is at book value.

It's actually argued by some is that it was the inability for the Russians to sort out property laws which was the critical issue. You cannot have stable private ownership before this. Much of the oligarch's wealth-piles came from wholesale looting, strongarming and fraud.

And they did try to give Russian workers shares on their workplaces. Problem was, the oligarchs [who'd gotten rich through theiving off the state] simply bought those vouchers off the narod.

 

[RedSword12]

Why would economic liberalization help out the economy, when OTL it completely destroyed it? Yeltsin was so bad that he left power with a 2% approval rating.

Yeltsin used economic shock therapy, which isn't a particularly successful method for creating economic growth.

 

[Sarthak]

Yeltsin used economic shock therapy, which isn't a particularly successful method for creating economic growth.

Poland, Czechia and Slovakia used it rather successfully. However point. The situation I Russia was too different for the process to work properly in the Russian federation.

 

[Catspoke]

That is right.

That is why in order to USSR do that, they have to give up almost everything in OTL. I did mention accept US Hegemony.

That situation I mentioned requires USSR not to challenge USA. No iron curtain, no wars, no communist sponsorship, no Cuban missile crisis. Pax Americana in 1946 upto 1979. The USSR have to replicate what China did, inner problems and revolts like Tiananmen are fine, while everything outside USSR will become US sphere of influence including every nation under the Iron curtain.

How much is USA empire building a thing in a passive USSR world???

Assuming post World War 2, the Soviets agree to a "Finlandized" demilitarized united Germany and an independent non aligned Poland and Czech republic. And the Soviets are holding the leashes hard on Communists in China and Korea.

(No one in the west really going to care what happens in Manchuria or North Korea, or the ex axis Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia, Albania, even Slovakia, the USSR can flex there if they want)

Perhaps the USA is in semi isolation, and disinterested in what goes on in the Soviets back yard.

 

[Namayan]

How much is USA empire building a thing in a passive USSR world???

Assuming post World War 2, the Soviets agree to a "Finlandized" demilitarized united Germany and an independent non aligned Poland and Czech republic. And the Soviets are holding the leashes hard on Communists in China and Korea.

(No one in the west really going to care what happens in Manchuria or North Korea, or the ex axis Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia, Albania, even Slovakia, the USSR can flex there if they want)

Perhaps the USA is in semi isolation, and disinterested in what goes on in the Soviets back yard.

More of USSR cannot fund them since money is in economic development.

That includes a smaller USSR military than OTL.

Even Korean war shouldn't happen at all assuming they want to grow consistently for 3 decades as fast as the Chinese.

If you take out soviet military presence, do you think these countries would remain communist or turn communist at all?

 

[Johnrankins]

Poland, Czechia and Slovakia used it rather successfully. However point. The situation I Russia was too different for the process to work properly in the Russian federation.

The biggest problem there is probably that Russia is too large for it. Also they were Communist only for 50 years while the USSR for 70. So their economies were 20 years less damaged by Communism.