Is the life now worst or better than socialist era?
Posted by Neat_Grapefruit_1047@reddit | AskBalkans | View on Reddit | 521 comments
Posted by Neat_Grapefruit_1047@reddit | AskBalkans | View on Reddit | 521 comments
WorldlinessRadiant77@reddit
My grandma (93 years old) put it this way:
During socialism there was no milk, no meat and no sugar. Now I go to the shop and buy as much as I want.
Or to put it in a different way, back then people had no clue how poor they were, now they don’t know how rich they are.
Nothing_Special_23@reddit
Again, it's speaking for Bulgaria. I imagine it was similar in Romania... but I don't think that was the case in Yugoslavia (well, not most of the time at least) or Greece.
fixme123@reddit
Yugoslavia and Greece didn't have hardcore communism. Nor were they tied to the USSR politically, economically and ideologically. Greece, in any case, was a Western aligned country. I don't think this question was for them, or applies to them.
popadika@reddit
Greece didn't have socialism or communism. Like, ever.
deaddyfreddy@reddit
Yugoslavia was a country aligned with the West (although less so after the 1960s).
mssarac@reddit
Greece was never socialist
GregK1985@reddit
PASOK in the 80s was pretty socialist, just not communist.
mssarac@reddit
Greece was still a capitalist country. And PASOK was always a reformist party, never revolutionary
DemiGodesss@reddit
Romania was way worse. Like North Korea worse.
BigBaibars@reddit
It applies to places as close to the Soviet core as St. Peterspurg, at least according to my dad who studied there in the 80s.
maraudee@reddit
That wasn't the case for Greece for sure as the Greek state was never communist.
Bejliii@reddit
Right now we have a few options but all of them are bad and expensive. Not everyone can afford milk on daily basis.
pushypro@reddit
This is a load of bullshit, I lived it there was everything you needed and it was real food. Where did your grandmother live huh Auschwitz? This is a lie, I lived it , take your propagandist attention seeking stupidity infested self and jump off a bridge !
ProfessionalShock425@reddit
This one.
In 20th century, we were much more turned to one another. Someone always had a mastery in hands and everything was built for fixing upping. It wasn't country that we miss, but union that it demanded of people. It was stingy for devirsication, options, glamour or form, so products you could buy had no extra flair, bling or pazzaz to loure. Now everything comes with bells, whistles and 2 year warranty. Worst of all, we lost the touch with one another.
takeSusanooNoMikoto@reddit
Okay, but what do you / did she mean by "no milk" ? If there was anything in Bulgaria during that time, it was milk. If you mean there was no 1.6%, 0.5% skimmed milk, then, I guess...
Especially when you consider that more people lived in villages back then where they owned sheeps, goats, cows and so on, so there wasn't even a need to go to the store and buy milk.
WorldlinessRadiant77@reddit
I think she meant milk products in general being in short supply. Maybe you have milk that particular day, but no butter, yogurt or cheese.
My grandma was a secretary in a factory and my grandpa was a civil engineer so they didn’t have access to the rural Theft Industrial Complex.
zet23@reddit
"...back then people had no clue how poor they were, now they don’t know how rich they are. " - very well put together!!! We don't understand how rich we are! How lucky to be born in Europe and to be able to leave post-socialism life!
Electronic_Bass_6984@reddit
now is way better. most of products are more expensive than now, if you compare the salary.
According_Act7462@reddit
If anyone says better during communism, you need to ask then if they would move back in time and exchange their life for their grandfather’s. 9/10 times the answer will be no
skgdreamer@reddit
I think the average age of redditors here is too young to give an opinion from experience under both systems. About 10 years ago travelling brought me both to Serbia and Bulgaria, when asking old people there was a 50/50 split, leaning in favour of now in Serbia (it was before Vucic) and of socialist era in Bulgaria.
Teodosij@reddit
My grandparents weren’t fans of Tito or communism, but they still feel nostalgic for Yugoslavia because that’s when they were at their peak.
For ordinary people, many things were undoubtedly better in Yugoslavia/People’s Republic of Bulgaria, because basic things like strong family bonds and affordable housing were still the norm. Of course, that was in spite of, not because of, the communist system.
Remarkable-Fennel375@reddit
Things made in Czechoslovak were made with such good quality there are still sought after all these years
Plane_Name8817@reddit
Funny, because in Slovenia and probably in other southern countries if something is bad quality or almost worthy of use, but not quite, we say its "czech" (češko) :D this saying comes from 80s or early 90s I believe, when people widespread started smuggling things from other countries.
lauscheboy06@reddit
It's very surprising for me as fir a Czech person 😃 I thought our products were known in eastern bloc as the top quality
Plane_Name8817@reddit
I dont know. Maybe they only bought the cheapest things. We do like your tractors though. Zetor is very popular.
Stolac_@reddit
Because Neoliberal products are crap made for consumption, not using and reusing
East-Raccoon135@reddit
It wasn’t in spite of. It’s literally part of socialism to ensure affordable housing for everyone. And collective ideology over the individual.
Teodosij@reddit
"It's literally part of socialism" to abolish the family and subjugate individuals to the state. This obviously wasn't (fully) accomplished in Yugoslavia and PR Bulgaria, which doesn't mean the communist elite didn't do their best to make it happen.
In both countries, affordable housing was never an issue under the preceding monarchist regimes. If anything, the communists helped create the modern crisis through policies like forced collectivization.
wikimandia@reddit
That’s nonsense. That’s some kind of Marxist-Leninism communism, not socialism.
Teodosij@reddit
We're talking about two Marxist-Leninist regimes. Marxism-Leninism aside, most forms of revolutionary socialism are fundamentally anti-family.
kiki885@reddit
Comparing Yugoslav communism to Warsaw Pact/the Soviet Union's communism is borderline braindead, I'm sorry.
Teodosij@reddit
Did I do that? No? Try again.
kiki885@reddit
Yugoslavia is not Marxist-Leninist. End of story.
Teodosij@reddit
Yes it was. Google it.
Sn3try@reddit
Can't believe communists crashed the housing market in 2008 just so Americans can't buy a home, pray for these poor souls 💔
Teodosij@reddit
You have the reading comprehension levels on an American communist. 😃
Sn3try@reddit
Whatever you say
treba_dzemper@reddit
When exactly did communist elite in yugoslavia attempt to abolish family?
FNR/SFR Yugoslavia started as a Bolshevik psycho-state but has pivoted nearly each decade, and most those pivots were already under Tito.
Teodosij@reddit
They didn't attempt to abolish the family outright, that would've been impossible. However, they did abolish the extended family type model which predominated in the Balkans up to that point. A term I've seen used to describe this model is "zadruga", although that entails a very liberal interpretation of it.
In just a few short decades, the Yugoslav communists transformed these extremely patriarchal societies defined by extended kinship groups beyond recognition.
You could argue that a similar process happened in the West slowly and over a much longer period, but there are some crucial differences not worth getting into here.
treba_dzemper@reddit
They absolutely did neither of those things.
They maintained zadrugas where they existed, and established them where they didn't.
They did deconstruct the toxic "Dedo s dva zuba, 0 škole i nije maknuo iz sela čitav život se pita sve" style patriarchy and instilled formal cooperative methods where all voices were equally, and educated ones trumped others.
AdSuccessful2506@reddit
Well, the neoliberalism and libertarians are much more effective than socialism in the subjugation of the traditional family to the State, see Russia, oligarchs rule. Nobody moves without them allowing.
Teodosij@reddit
In what world is Russia a libertarian country? Anyway, I don't fully disagree. Virtually all modern regimes seek to subjugate (or even destroy) the traditional family, including Putin's poophole.
AdSuccessful2506@reddit
Russian isn’t libertarian, but capitalist and an oligarchy definitely.
deaddyfreddy@reddit
thanks to IMF loans!
odanwt99@reddit
Strong family bonds and affordable housing was also the norm here in Greece back then.
Teodosij@reddit
Exactly. These were "leftovers" that had nothing to do with communism, capitalism or any other modern political system.
odanwt99@reddit
It seems that a lot of trends that are described in this comment section are common across europe and north america so it probably has to do with overarching societal and technological developments.
MMortein@reddit
The problem with asking the old people is that they were young during socialism, and now they are old.
Of course life was better when they were young.
DobrogeanuG1855@reddit
Not necessarily. Ask people about the 1990’s.
Stepaladin@reddit
Ask me, who was a teenager in 1990's, and I totally could tell you life couldn't be better.
It's my parents who had to endure the hardships and worry about tomorrow each day. I was young, full of energy, didn't really care about everyday problems and believed the whole world is ahead of me.
vegancorr@reddit
I'm Romanian. I was a teenager as well in the 90s and it was pretty bad. I was waiting one full year for my relative in Italy to visit us and bring us cream biscuits. In the communist era it was even worse, oranges only on Christmas. It was horrible for me as a kid and we were one of the "richest" families in my village. No money for toilet paper, communist books were harsh on my ass. I don't understand how people can say it was better back then, unless they were part of the apparatus or informants for the secret police.
mardex_5@reddit
Your country didnt have the war in 90s like Croatia, Serbia, Montenegro and Bosnia had...
deaddyfreddy@reddit
If you don't want wars - just don't start them.
Rich_Plant2501@reddit
I doubt the person you're replying to has started any war. Just like many others didn't start any war either.
deaddyfreddy@reddit
Yeah, wars just happened to occur.
Rich_Plant2501@reddit
From my point of view, I completely agree. My grandfather was 14 when WWII started. He didn't start the war. Just Bulgarians showed up in his village. I was born just as wars in Yugoslavia were starting, it just happen to me. I couldn't be either for or against the war, jusr a regular infant. As I reached age of 6-7 we were just bombed. It just happen to me. This time I had some consciousness, just like most preschool children do, but I didn't want any war. Now in my thirties I don't any war. If there is going to be any war that happens to me, it's out of my hands, I certainly won't vote for those who would start a war, I wouldn't vote for anyone who caused a war even indirectly. So, please tell me, how an average person starts a war?
deaddyfreddy@reddit
Good pal!
Anyway, people voted for Hitler, people voted for Putin, people worked in media spreading propaganda, people joined the police and military, after all, ordinary people killed other people!
Prolaznica@reddit
Yugoslavia didn’t start any war, mate — it was dismantled by the same folks who were “bringing democracy” through CNN commercials. Serbia was busy defending what was falling apart, while the media already had the villains pre-drawn. The fun part? Now we’ve got the internet, so the propaganda actually has to last longer than a TikTok clip to work. ;)
Rich_Plant2501@reddit
Your point being... what exactly? Most of the people are not bloodthirsty, don't want war, don't want to kill in war or in peace. They can be fooled by propaganda, that's true, but most of ordinary people aren't enjoying any of it.
deaddyfreddy@reddit
I'm not sure which is worse - being a bloodthirsty killer or being a fool turned into one. Either way, the outcome is the same.
If you don't enjoy it, then don't do it.
Again, the "voting" called that a reason, you are literally saying, "I give this person the right to act on my behalf." Therefore, the person who voted is responsible for the actions of a person they voted for.
Rich_Plant2501@reddit
Ok, next time I vote for someone who starts a war I'll personally send you a message so you can gloat. I used voting as an example because it's the only official way for me to influence a choice of starting to war.
I agree with this. I believe people do as what their sense of right allows them.
mardex_5@reddit
What are you implying here boy?
deaddyfreddy@reddit
I'm not implying it, I'm saying it (almost) outright: it wasn't extraterrestrials who started the Yugoslavian wars.
mardex_5@reddit
Everybody knows who started the war, it was Serbs.
There are no multiple countries who started and wanted this, it was Milosevic's Serbia that wanted this.
I'm a Croat and know what kind of terror me and my people suffered...
ElectronicBit8952@reddit
Actually none of the other Eastern Bloc countries had it.
mardex_5@reddit
yeah, but question is for Balkan area
ElectronicBit8952@reddit
It was really the former Yugoslavia. The Balkans also include Bulgaria, Romania and Albania.
Stolac_@reddit
You’re 100% fight - A Hercegovinian here
natiAV@reddit
Apart from war there are real biases like: fading affect bias (unpleasant memories diminish faster than pleasant ones), positivity effect (older adults tend to favor good memories over bad ones), euphoric recall (remembering things with a positive bias), selective memory…
Although some other biases can exist in the negative, it has been found the positive biases to be more frequent. https://www.theguardian.com/science/head-quarters/2015/jan/16/declinism-is-the-world-actually-getting-worse
DobrogeanuG1855@reddit
So you know the realities.
The 60’s and 70’swere prosperous, abundant, filled with modernity and new opportunities. A scientific, artistic and social renaissance.
tollbearer@reddit
As a young person, if this is better, then fuck.
shalvad@reddit
On the other hand, it was like 50 years ago. In general, in every country, life should be better now than 50 years ago; we have better medicine, and the internet. mobile phones, etc.
pushypro@reddit
Excuses and empty phrases/theories , learn to compare data my friend then you will objectively have an answer
S7AR4RGD@reddit
I wasn't young during socialism. I remember the wars, the transition, then the drugs to numb the pain from the wars. America fucked us good, amd they knew what they were doing.
Dear-Potential-3477@reddit
i can compare my grandfathers life during yugoslavia vs mine, at 26 as a truck driver he bought a 2 story house on a single income which i can only dream of nowadays. But it is true the economy was held up by loans which needed to be repaid by the 90s.
Worth_Job_5423@reddit
Don't tell me you can't buy a 2-story house with a truck driver's salary. That's BS.
Plane_Name8817@reddit
You can buy a house on a drivers salary, but you cant pay it off entirely with one paycheck.
They paid back the entire loan with one monthly paycheck. My grandfather told me people took loans for agricultural equipment worth equivalent of thousands dollars today, and after a while paid it off for the price of a packet of cigarettes.
Dear-Potential-3477@reddit
no hope of doing that anymore, both parents have to work these days to barely survive.
Worth_Job_5423@reddit
Absolute bullshit.
schkembe_voivoda@reddit
I think now you can still buy a house with truck driver’s salary at least here in Bulgaria but the job is hard and it’s not for everyone.
Familiar-Self5359@reddit
You actually could. The housing credits were like on 50-60 years costing peanuts on a monthly level and the worker's rights and benefits were unbelievable.
Some_Vermicelli80@reddit
You have been ignoring the other side of the story. He bought 2 story house because he took a loan while the inflation was sky rocketing. His salary became larger than the loan he had to pay off. That's why he managed to buy the house. However, it also means that his salary lost tons of value before the end of the month, meaning that he had to buy everything he could with the money he received, otherwise that money in 3-4 weeks would be worthless. This is also why people bought stuff on checks, as they were postponing payments; even 7 day payment delay meant 50% savings. Value of everything was deterioring by hour. And this is why Slovenia and Croatia wanted out of it, as they were receiving lots of currency with real value - DEMs. This led to a war.
Dear-Potential-3477@reddit
Thats not what led to war. Czechia and Slovakia separated without war and so did the soviet union
Dear-Potential-3477@reddit
Thats what led to breakup but not what led to the war, the war was caused by politicians who wanted to profit from it.
Dreadscythe95@reddit
The same thing was happening in Greece back then with Capitalism. It was the loans as you said.
vladedivac12@reddit
That's the reality in most countries.
MariusAtasiei@reddit
I believe that the reasons matter too, most of the elders I asked and said that the communist era was better said that for strange and non-economical reasons like: less women rights, no Russian threat(because they were from the bloc, weird logic), homophobia or his job was important then.
skgdreamer@reddit
Those are all negative, I got things like people were nicer to each other and had a feeling of community while work life balance and cost of living were better.
ContributionLatter32@reddit
The prevailing opinion ive seen with older generations here is that now is better in many ways, but they are still nostalgic about soviet era life. I think that is just a normal human response.
EleFacCafele@reddit
Incredible better now. People born around 2000+ haven o idea how bad it was during communism, especially in the 80s.
Top_Selection3866@reddit
Ya my parents left Croatia because of the economic situation.
Dear-Potential-3477@reddit
Its funny the Yugoslav civil war and ww2 were so brutal that people don't even talk about the 45 years of communism in between, that was living life on easy mode compared to those two wars.
CATelIsMe@reddit
I am from transylvania, both after 2k, and the stories my parents tell me of makes me confused why sometimes they praise ceausescu for getting rid of the countries debts... like... yeah, but the fucking cost?? You lived through the cost, how was that a positive??
EveningChemical8927@reddit
🔝 Also 🇷🇴 here and I agree
Tassiloruns@reddit
As a kid in Bosnia I remember hearing parents/guests discussing the news and events from Romania leading up to December 1989. I had no idea what it meant but knew it was bad.
DobrogeanuG1855@reddit
Compared to the 80’s? Yeah, absolutely
Compared to the 70’s? Just relatively.
People born in the 80’s or later have no idea how good we had it in the golden years of socialism in the 1970’s.
EleFacCafele@reddit
I lived through the 70s and did not have that good. Some connected with the Communist Party had it, but not everyone.
DobrogeanuG1855@reddit
You are an exception, most people disagree with you. Most people didn’t have connections high up in the party and yet lived fine. The difference is massive in terms of food, economic performance, available goods, etc..
I have worked with people who document this period scientifically and have talked to hundreds of people about this, you are part of the minority.
No, your anecdotes aren’t the Word of God. Humble yourself.
EleFacCafele@reddit
Neither you claims are word of God so humble yourself too. Your posts aren't the New Testament.
DobrogeanuG1855@reddit
I work with data, models and phenomena in economics, anecdotes are but a small part of those.
In history, it’s different. History is a science, but it involves a lot of subjectivity, and peoples’ recollections matter a lot.
Here the data and peoples’ memories back my claims, 66% of Romanians recognise Ceaușescu as a good statesman. The older the respondents the higher the probability they give a positive response.
RegionSignificant977@reddit
Under that good statesman Romania ended up as one of the worst countries in Europe. Second only to Albania maybe.
EleFacCafele@reddit
Listen, I know better what history is, don't lecture me. I am a retired archivist.
DobrogeanuG1855@reddit
Great, so then you can understand the polling and the research that’s being conducted on the period.
EleFacCafele@reddit
And I can fully disagree with you.
DobrogeanuG1855@reddit
Of course, debate is essential to scientific discourse, without which we cannot progress.
Hai noroc
SoulEkko@reddit
Ăsta-i tataie clasic expirat fără realizări în viață dar care-și dă bășini de mare om pe Reddit. Irosești orzul pe gâște.
EleFacCafele@reddit
M-a pufnit rasul cand am citit cum se lauda.
Deruz0r@reddit
Bro fuck off in the 70s if anyone in the party heard us talking like this we would all be sent to prison and beat up or worse.
DobrogeanuG1855@reddit
Sure 😂
What was it they accused Ceașcă of? The genocide of 60 000? Everyone in gulag or dead, yes that was the “communist” era here :))
SoulEkko@reddit
What's the point of "having" something "good" if it's not sustainable? Communism failed, USSR failed, keeping people in fear and control them through tyranny failed, every single system that Russia produced, failed. They are failing now, again, shooting themselves in the foot by attacking Ukraine. Dunno about you, but I like where I am right now, thanks.
DobrogeanuG1855@reddit
Fuck Russia, socialism is not a russian invention.
Look at China, they’re doing great.
SoulEkko@reddit
Would you live there? Or better yet, do you live there?
DobrogeanuG1855@reddit
I would go there in a heartbeat were I not a patriot. I’m fluent in French, English and almost fluent in Spanish. I have sufficient diplomas and sufficient qualifications to earn a good living in France, Belgium, Switzerland or any Anglophone country for that matter.
I choose to remain in Romania, but I am saving up money to visit China.
itskobold@reddit
Always an excuse to be found eh ;)
DobrogeanuG1855@reddit
You don’t love your country?
itskobold@reddit
It's alright, one of the best in the world all things considered, even if our voters consistently vote against their best interests. But what else is new?
Look I've been an "online socialist type" before I had enough sense in my head to know I was essentially being groomed by other nihilistic losers and sorted my life out. I remember saying shit like "china/cuba/wherever else has it all figured out, but I won't ever move there, for xyz reasons". It's all bullshit though isn't it? You could be the least patriotic person in the world and you'd find another excuse as to why you don't want to live in China, or some other country that you claim to love so much.
DobrogeanuG1855@reddit
How about you stop assuming stuff about other people, ‘ight? You don’t know anything about me, your entourage sounds horrible though.
I’m trying to work for me and my country, we should all do what we can. Don’t be lazy, don’t be desperate, stand strong and stand united.
itskobold@reddit
I'm not lazy or entitled, that was my socialist mindset. When I applied myself and made something of my life through hard work I realised I had been lied to by socialists. I wouldn't call myself a capitalist nowadays either, but when I myself started to apply myself this socialist mindset melted away from me naturally. I know nothing about you but plenty about socialism and the way it manifests online and I absolutely reject it
SoulEkko@reddit
You didn't answer my question, but you've thrown information I never requested. Not visit, living.
DobrogeanuG1855@reddit
Stop being so obstinately dense.
The fact that you don’t love our country is sad, very sad. We’re a proud nation, you should be ashamed to deride patriotism as you have just done.
China is objectively prospering and their citizens are on average much ahppier than those in most “Western” nations. You can either accept the data or shut the fuck up.
Yes I would live in China if I weren’t already trying to better my own country, you shameless, stateless mutt.
EleFacCafele@reddit
Stop bragging. You are not only one who speak a few foreign languages and have qualifications to work in the West from Romania. A bit of humility would go a long way.
Dear-Ad1582@reddit
It was close to Yugoslavia as life in 70s and the Ceaușescu got in love with North Korea and all went down. That low that people were shoot at the borders trying to emigrate to Yugoslavia.
Lucifer_893@reddit
Yeah, the problem with socialism is it eventually runs out of other people’s money.
DobrogeanuG1855@reddit
Haha, Margaret Thatcher is dead and the Brits sing merrily about her death.
Lucifer_893@reddit
Surely the brits are doing great these days, no?
etre1337@reddit
Hm, I don't know about that. Is true that back then the things were done properly and economically the situation was better. But compared to now ? I don't think there is any comparison.
And by "done properly" I mean better urban planning, better workmanship.
I remember when I had to change the windows on my apartment (1980s) in Bucharest compared to my mom's apartment (1960s) in Braila. Mine had the wood in putrefaction, I could rip it off with my hands and at my mother's place, the wood under the paint was pristine. Like I could still see the marks the woodworker made.
pushypro@reddit
Yepp what was in Yugoslavia and Bulgaria was much better than in Romania, I remember as a teenager in the 80s when I visited Romania... Dude we were like Switzerland compared to you guys I agree with you.
mhmilo24@reddit
Given that before socialism/communism these countries were Monarchies with a focus on agriculture. Capitalism took over when part of their economy has already shifted towards industrialization. A lot of institutions have been created during the socialist/communist era that were kept, which were also mainly not present prior to their political shift from a Monarchy. There is no guaranteed way to know what kind of development would have happened within these counties if they were transformed from a monarchy directly to a democracy with heavy market-liberalism.
Boeing367-80@reddit
Romania was one of the worst situations, but yeah.
Look at how many East Germans raced for the border when they had the chance in the summer of 1989.
Whatever followed, the people of Eastern Europe were very clear, in 1989, that what they had then was unacceptable, bc they uniformly, and with hardly a second thought, got rid of it.
And it was them and no one else who did that. It came as a total shock to most of the west.
SoulEkko@reddit
I think even less mentioned is how much EU has helped us to recover and reach a starting point of prosperity which Romania hasn't really experienced before in its history. We had a few glorious decades in the interwar period, but what followed...
This vid sums it up very briefly and to the point.
SoulEkko@reddit
So to answer OP
In short: no!
In long: holy fuck no!
Dimi7rozavar@reddit
It depends. For some people it was better for some it was worse. In some areas it was generally better in most it was worse. Overall now it's much better. But again, it depends on you life goals.
No-Insurance100@reddit
Every Croat and Slovene will claim it is better now. Serbs, Montenegrins, Bosnians, and Macedonians are more divided. There's no need to have this conversation every month
BosnianGeek@reddit
Every Croat says it’s better from their apartment in Stuttgart.
Unable-Stay-6478@reddit
There are lot of Slovenes and Croats that beg to differ.
Barbak86@reddit
Much, much better.
I experienced probably the most shitty part of the socialist era (the end of the 80', beginning of the 90'), so my opinion will be affected by that. If you ask older or much older people than me, you might get different opinions than mine.
Vanjcho@reddit
Depends. Not every socialist country was the same. Some were socialist nationalist, still allowing private business. Some were hard core. Have you ever wondered why you couldn't get things like milk? It's not that the state was not capable. it's that the states priority was heavy industry and production, not consumer demand.
What they didn't know then is that people REALLY dont want to live like this, which is why it leads to corruption and black markets, and protests, etc.
This is why Yugoslavia was open to the outside and managed very differently. There were many mistakes made, but ultimately, having a nation run by 1 face for decades is never a good idea. Im genuinely scared of the power vacuum China and Russia will have once the presidents pass away. Human ego and pride are what end up destroying the most.
Ok_Math_818@reddit
"Much better" is the only answer
0ld_Snake@reddit
Idk, my parents and everyone they know swear by the Yugoslav way of life. They yearn for it and I understand why, at least in Sarajevo. Now I'd nuke the country with how bad it is. The "progress" we made as a country is nothing but a big lie. People have perceptively more money but everything costs 11 times more and it's becoming unbearable. The only way people cope with life is by convincing themselves that it could be worse. I hate capitalism and I think most socialist and communist countries don't do very good in capitalist because they just can't catch up and the people are used to a certain system which now they have to unlearn, which is almost impossible.
Skobalj_2689@reddit
Only thing in better in Yugoslavia than today Bosnia is the fact that we were all together in one big nation. But life wasnt good for all people you know
0ld_Snake@reddit
For the average person it was better than today
Skobalj_2689@reddit
No way, people are just nostalgic af
lee7on1@reddit
We'll never know, internet has changed the whole globe and now we think we're richer because of all of this 'cool shit'.
But anyway, I highly doubt real socialism existed at all, considering how fast everything fell apart. Corruption was probably at insane levels too.
Dear-Potential-3477@reddit
That generation loved living the easy life on IMF loans+brotherhood and all that. But when it come time to repay them they decided to kill each other instead.
Cefalopodul@reddit
Yugoslavia until Tito's death was the exception. Thing is Tito's model was not sustainable so it would have collapsed in 10 years even if he had lived.
boozcruise21@reddit
Why was it unsustainable?
__Rosso__@reddit
It heavily relied on Soviet Union and USA being in a highly competitive cold war.
Which started to die down in 70s and was crumbling in 80s, as one side was becoming stronger (USA), and end of Cold War was nearing, Yugoslavia was falling apart.
deaddyfreddy@reddit
Mostly on the USA, the aid from 1950 to the early 1960s, then IMF loans etc.
boozcruise21@reddit
Are you talking about the economy depending on foreign aid?
BlackNumenorean@reddit
I think people mostly commend the socialist period because it had a clearly defined ideological and economic structure that built confidence in general population. You often hear how in ex-Yugoslav countries "there existed a system". When people compare that state to todays capitalism, they see a rather bleak image where most profitable assets being sold to European, US or Chinese companies, and they don't like it. However, SFRY wasn't perfect and even proclaimed bankruptcy in the 80s due to high oil prices.
peanut_the_scp@reddit
IRRC Tito took massive loans from the IMF to develvop the country and had no intention of paying it back because the "downfall of capitalism was inevitable"
Yeah as it turned out the downfall of capitalism never happened and those loans needed to be repayed
Cefalopodul@reddit
Because Tito made some really bad assumptions in the 1950s and tailored the entire economy and society around those assumptions.
The worst of them is that the Cold War would not end very soon and the US and USSR would be in constant competition and Yugoslavia would be able to profit by playing both sides against each other.
BreakfastDue1218@reddit
Yeah I’m a big dicksucker for Yugoslavia but Tito was obnoxiously narcissistic and never planned a successor for after his death so the country fell apart
Cefalopodul@reddit
The country fell apart because his entire societal structure and economy was centered on the Cold War not ending. Then it suddenly ended, the economy went to shit and ethnic which he had kept hidden were suddenly visible.
StamatisTzantopoulos@reddit
Many ex Communist countries are doing remarkably well, eg Poland and Slovenia, even Croatia to a certain extent
FingerEffective6465@reddit
Life is amazing now in Romania you cannot compare with comunist times,only lazybones are poor
Stverghame@reddit
It is better now. A different dictator is here now, but we'll get rid of him so it will be even better.
Unable-Stay-6478@reddit
Better how?
Stverghame@reddit
Financially, freedom of movement, diversity in products both domestic and foreign, lower discrepancy with the most developed parts of world.
Unable-Stay-6478@reddit
Sure, if your idea of ‘better’ is debt, skyrocketing rent, emigration, and buying mostly imported crap. Yugoslavia ranked mid-European by HDI and was the most developed socialist country. Serbia today lags far behind the EU average and is in the lower half of Europe by income and life expectancy. Yugoslavs had free healthcare, education, housing, and could travel and work in both East and West. Serbs today can travel short-term in Schengen, but can’t legally work there without a visa. Yugoslavs could — and millions did.
Stverghame@reddit
HDI was created in 1990, when Yugoslavia was on a deathbed. Make up a better lie.
That is Yugoslavia's second name.
Yugoslavia wasn't better in that area either lol.
Woooooah, what an achievement. Moooom, I'm the richest guy in the poor man's club, that fucker USSR has 1 dollar, while I have 1.3 dollars!
Nothing was "free". If you consider that "free", then it is free today as well (not counting the housing). My parents and grandparents hadn't left Yugoslavia despite having decent jobs, while here I am traveling around souther hemisphere with a rather average job.
Unable-Stay-6478@reddit
So? It's a formula that can be easily applied with known factors such as health, education and income index. But ok let's disregard this statement.
Yugoslavia's external debt in 1981 was 21 billion. Serbia's debt today is 39 billion dollars. Yeah, totally the same.
Yugoslavia was on the same level as Greece and Portugal. Slovenia and Croatia alone were above Austria, Italy and Spain in terms of GDP per capita.
Give me more context - they didn't leave because they didn't have the money or because they did not have a need to leave? Were they married at a time? Are you married. And I assume you are not working in a Serbian company but foreign one.
deaddyfreddy@reddit
If you don't think you can afford to give your kids a good life, then don't make them. Btw, that's one of the things I like very much now: the pressure from others to "have children" is much less.
Wouldn't it be good if you lived in Serbia, spent your money there, and received your income from another country?
Unable-Stay-6478@reddit
I was making a comparison. He was talking how his parents didn't go anywhere while he travels without problems. It's very different if his parents were together back then, with kids or whatever then his situation where he travelled probably without a spouss and children.
Lol no. Why would I live and contribute in a country that gives little to nothing? I would choose a country with lower taxes.
Lord_Bayaz7@reddit
In Serbia, worse for most people. Yes, consumer goods are more accessible, and some things that were counted as luxury in socialist era are now common. However, access to housing and healthcare is more limited. Overall, I won't be able to have the same quality of life as my parents, although I work longer hours.
deaddyfreddy@reddit
Because there are no more "free" loans from IMF?
Lord_Bayaz7@reddit
We did have a fiscal deficit, but it was not unsolvable. Successor states have much worse debt problems.In general, it is a global trend, similar things are happening now in western world Members of our ruling class decided they could make more money in an unstable environment.
The fall of communism provided an opportunity. Around 40 years later, we still have mostly the same people on top in all successor states of Yugoslavia, living life of opulence and luxury Due to globalism, an average person has more access to various goods, but overall quality of life is worse.
deaddyfreddy@reddit
even if adjusted for the 40+ years of inflation?
Lord_Bayaz7@reddit
Yes, the GDP to debt ratio at the worst point in Yugoslavia(1985) was about 50%. Serbia is around that level currently, Croatia has a somewhat higher ratio. Austerity measures in Yugoslavia reduced the debt ratio to something around 20%, but at the expense of other economic indicators, and then the civil war ensued...
sweetSourMoon@reddit
Romanian here:
By the account of my great-grandmother who lived through two wars, almaost died durind the red army occupation of her natal village because it was not safe to go out outside durind nightfall and she needed a doctor, had 14 children and only 3 reached adulthood, moved from village to city to village never havind a place of her own - moving after my great-grandfather who was a train engineer, and only comming back to her natal village and living back with her mother after he died of cancer, with no land to claim as her own because it was taken by the CAP, restituted after the end of communist era and had zero value to a 93 year old bag of bones... If I could resurect her, she will say that we live in much better times.
By the account of my grandmother, her daughter. The wife of a average secred service agent, eating caviar and drinking champagne. Always having her table full (but a horrible cook), going on vacations and not having her husband home most of the time (he was gone for weeks, and she didn't bother to ask why stange photos of children were mailed to him during his time in "Securitate" - (secret service). Yeah, that life was better.
My mother, her daughter, is kind of on 50%-50% good vs bad.
Myself, her daughter, who read her grandfather's file, who lived in a city where some crazy ass Russian chick performed inhuman torture experiments on prisoners, and meeting the survivors... We have a better life right now.
Pick your poison....
deaddyfreddy@reddit
Yeah, in the Soviet Union you had to be either in KGB, Military or the Party official to live like this.
sweetSourMoon@reddit
"Securitatea" was the Romania variant of KGB. He was also in the Military. "Average" because he wasn't killed afte '89 like another family member who got poisoned 6 months later while drinking a beer with some friends...
danielpreb@reddit
Knowing the fact that newborns were shot with the whole family for being baptized, I believe that the situation is much better now
deaddyfreddy@reddit
The problem with these types of questions is that they don't ask for details.
You definitely had to add something like "Why do you think life was worse/better?"
Pamisos@reddit
The thing is that at that time, life in capitalist West societies was better because there was a rival that pushed for more democratic privileges.
Socialism is still an infant , capitalism is already an old man. Change will happen but not ahead of its time. The term "Socialist Era" mean Socialism is over but that is not the case.
East-Raccoon135@reddit
Agreed. Capitalism has hundreds of years of experience, socialism is relatively new. We still can look towards China and Vietnam on how it has evolved and survived
deaddyfreddy@reddit
China these days is a capitalist country
OkoMushroom@reddit
Incomprehensibly better, can’t imagine being gay in socialist Yugoslavia.
Teodosij@reddit
As a homophobic Orthodox Bulgarophile, I agree.
sashko5@reddit
Are there many bulgarophiles in Makedonia? I know that some people use "bugar" as an insult there.
Dear-Potential-3477@reddit
Bugar is not an insult it refers to an act, if you stab someone in the back and they call you a bugar it means you did was Bulgaria did in WW1 which was open a second front behind Serbias flank. Its in reference to a historical event we aren't calling Bulgarians back stabbers. Bulgarians dont have a bad reputation at all in Serbia these days.
Teodosij@reddit
"Bugar" is a derogatory term so-called "Macedonian nationalists" adopted from the Serbs.
Pro-Bulgarian sentiment is not common here. Like most Balkan people, Macedonians don't like to read. Their knowledge of history usually consists of what they were told in school. I personally had nothing good to say about Bulgaria until I began to read British/American sources and contemporary documents about our history + research my own family, which clearly considered itself to be Bulgarian until the first half of the previous century.
sashko5@reddit
Interesting... I consider myself a Makedonophile and I know most bulgarians are like me. My family name even ends with "ski" but I have no relatives in MK.
moisthotdogg@reddit
What the hell is a Makedonophile and a Bulgarophile? Like being romantically attracted only to Macedonians and Bulgarians or something?
sashko5@reddit
It means you have positive feelings towards another country/nation. Most of the time it has nothing to do with the political situation in that country.
moisthotdogg@reddit
My definition was better ngl😛
OkoMushroom@reddit
Make friends where you need them, I’m not your enemy. I don’t care how homophobic or orthodox you are, I’m more sympathetic than the others about our geopolitical relations with the neighbors.
Teodosij@reddit
I was just joking. 🙃
Loife1@reddit
Being gay is not exactly a socialist/capitalist issue, especially considering socialist movements were generally more accepting of it. I mean the USSR was one of the first countries to decriminalise homosexuality in 1919
No-Championship-4632@reddit
It was considered a mental illness and they were sent to mental clinics. So it was legal yes, but that's half of the story.
Funny_Address_412@reddit
Compare 1950s USSR to 1950s america and the USSR would look like a liberal paradise
No-Championship-4632@reddit
1950s? Like say 1952? Stalin was still alive. USSR was the worst place to be on the planet while he was in power. USSR satellites right after them because they copy-pasted everything from USSR. You won't believe how many of the naive communist idealists were killed in that period. For example, you know about the Reichstag fire and Georgi Dimitrov, right? There were 4 people charged for that - Dimitrov, two more Bulgarians and a Dutch. The three Bulgarians were acquitted and one of them moved to Moscow. He got sent to a labor camp and died in the early 50s on the order of Stalin. Dimitrov himself died while visiting Russia rather unexpectedly (people say he was poisoned but they never made an autopsy). There was a reason for that, he was negotiating with Tito about joining Yugoslavia.
Funny_Address_412@reddit
Worse than Nazi Germany? That’s an… interesting take. Guess the gulags are somehow worse than gas chambers now while having a death rate only slightly higher than the modern day US prison system and being smaller both in total scale and in per Capita prisoners.
Idealism is literally anti-Marxist, you might want to reread what “dialectical materialism” means before throwing that word around. I fully support Stalin on that, purging idealists wasn’t betrayal of Marxism, it was Marxism.
So let me get this straight, if Stalin supported Bulgaria joining Yugoslavia, you’d call him anti-Bulgarian, but when he didn’t want Bulgaria to lose sovereignty to Tito, he’s still the villain? You can’t have it both ways, pick a narrative.
No-Championship-4632@reddit
Nazi Germany before the end of WW2? Definitely worse. There were famines, like Golodomor for example. Persecutions were as bad as in Germany (as some point Stalin even went after the jews just like his mustached fellow). Gulags were as bad as nazi camps even without gas chambers - they were mostly in Siberia and conditions there were inhumane - people were sent there to die, it's not like a normal prison and the goal is not to rehabilitate people, the goal is to eliminate them. If they had the weird will to survive in those inhumane conditions, then inevitably some guard will make sure they die there. Navalny's fate in the Russian penal colony nowadays is just an echo from those times.
My attitude towards Dimitrov have nothing to do with the fact he was most likely killed by Stalin too.
BalkanTrekkie2@reddit
It was ilegal in most of Western countries. Part of the age not specific to region.
No-Championship-4632@reddit
Yeah....well, it's a hard choice ending up in a penalty colony like Belene or a communist-era mental hospital like Karlukovo. You will get beaten on a daily basis in both. Probably the mental hospital is still better, less forced work, but forced medication on the other hand....apart from that, it's more or less the same, you can't escape from both.
OkoMushroom@reddit
From what I know it was like that for Yugoslav era Homosexuals, for the ones who were caught anyway. The ones that weren’t, forced themselves into marriages with a woman while the world moved on and they got screwed in the transition with a basket of unresolved issues they don’t even know how to deal with.
No-Championship-4632@reddit
Yes, same thing happened here too.
Loife1@reddit
I'm not saying it was all sunshine and rainbows, I'm saying that it's less about socialism and capitalism and more about the general culture and history of the area. Like for example Britain was far behind in homosexual acceptance, and France was ahead.
However, obviously a revolutionary movement that at least originally was about equality and emancipation is going to be more liberal with it, which is the only real reason it was decriminalised in the USSR in the first place.
In Europe in general, a lot of the early homosexual rights movements were socialist, and socialists tended to support decriminalization.
No-Championship-4632@reddit
Fair enough, yet at the same time I think exactly that attitude of the Soviet bloc is to a large extent responsible for the homophobia in Russia and Eastern Europe nowadays. Cause there were lots of things that were illegal back then and are perfectly legal now (such as opening a small business or entering into a border area without a permit). There was a certain stigma about mental disorders however, the whole idea was to keep them out of society and while criminals were somewhat redeemed after serving their jail time, those patients were mostly locked in the asylums for life. The mental hospitals themselves were normally built in some sparsely populated rural area, away from towns and villages, usually in a forest or something.
AdSuccessful2506@reddit
The cultural factor was much more important about how it was socially considered homosexuality, transgender people, etc., than the political factor.
OkoMushroom@reddit
Bro I think you mean well but just don’t insult me with how accepting it was. I grew up here and remember my friends, relatives and parents reactions whenever the topic of homosexuality came up, those people would have no issues approving electro shock therapy if they could. They just never realized who was listening when they made their speeches.
Loife1@reddit
I never said it was. I said it was an issue of culture and not purely socialism/capitalism.
OkoMushroom@reddit
Being a homosexual has nothing to do with socialism/capitalism I agree, but life is better and freer in capitalism, it allows existing people to create the culture they need to thrive. Socialism only favors one set of people, for others it’s a death sentence. Were OG Yugoslavs more “liberal” than today’s people? Yes they were, the 1974 constitution of Yugoslavia that legalized abortion proves it, an unheard of thing throughout all of Europe and the US back then, from speaking to my grandmother and mother about it they are supporters of it, there was a positive culture around the topic of abortion.
But it falls short for people like me who despite having been documented since antiquity, ruin that socialist image of some forced societal perfection. The same “liberal” Yugoslavs everyone prides over are the same ones that’ll make me disappear because thats what happens to inconveniences.
coditaly@reddit
Out of curiosity how is it now?
cromagnongod@reddit
You still won't see any public displays of same sex affection but it's definitely a little better than it used to be. Still way less accepted than in the west.
OkoMushroom@reddit
Expectedly balkan but these days everyone more or less minds their own business. It still is dangerous though no doubts about that.
InfiniteYam3016@reddit
Better, for romania besides the dumb fuck that happen with the debt repayment economy stagnated (I belive in all sociaist states), bith us and bulgarians didnt inplement reforms in the 80s so our 90s were pure shit probably even worst than the 80s (pre 1998 at least when the big reforms ended for the most part) . Since 1998 romania and bulgaria both kept growing for 25 years almost constantly. One must be retarded to say that life in bulgaria or romania was better in the socialist era since 2004 onwords
Tardosaur@reddit
Much better. We only sold everything to the west, we have no future, community is in complete shambles, and we have fascism no.2 approaching. But at least we have iPhones.
Vegetable_Radio3873@reddit
The same narative is pushed in Romania. Just curios, what did you sell to the West?
Dear-Potential-3477@reddit
NIS got sold to Gasprom for half a pack of strawberries, every single factory in the country got sold for a packet of peanuts to western companies who then ran them into the ground. Those companies should have been given to the people in stocks and bonds
deaddyfreddy@reddit
Don't forget China and Russia too.
Tardosaur@reddit
The whole country. Everything got privatized and it's now owned by foreigners. The same thing that happened in DDR and other ex-socialist countries.
But iPhone and 50 types of the same shit yogurt, we good
Vegetable_Radio3873@reddit
Interesting. Why I ask is cause we hear the same thing in Romania, but here many of the big/most valuable companies are still state owned.
No-Department2949@reddit
Care sunt alea? Prietene,se face import la greu de orice si noi ca tara nu aveam o dezvoltare proprie. Suntem tot sub papucul altora. S a schimbat doar coperta. Suntem o tara care pompeaza forta de munca pentru tari mai dezvoltate si cumparam la greu ce vand altii.
Vegetable_Radio3873@reddit
Nucleara, Romgaz, Hidroelectrica.
Cumpărăm din import pentru asta vrem să cumpărăm. Telemea v. Camembert. Anul ăsta suntem cel mai mare exportator de cereale. Nu știm ce avem, însă știm să ne plângem.
Mmiron0824@reddit
Lasa-l ca e suveranist.
Vegetable_Radio3873@reddit
Am bănuit. Am vrut doar să văd dacă propaganda rusă e la fel și la ei.
rablador@reddit
evident. aceeasi narativa.
limoncello35@reddit
Exact. Și părinții mei se plâng ca s-a vândut țara la Occident.
New_Breadfruit5664@reddit
My family is from the GDR and yes. Holy shit they had a so much better life so much security.
In general this question is answered by statistics. In every country the standard of living dropped considerably and some countries took 20 years to even reach the standard they had in the late 80s.
Besides Romania of course because Jesus fucking Christ Romania was an unbelievable hellhole under Ceausescu.
Problena@reddit
West? Dude, wake up, most of it is now in the hands of China, Russia and UAE.
Mmiron0824@reddit
And a state owned mine would made everything perfect? Stop being hypocrite... You live in an amazing country, you just had some unbelievable years (and yes, I'm counting sports too) but you care about some companies that "unfortunately" are not controlled by guys like Mamic.
Don't try to be different. We in the east, the ex-commies... We talk the same language.
Tardosaur@reddit
lol
RoyaleKingdom78@reddit
Yugoslavian/Titoist socialism is not the same with moscow-oriented one.
Vegetable_Radio3873@reddit
True. While the western one is even more illuminated.
ciorbadecurcan45@reddit
Comunistule
CoconutSlight3344@reddit
I can assure you who ever wrote this comment is not old enough to live in yugoslavia
This is propaganda pushed by serbs and yugonostalgics who hate Croatia
Tardosaur@reddit
I'm a 50 year old Croatian. Guess again
You weren't even born in Yugoslavia, right?
CoconutSlight3344@reddit
And you went to war for our freedom?
Few-Tax5585@reddit
Negiraš objektivne činjenice da nikad nismo imali manju razliku u razvijenosti od zapadnih zemalja. ( Trenutno smo na prosjeku 80% EU).
Da ne govorim o inflaciji, ogromnoj stopi nezaposlenosti unatoč trpanju radnika u firme( usporedi broj radnika u tvornici auta u jugi ili nekoj zapadnoj tvornici). A ta rasprodana industrija bi ionako većinom završila u Kini, Bangladešu itd. Problem u jugi je što je sva industrija bila niske dodane vrijednosti.
Zaboravlja se da se to seljenje industrije dogodile diljem zapadne europe. ( Pogledaj RHW, ili walloniju u Belgijji). Primjerice sva brodogradilista su se zatvorili u Europi( rade samo jahte ili u maloj količini vojne brodove) zato jer se većina proizvodnje preselila u Kinu, Koreju, Japan. Nijemci su napustili taj segment niske dodane vrijednosti, a dižu kajmak na propelerima ili motorima za te brodove.
Familiar-Self5359@reddit
Why do you always assume that if people liked Yugoslavia (before the wars, obviously) hate Croatia? I'm genuinely interested in this trend. Did you really have it that bad during Yugoslavia? Wasn't Croatia the most developed state in the Federation after Slovenia? And I'm not even going to mention historical facts like Tito liberating Dalmatia which never would have happened in the NDH?
No, seriously. I'm genuinely interested to know why you guys hate Yugoslavia so much. Oh, and btw? The Yugoslav state or system were not at fault for the wars. Quite the opposite. The nationalists were.
CoconutSlight3344@reddit
Because if you take people who say it was better are mostly people who were sons or kids of some officers in JNA who lived on expense of hard working people who lived in poverty. And in Croatia they must work for their bread but in yugoslavia they didnt do nothing and got everything
Everybody in yugoslavia got it bad. If you say anything wrong you go to prison. If you want to fight for better life you end up in prison or killed. There was no freedom of any sort. All arguments of people who support yugoslavia are part of propaganda and were not real.
Thats the part with those same people. Partizans did liberate dalmatia and istra but liberate is not the right word. Under new managment is more correct. They continued killing similar to ndh. For me and most normal people jna and ndh were same.
Yugoslavia didnt fall apart because nationalism it fell apart because it was always a big lie that was a bubble waiting to pop. In homeland war in Croatia we fought against the yugoslavia and their flag. Imagine you went to war to set your country free and under yugoslavia flag they did genocide of Croats and killed to many inocent people and than some kid online takes that flag and says there is nothing wrong with posting it on events.
Best example of haters of Croatia is party that is in charge of our capital Zagreb. They say they wont participe in walk for Fall of Vukovar where yugoslavia killed and did genocide over Croats because they think war should stay in past (Vukovar happend in 1991) but they go every year to Trnjanski kresovi were they celebrate entering of partizans in Zagreb in 1945 and says that it should always be rememberd what happend in WW2. On this example you can see that they prefere yugoslavia and hate Croatian history and blame us for fall of yugoslavia.
Sea_Bag3184@reddit
You're incredibly stupid
No-Department2949@reddit
Same thing in Romania. Just a farm of workers for bigger countryes and good to buy french,italian etc etc products.
Kioz@reddit
The Serbian "Suveranist"
Sea-Temporary-6995@reddit
We need mixed public-private economies like China.
Mmiron0824@reddit
Are you serious?
Sea-Temporary-6995@reddit
Yup, but this is my personal view which is not going to be realized, especially not on the Balkans, so don't worry!
From my POV though, public companies are a must in certain branches due to natural monopoly, and in other branches the state must intervene to boost innovation and private enterpreneurship.
My current company was bought by a Chinese company which doesn't sound like a big deal until you read that the Chinese company was started in a state-owned university with state money. So the state invested in a potential business that turned out to be profitable. This is the case for many Chinese companies.
We actually can see similar methods in the West when governments save big companies (like in the last 2 crises governments funded banks, car manufacturers, etc.) or outright support the company with state money (like with Elon Musk's companies).
Mmiron0824@reddit
So... like EU funds?????
Rough_Typical@reddit
Your industry really took a dip after Yugoslavia. You can still find all kinds of things that were made in Yugoslavia all over Greece today like electricity meters, bicycles, cars etc., but not a thing made in the countries that succeded it
BearPawsOG@reddit
It all depends on who you ask. 'Socialist era' is relatively large time period spanning from the end of WW2 until early 90s of the last century. When you ask like this different people will think of different specific year to compare. Also, people will differ in what is the most important in life. For some it will be money and personal wealth, for others security, peace of mind, family values...
I can tell you what remember. I am old but I was there only for the last decade of the communist era and I was just a kid then, early elementary school. Before the wars have started life was very peaceful and quite good for me and my family. My mom and dad where working very simple jobs, they just moved from their village to a bigger city, had two children, but were able to build our family house in their early 20s, which is a science fiction now, not only in Balkans but for most of the world. We had everything we needed to be honest, but as I said, life was different if you take a look at a different time period. In Yugoslavia we had it good in the 80s I guess.
deaddyfreddy@reddit
Every time I read something like this, I play devil's advocate and think, "Maybe these people are right. Maybe there was definitely Bratstvo i Jedinstvo." Then I remember films like "Balkanski Špijun", "Profesionalac" etc, and usually that's enough to snap me out of the delusion.
alex_zk@reddit
I spent my entire childhood in the green part and for a child it was great, but I almost sent my father to prison by accident because I apparently I said something I shouldn’t have to the wrong people. So, a mixed bag…
Don’t ask what, who or why, because my parents never told me.
FloppyDiskDrives@reddit
Something something … ‘spremni’?
deaddyfreddy@reddit
Oh, the famous Croatian IKEA ad: "Ready for home!"
-Against-All-Gods-@reddit
Ćevapi su spremni?
OnlyBrez@reddit
Enlighten me please?
dg-rw@reddit
lol
Personal-Adagio-8629@reddit
Every political system has its flaws. Socialism had a lot of them, but this type of post-socialist democraties,,which are often not liberal or democratic at all, has many flaws too.
Im from Croatia and I am watching my country being robbed for years already by our home grown lol politicians, in Yugoslavia it was possible for my grandparents that had no food to eat and lived in villages to move into cities and get apartments basically for free if they just kept their workplace and kept being supporters of Tito's Party. The problem was of course in lack of freedoms of each country which culminated the worst way possible, with the war.
While I personally cannot imagine how it was to live in Yugoslavia and find the current system better, there are serious flaws that need to be worked on, and in our case are worked on by European Union investigators.
Familiar-Self5359@reddit
Yugoslavia was the furthest from a closed society. It's not true that it was closed for tourists. A major part of the Yugoslav economy actually depended on tourism.
In fact, so much so, that CIA has an actual analysis of how much Tito and the state were investing in tourism and the effects:
https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP85T00875R001700010072-0.pdf
Personal-Adagio-8629@reddit
This is cool. Hey,im not the arsehole who is going to argue a fact if its true, but I have the other side. So, my mother lived in Dalmatia (today's tourism center of Croatia) and she remembers it was pretty isolated from the rest. and more like "camps for our dear workers" integrated. She basically said only domestic tourism was happening ,but until 1980s early she never witnessed an actual tourist. Mind you her place of living is fairly small.
Familiar-Self5359@reddit
It's not that I don't believe you and yes, the camps for the workers were all over the country form Lake Ohrid and Prespa to Slovenia haha. But I know for a fact that foreign tourists were always present in Ohrid, for example.
Also, we have to take into consideration that types of tourism differ through times. At the time, people from the Western World were visiting renown places which in term became tourist hotspots like Dubrovnik, Split, Rijeka, to name a few. From today's aspect, most are looking for secluded and isolated places to avoid crowds and to relax.
So, in that context, if your mom was from a small place, it's completely understandable that she didn't see any non-Yugoslavs.
Personal-Adagio-8629@reddit
Yeah, she lived in a little place under 100 people at the time, Pisak :)
Familiar-Self5359@reddit
OMG it looks amazing! Man, I love Dalmatia! Might take my family and visit some day!
Personal-Adagio-8629@reddit
I swear,not only, cause its Croatian, its the nicest, most peaceful place you can find in our coast. Hurry up because they are already trying to build 100+ apartments in the place :( all for the next year
Familiar-Self5359@reddit
Yeah, they're doing that all over the place. I have a villa on Lake Ohrid's coast at a place called Elen Kamen, a quiet, cozy, secluded place where I grew up. For the past 5 years or so, it started getting urbanized like crazy. It lost its spirit.
Personal-Adagio-8629@reddit
Worst part is when infrastructure in which they gave 0.00cents cannot handle all those new buildings and then the electricity collapse etc....happens a lot lately down there......total ruining of something so beautiful
Familiar-Self5359@reddit
Exactly!
ernestbonanza@reddit
socialism collapsed because it became a system that could not produce a good middle man. it was either only highly qualified professionals or low level. that led to their collapse.
since then the west is doing the same thing. middle man quality is dropping fast.
so I don't know if it says something about your question.
Affectionate-Row-710@reddit
In case of Albania 100% better. People bitch more now but that because they can. Bitching about life before 1990s got you locked up.
Puzzleheaded-Bug8136@reddit
The boomers will say it was better in Yugoslavia because for the biggest part they lived in its prime. However, if you ask gen x, they will say it is better now. They lived there in the 80s and 90s which is after Tito’s death and when Yugoslavia started to go downhill. There was a 500 billion dinar bill, there wasnt enough food for everyone and wars were happening.
TLDR: Depends on who you ask since they lived in different periods of Yugoslavia
absolutzer1@reddit
Yugoslavia was better. Albania, Bulgaria, Romania was worse.
Funny_Address_412@reddit
Bulgaria was better
absolutzer1@reddit
How was bulgaria better, please explain? Bulgarians couldn't even enter their own hotels in their own country. They were a puppet state of CCCP
Funny_Address_412@reddit
78% of the infrastructure used today was built in socialism, Bulgaria had a stable economy, thriving industry and domestic computer production today it's a consumer economy with almost zero production and half the population
Competitive_Let3812@reddit
Far more better
No_March5402@reddit
I'm from Poland and my older family members usually provide simple answer to that and in all cases its based on if they were in good financial situation before or after so yeah
Sankara_13@reddit
Worst.
vojdek@reddit
I can only speak for Bulgaria.
If you/your family had good party connections or affiliation - of course you were better off back then.
If you didn’t - well, it was shit.
WerdinDruid@reddit
Different issues but better overall.
igavr@reddit
This is a manipulative question. Various aspects would result in different answers, especially age wise. Most people who were young and healthy and did notblose anything (because they had nothing to lose) during that time would scream in was a wonderful time. While I wouldn't be so sure
pr0faka@reddit
My mother in law is very firm on the "It used to be better" stance.
All you need is a very short talk with her to understand that her main argument is that she used to be younger and healthier back then.
AmoebaCompetitive17@reddit
Funny how you called your mother in law as not very sharp if she can not come up with such a simple generalization
klebermann@reddit
There is no comparison.
IcyAnt9279@reddit
Just look at Munich and look at Berlin. Tells you everything you need to know.
ShoppingGrouchy4075@reddit
Please explain.
DemocratiaIncaEVie@reddit
light years better here in Romania
Neat_Grapefruit_1047@reddit (OP)
Romania wasn't "communist"
DemocratiaIncaEVie@reddit
The name of the country under Ceaușescu was "Socialist Republic of Romania" and before him "People's Republic of Romania"
SoulEkko@reddit
For anyone wondering, this was the comment that post OP deleted.
Unicorn-gutz@reddit
Socialism is not communist, the governments of Eastern Europe were communist ideologically but the economies were socialist
cibcib@reddit
Ah yes, the communist party of Romania that killed all political leadership, scholars, intellectuals and stole their land to "give to the people" were actually just some vanilla" socialists"... /s
BreezyBadger93@reddit
It's always this wannabe smartass take that none of the communist party run regimes were actually communist ideologically, but rather socialist, dictatorial or whatever.
Did they have a communist run government radically implementing and enforcing changes in line with their ideological goal? Yes, so they were communist.
Unicorn-gutz@reddit
You misunderstand what communism and socialism is, the governments of Eastern Europe were very much communist ideologically but they did not have communist societies
Unicorn-gutz@reddit
Socialism does not have to be vanilla or democratic it is simply the transitional stage between communism and capitalism, communism is a hypothetical stateless classless and moneyless utopian society while socialism is what has actually been attempted in practice
Ok_Fee5166@reddit
north korea is called the democratic people`s republic of korea
ciorbadecurcan45@reddit
Ceaușescu era communist , intelgentule
swurahara@reddit
What do you mean?
dude123nice@reddit
So you basically don't know any history. Great.
RegionSignificant977@reddit
Actually Romania was more communist than Yugoslavia. In communism all the means of production of goods and selling of goods and services should be public. It was like that in Romania and not in Yugoslavia.
Rich_Poetry4900@reddit
Not the Brazilian tankie from half a world away telling people that "umm it akchually wasn't real communism 🤓☝".
If you want people to warm up to your favourite ideology, then start by not discarding other people's experiences and being a caricature of a commie.
CyberWarLike1984@reddit
What are you smoking
abhora_ratio@reddit
Would you be so kind to enlighten us about what it was if not "communist"? Perhaps you know better why we had the entire communist structure, symbols and organization.
While you are at it, please enlighten us with your vast knowledge about the people who were tortured and died to build this amazing not-communist Romania where everybody was equal but some were more equal than others.
Stop reading Russian disinformation and use your brain.
Deruz0r@reddit
Ceaușescu's party was PCR = Partidul Comunist Român xD
peanut_the_scp@reddit
"It wasn't real communism"
Dear-Ad1582@reddit
Fine you smartass.. Dictatorship under the guidance of communist party and it's illustrious leader. His excelency General Secretary of Romanian Communist Party Nicolae Ceaușescu, Carpathian Genius and his famous Academy member Doctor Engineer Comrade Elena Ceaușescu, world renowned scientist.
arthurxheisenberg@reddit
Yikes, take that shit out of here. You literally came to the Balkan sub to ask if communism was better and you expected answers like "yippie, we loved it"
cibcib@reddit
Lol what?
Vegetable_Radio3873@reddit
Oh, no, please do tell us what comunism is.
skuteren@reddit
the classic "well it was not real communism" and why it was not? because comunism is not achievable in the real world, it is a utopian system that has no rights to work
Vegetable_Radio3873@reddit
Yeah, same shit repeating…sorry, meant to say “comunist ideals of equality”
skuteren@reddit
oh nonono, i completely agreed with your previous comment, just wanted to add something to it
sunkysunny@reddit
My parents say it was better back then, it was calmer, many things were free, they felt secure and safer. Then I remind them they were poor and basically starving and couldn't leave the country to look for a job or go travel and then agree and say it sucked.
Cute_Commission6735@reddit
Yugoslavia here. It was better in the Yugoslav era.
Bejliii@reddit
Better because you can leave the country without the border guards trying to shoot you.
But that's about it, having the opportunity to immigrate is the only major feature of the post communist society. The rest are the same in its core but in different shapes and system. The way how things function and how they are managed remain almost equal.
Fearless_Shelter_242@reddit
In Greece its worse
Healthy_Toe_1183@reddit
Your country never went through the communist trauma. That piece of shit churchill traded our liberty and future for yours...on a napkin...
Cool_Guy_Chazz@reddit
Not to be devil's advocate but it's not like Romania would be any different without the deal. The deal was made so no conflict aka WW3 would start between the powers. Romania would always have been in the Soviet Block do to being right at the border of the USSR. Greece at the other hand wasn't that important to the USSR, it would have been good to have a big port in the Mediterranean but not important.
ivanp359@reddit
Yeah, but it took like 3 decades of development + your country’s economy to crash and burn in a train wreck in order for countries like BG and RO to be actually comparable in living standards. Back in the 90s the gap was just astronomical. Not sure if you’re aware, but people back then would go work in Greece illegally and paid peanuts under the table, but still get paid 10s of times more compared to their own countries
Cool_Guy_Chazz@reddit
Ok? My comment was an answer about why Romania would always have been part of the Soviet Block even if the deals between the great powers didn't happen. I didn't talk about economies or anything like that.
So your comment seems a bit out of place in our conversation. 😅
Healthy_Toe_1183@reddit
We would have been in a much, much better place now if that deal would have not taken place. The communists ruined the country in almost all meaningful ways possible and the effects are still being seen today in many facets of our society. I will not go into great detail about what happened but just know that in the 50's most of our intelectual and political class was sent to prisons and murdered and in 1989 there was no real revolution here. It started as one with a mass protest in the streets but it quickly got hijacked by the 2nd and 3rd rows of the communist politburo. Those same communists or their offsprings and relatives have been ruling the country until today.
Greece had tremendous importance for the western world and the soviet union. Besides the fact that it is the cradle of democracy and a symbol of it. The russians have been dreaming about gaining access to the warm mediteraneen waters since ecatherine the great's imperial russia. This is why they proclaimed themselves the 3rd rome after the fall of constantinople and adopted the double headed byzantine eagle. It has been their dream for centuries to gain access to the bosporus
Yes, it would have been difficult for Romania not to fall in the hands of the communists, especially since we were coerced to fight for 3 out of 4 years against the soviets, alongside the nazi's. But the way that piece of shit churchill handled the entire deal through a secret meeting with stalin in moscow and written on a napkin was disgraceful and humiliating for us to say the least. And to see all this western modern day propaganda in movies and literature of churchill being painted in the image of a saviour, savy politician and genious military commander and hero is sickening to say the least.
EveningChemical8927@reddit
That is correct, but the point was talking if Greece is better or worse than 50 years ago it is totally irrelevant for the topic. Also I cand guarantee you that you have absolutely no idea how to work 8 hours per day/ 6 days per week in order to afford the bare minimum of oil and sugar ration. Butter/meat/cheese/soap and even toilet paper were luxuries in communism Romania
dephinera_bck@reddit
Just take a look at the GDP growth through the years. Numbers speak for themselves.
Funny_Address_412@reddit
GDP is a fake statistic, the richest can buy yachts while the average person takes out loans to survive and the GDP would be high just because money is moving around
Fit-Repair3659@reddit
Notice how OP replies to comments only to tell us, Balkans, what real communism is, and that our countries never experienced real communism?
Now take a look at OP's flair
Funny_Address_412@reddit
It's some westoid trot spreading propaganda
Deluxe_Scar_3393@reddit
Was a FKING prison, a dark and cold era... Nobody from the E Europe wants it back...
Funny_Address_412@reddit
Looking at statistics it's around half of the east
Soultaker5382@reddit
Well you see the eastern bloc was never really socialist, it actually was State capitalist. Frankly the Soviet Union was the worst thing to happen to socialism because it bastardized it. Socialism isn't inherently autocratic, and in fact Karl Marx envisioned socialism and then communism actually appearing in western Europe. He never really envisioned it as something for Russia. Now actually the West also had socialist governments for a while. After WW2 until the 1980s when neoliberalism appeared, Western Europe largely followee Keynesianism and this led to the creation of extensive welfare states in the West where public goods were publicly owned, even things like housing and stuff were done mostly by the government. This is what I like to call non-marxist socialism, essentially Socialism envisioned as an economic system that prioritizes the wellbeing of people rather than the concentration of power in autocratic systems, or the prioritization of profit as seen in neoliberalism. So I mean yeah Eastern Europe is better now but not because socialism fell or something, because you never really had it, but because autocracy fell, and that is always good.
Funny_Address_412@reddit
Trot position, it was socialism and it was good
Funny_Address_412@reddit
I doubt anyone here has lived in both systems enough to talk about it, but from what I've heard there wasn't a demographic collapse in socialism
Good_Composer_8409@reddit
I'm from Greece and obviously I grew up in a capitalistic western country Greece. But from what I've heard from people of the Eastern bloc I'm glad we never had to live under communism.
AdorableAttitude3668@reddit
Way better
Flat_Square_8047@reddit
There's a slight issue with your question, because it infers that now Balkans is in capitalism. Like they flicked a switch in the 90's and all the sudden all the communist mentality, political elite, economic models, all became capitalist overnight, and that is so wrong.
We are still fighting the ghosts on communism in all ex-commie countries. Whether its the old grandmas still voting for communist parties, political elite that is looking for ways to steal, rich entrepreneurs that continue cheating the system, or this idea that the government owes you a better paying job. Maybe by 2050 we will get there, but right now we are not in a pre-capitalist era, we in still in post-communism.
Relevant_Mobile6989@reddit
Better. Fuck communism.
tipoftheiceberg1234@reddit
Not every country had a bad experience with communism. Besides all Eastern European countries were different socialist governments, and while generally they held the same core principals, quality of life varied from country to country even within the eastern bloc.
Bulgaria had a different experience than the Soviet Union, East Germany was different than Albania and Romania and Albania probably had it worst. But not everyone else did
Relevant_Mobile6989@reddit
I think you don’t know much about communism. I’m not sure what sources people supporting that shit are usually reading, but none of them are true. The propaganda worked so well that what Mao said actually became true: tell a lie so many times that it becomes reality. That was communism - a system made for idiots (the more, the better) ready to believe that crocodiles fly.
All of the states were strictly controlled by the Soviet Union. That’s why you have Russian agents working in all institutions, undercover or not. Putin was one of them. Overall, the situation was shit. Probably East Germany and Kaliningrad Oblast had it a little better due to being closer to territories controlled by the US, but these were still severely undeveloped compared to the West. Do you have any idea how much money Germany had to pump within East Germany after reunification? Billions, and probably that was only for getting the road infrastructure done.
tipoftheiceberg1234@reddit
Okay you’re not with us this convo has taken you somewhere else
I said Albania and Romania had it the worst. But you can’t pull other people down just cuz your experience was bad. Now was communism good in the eastern bloc? I don’t think so, I think it was unnecessarily harsh.
That being said it wasn’t the boogeyman nor scapegoat many people want it to be.
Flat_Square_8047@reddit
You're right, Moldova was IN the soviet union. And still, fuck communism!
Neat_Grapefruit_1047@reddit (OP)
Ceacescu wasn't socialist btw
Vegetable_Radio3873@reddit
What was he? Maduro? Chavez? Castro? Kim?
Relevant_Mobile6989@reddit
Then what was he? A piece of shit like the other leaders of the Iron Curtain? A guy who never worked but acted as the leader of the workers? Read some real history and give up looking for good things about communism. They didn't do any good, only bad things. They killed lots of people for nothing. History should mention them all as murderers, not politicians. I hope they all rot in hell.
CoronaryStenosis@reddit
Republica Socialistă România…
ArcadianMess@reddit
Are you out of your fucking mind ?
Brainfreezdnb@reddit
1000 times better
Acceptable_Tale_9688@reddit
It’s just objectively better
MDedijer@reddit
My parents were born from poor parents from rural areas in Serbia and Bosnia, decent students, finished (free) law/econ at 23, both got employed two months later in a city they chose for themselves, got my sister and received a free apartment by the time they were 28, bought a new car at 30,… no connections whatsoever, no help from their friends or family, not even members of the party. All of their college friends did pretty much the same. What is there to discuss? Not a single one of my friends parents paid for the apartments they own and they all own apts. Not a single one of them was a member of the party. It’s a pattern.
Most of my friends are fairly successful with college degrees and at almost 40 none of us have paid off our apartments if we even bought one to begin with. Again, a pattern.
tipoftheiceberg1234@reddit
Yugoslav perspective? Mixed, with many sympathetic to the communist regime.
Elsewhere in former eastern bloc? Maybe some old people are sympathetic to the regime, but economically people are better off now as a whole. They doubled down too hard on communism in the eastern bloc and should’ve allowed socialism with a human face. Then people wouldn’t have been as bitter.
But in general I think one thing people wouldn’t vehemently disagree upon that was better in communism was the lack of individualism. You didn’t go out on the street talking about everything and commercializing your identity. It just wasn’t done and if you ask me we’ve gone too far with that nowadays.
There was order and uniformity, which can be catastrophic if too heavily applied, but a light touch is okay.
Metanasths@reddit
Born in 1981.
Things are slightly better in Greece nowdays.
Problem is its slightly instead of much better as in most other western countries.
The former communist countries are vastly better obviously.
Poglavnik_Majmuna01@reddit
It is much better now in 99% of cases.
The only reason why someone would argue that it was better back then was because our industry was “stronger”. Whilst it may be true on paper, in reality almost all of the industry that failed was because they were ridden with over-employment, poor productivity and virtually no ability to compete globally.
Unable-Stay-6478@reddit
I have a feeling you are not working in a Croatian company.
MDedijer@reddit
And they are likely visiting their parents in the apartment they got from the government/company for free back in the “unfair distribution days”.
Rough_Typical@reddit
Hey didn't you switch to the Euro some years back? How is it working out for you?
DimensionAgitated507@reddit
Well in Germany we have coffee and better cars... We don't have to wait to buy one. Worse? People ain't as close. Trouble binds people.
IcyAnt9279@reddit
Back when you had to sneak VHS tapes and hope your neighbors didn't snitch on you? Back when folks would give you everything just to own a pair of blue jeans? Back when folks were rolling around in little death trap cars and 6 people lived in a 1 bedroom flat? Nostalgia is a hell of a drug, and I agree that families were tighter (sometimes out of necessity), but it is certainly better now.
Thermopylae444@reddit
Better. Freedom is always better.
Competitive_Draft_53@reddit
The answer btw is very simple - Fertility Rate. https://youtu.be/-ydu-hPhGlI?si=iZ9UfZU38fy-dS-8
Crni_SKadu@reddit
Depending on for who and in what sense and also in which country. Generally though, socialism was better for the average person, less economic instability and overall better social services. You couldn't really get rich even if you were in the ruling party (compared to now) or even moderately well-off if you weren't. There were frequent shortages of non essential consumer goods and lack of luxury goods.
Now you do have more political freedoms, though with added caveat that that political freedom enables corruption and state vs people division of interests. You can buy pretty much anything you want relatively cheaply aside from housing and healthcare (so essentially a completely reversed situation). Generally especially manual workers are worse off, while if you get into like into top 30-20% income group you can live pretty comfortably.
The wealth disparities are pretty high now, while back then even the most well-off didn't really enjoy particularly luxurious lives, meanwhile no one was homeless.
I'd say it was generally better back then.
Mmiron0824@reddit
In Romania the ruling party made you rich automatically because "rich" is a subjective term. Rich = access to foreigners, prostitutes, food without ratio, priority, foreign products, etc. Money meant shit.
And I think I can include Yugoslavia too in my analogy: While in communist (socialist) times we were closer to each other, we were very far off from the western standard that, let's face it, we see in the american/canadian/french movies in the 80's. We all knew the possibilities, my parents for sure did knew that we were stuck in mud. Now... in 2025... I think I'm not wrong of saying that living in Ploiesti, Romania, could not be that far from living in... Lyon... Atlanta... Salamanca... Porto... You name it.
Does it look bad...? In an artistic way? Maybe, but the fridge is full, the car has AC, I'm in Bucharest in 1h by highway, can make an MRI next day (debatable), feel safe, can have a perfect love life, raise kids with unlimited access to information, etc.
My take is that it's much better now, but Yugo and Romania are kind of 2 different stories. Remember, our people were swimming to get to you!
Crni_SKadu@reddit
I mean, while i don't intend to deny your subjective experience or your perception of Romania and the way its changed, i am speaking in generalities and my claims are backed up by peer reviewed research data.
I can also tell you about how my grandparents got a free home, moved from the countryside to town, became literate and got jobs they've worked for their whole lives without needing to worry about anything economically. My parents came from poor peasant families and became engineers. When socialism fell they both lost their jobs, my father became a drunk and they divorced. My mother brought me up all while struggling financially having to work sometimes hours away from our home. Without the help of our neighbours we'd struggle a lot. Now i don't claim this was everyone, nor do i extrapolate based on that that it was better back then for everyone, although i am clearly biased.
I also don't particularly care to compare historically higher developed nations like Germany and Austria to Turkish backwaters like Serbia and Romania. Why don't you compare how you lived with the worst of capitalism like most of Africa and South East Asia?
BigBaibars@reddit
This research is widely circulating but it's well known how bad the methodology was.
They compared socialist to capitalist countries after separating them based on development. Iirc there were over 30 "developed" capitalist countries and less than 5 socialist ones, but could it be, just possibly, due to the fact that capitalism leads to development?
If you remove the imaginary categories, and replicate the study accordingly, capitalism would win easily.
Crni_SKadu@reddit
Could it be also that capitalism had more time to develop? Since mid-late 18th century? Meanwhile socialist countries started off comparatively less developed and industrialised faster than capitalist countries. Both socialism and capitalism historically led to development, for different reasons and under different conditions. I don't think this argument is as good as you think it is.
BigBaibars@reddit
"Capitalism" is not one big block of land. Britain started transitioning in the 18th century, Italy and Spain in the 20th century, and it took South Korea centuries to figure it out and start in the 1960s.
I italicized the word "transition" because capitalism is not formed the same way socialism is. It's a matter of trade-offs here; it takes long for feodalism to transform into capitalism, but did capitalist countries suffer from Holodomor and Great Famine while restructuring their economies? All of Eastern Europe suffered immensely because of the forced collectivization.
Does the same logic apply to East vs West Germany, and South vs North Korea? Because we've had only these two experiments in history and they both falsify your claim.
What you said does not refute my criticism for the article, even if assumed to be completely true. The article (and your main claim fwiw) says that socialist countries had better life quality, not "led to faster improvement in life quality".
So yeah, that research is practically worthless.
Crni_SKadu@reddit
But it's not like these countries you mention are isolated islands. The Marshal Plan played a huge role in speeding up reconstruction and development only in order to compete with the socialist bloc. The bloc was largely isolated from the same global market economy that enabled the enrichment of top capitalist countries at the expense of everyone else that remains poor to this day.
It takes long time initially for capitalism to develop out of feudalism but once it's done, capital bludgeons every obstacle of private interest everywhere usually by force. Socialism is also not an immediate transformation, collectivisation of agriculture and industrial development are bare minimum prerequisites and every historically socialist countries was a feudal/semi feudal country aside from east Germany i guess.
Regarding famines. It's a matter of time period. Industrialisation in ussr happened over 10 years, while it took uk and usa roughly 100 years to achieve the same agricultural/industrial ratio. It's not like these periods weren't known for rapid famines of great many people over long time periods due to stuff like enclosure acts, but they happened "organically" unlike in ussr and where this was forced and led to famines. Now of course i don't assume you are going to attribute the great Bengal famine, late Victorian Holocaust or Irish potato famine to capitalism? Every lesser developed country in the world suffered greatly due to capitalism. If we are going to apply this criteria, which is outside of what was initially discussed, then best do it consistently.
Responded largely to this in 1, and no these countries weren't similarly developed. East Germany suffered far worse during the ww2 with allied bombing and bitter fighting between nazi germany and ussr. North korea was practically bombed into stone age by USA.
Sure, socialist countries had both better physical life quality and faster improvement in life quality baring famines which were disastrous. USSR outpaced any country in the rate of development from 20s till 50s, this is well known stuff.
BigBaibars@reddit
This is an extremely simplistic way of thinking. I honestly will just ignore this response and focus on what matters.
A. The Marshall Plan was implemented after WWII. So now you are contradicting yourself; did capitalism have centuries to develop, or did it improve rapidly through the Marshal Plan?
B. You are implying that the Soviet Union did not support its allies in the same proportion, which is false. This fact alone refutes your idea.
C. Spain and Finland weren't part of the Marshall Plan; and all countries besides France, Britain, West Germany and Italy received an insignificant amount of funds. For example, France received $2.7 billion, while Portugal received $51 million, Sweden $107 million. These are negligible numbers, and again, this fact alone refutes your idea.
The Soviet Union and its allies ruled over all of Central Asia, most of Eastern Asia, and all of Eastern Europe. All of these regions are resource rich and densely populated, so again, weak argument.
Stop here, it's not "done", it's a gradual but exponential process.
Obviously I won't because it's simply a false claim. The Bengali Famine happened because the British Empire used the national resources and used them for its military, effectively stealing them from the public. Under capitalism, private property should be protected, not stolen, so this has nothing to do with capitalism.
The Irish Famine was caused by British tariffs on most agricultural output except for potato, which made Ireland overreliant on potato and as a result, too susceptible to famines. Add to this the British persecution of Irish people and you have the perfect recipe for a famine. Again, completely due to state intervention. It's moronic to claim that this is caused by capitalism.
But regardless, you seem to be dodging the point. You claimed that the communist model is better because it industrializes faster, and I told you it's a tradeoff because this industrialization literally necessitates mass famines (we're talking about history's greatest).
Forced collectivization is necessary but not sufficient, I get it, but this doesn't prove my point, since it admits that the implementation of communism necessitates famines.
The famines you brought up were due to irrelevant factors, not economic system. Korea industrialized without any famine, and so did Japan, Poland, America, and literally most capitalist countries on Earth. On the other hand, you had 2 major communist countries and both of them lived through famines during the transition. Must be a coincidence, right? /s
This is straight up false. So false that you can figure it out with 1 Google search. Here is a research. But it's not even a contested idea that West Germany got bombed to the bones, worse than East Germany.
Oh that's unfortunate. South Korea still outgrew China and Vietnam.
Nope, they had much worse life quality as can literally be proven using the study you first mentioned. It's like you forgot everything I wrote and went back to the beginning. I will just end this discussion here because you are not even putting effort to learn what you don't know.
Mmiron0824@reddit
"bettwr life quality" is also a "present" concept, it can't simply be forever because we belong to an international context.
And how would communism/socialism in Eastern Europe work with... Internet?
Mmiron0824@reddit
To answer your last question: Because of course in life you aim for better, and Germany was better, not USSR or war-driven states. And we were better before WW2. I have studies too to show you that Ceausescu went full on agriculture and my fellow citizens are illiterates after living their best years in communism. And while I don't mention it, I always try to remind my friends of how lucky we are being here. But living ok in Romanian communism? Well... it's like saying that life in prison is ok because you get food and medical treatment.
But I appreciate something a lot in your answer: that you distinguish your life from others. That you understand that your life was not the definition. It's truly sad what happened after 1990 to your family, I'm sorry for that, I hope now you have a happy family.
My family was shattered in 1941 because of the Russian invasion of Chernivtsi. My Grandfather was always "non-grata" in communism because he had "bad heritage", but anyway, I have to tell you that my babushka, from the other parent was a true blood communist. I have to say, I loved her a lot and she was in my duty for her latter years, but... she was the most close minded of them all, it was like she had black and white lenses all the time. I think it was not a coincidence for her that being so blinded by the communist times made her mind so limited. She lived in horrible conditions by choice, because that's what communist times thought her: live cheap, because that's the way of living. But her "sacrifice "was useless. Nobody benefited from her day-by-day "sacrifices" after 1989 (before that Ceausescu wanted to pay off the national debt, maybe the most stupid move of recent history). I met this type of people in Belgrade too. They simply couldn't move on. They were stuck in their youth days for an infinite loop. That is not life. To live everyday the same day is not a life.
I like more how things are now, but again, you mentioned something very smart: everybody is biased, and we have to respect everybody. But my take for general feeling is that... Now it's a LOT better.
Crni_SKadu@reddit
Sure, i don't particularly know much about Romania's socialism other than that Ceausescu was a moron to put it lightly. And Romania might be an exception to the rule, however most research done on this subject, uniformly agrees that socialist countries had better physical quality of life compared to similarly developed capitalist nations.
While in life you should for sure aim for better, it's not how you make economic/historical analysis that speaks in general terms.
Familiar-Self5359@reddit
This was a very interesting debate. If I can give my 2 cents on the matter, the starting point is that the systems that governed Yugoslavia and Romania at any point in the socialist past were completely different. So was access to international credits.
As a society, we had it much better then than them, meaning that we can't label everything "communism" and shove it in one bucket.
And I agree with you both to some extent. So, I'd say that what matters is the prism through which you value things.
For example, my parents and the vast majority of my friend's parents also struggled immensely after the breakup of Yugoslavia. Before that, they had stability, happy lives, etc. On the other hand, now you have access to almost everything.
Me, personally, as a father of two, I'd love to live and work in Yugoslavia and to have 7:00am - 15:00pm working hours so that I could spend the day with my kids, instead of working 9-10 hours per day in order not to starve and to provide them with what they need. That alienates us. And no. Today's not easy to find other jobs even as an intellectual worker with years of experience.
Mmiron0824@reddit
But what the majority of the comments don't mention is that you would like that lifestyle, but working for what?
It's obvious, and we have it documented it in an amazing way by Recorder on their YouTube channel on a documentary from 2019 (30 years), that a lot of the factories after 1990 showed clearly that they were producing... Nothing. It was just a form of keeping people going to work in infinite loop, because anyway nobody bought the products.
Are we really that naive to not understand that we live on offer/demand? Which frankly... Is correct?
Why would I work in a hospital where there are no patients? Why would I work in a hotel if it doesn't create any profit? Why would I work in a NGO that protects wolves in an area where wolves don't live?
Secret_Criticism_732@reddit
Communism is an absolute shit regime and it absolutely ruined our country. We are a CLEAR evidence it is bad. European socialism is a fine, But that’s still a capitalism.
I
Vegetable_Radio3873@reddit
Yeah, the starting point matters.
0ld_Snake@reddit
The man said nothing but the cold hard truth.
mr_TT_baki@reddit
That really deppends what your priorities are: 1) grandparents born 1935, lived as kids in big famine and poverty, when 60s and 70s happened they got a place to live, food, seasidr vacation and sense of belonging, today that leap in life quality is not happening
2) parents born in 60s, lived their teens in socialism, adult in capitalism, got the best and the worst of both worlds. What is better, will be 50-50 but cspitalism secured the future for their children in the end
3) me, a kid in the 90s born on socialism fall, where i live the consequences of transition from one system to other, i say capitalism is better but the problem is uncontrolled greed in capitalism. Socialism created much more greed in people than what west is used to seeing, something we are dealing with for 30 years and will probably untill my grandkids come of working age.
Krembiloid@reddit
In Bosnia it's a lot worse for most people, the country is run by literal criminals and black market profiteers, who got rich over night and kept stealing public money after the war.
We're basically a protectorate and probably some kind of neo-colonial social experiment.
MartoVBG2K5@reddit
Life is much better than Socialist era, especially since I'm from Bulgaria.
Tall_Expression_4794@reddit
I would say that most of older people look at the communist era with a lot of nostalgia. Not because they were young but because of the life quality. Now, there is a huge list of reasons why their lives were so comfortable back then and most of them are not really sustainable and are some of the reasons why Yugoslavia fell apart (I am talking about economics). Country started collapsing years before the wars actually started and those were mostly financial reasons
-ToniCipriani-@reddit
It’s not even comparable, even the worst days today are better than the best day in communism.
People wouldn’t be able to survive mentally half a week if we were to make an exercise.
Mi5tman@reddit
I've heard family in Croatia say that things were better during Yugoslavia... but some of the things they talk about sound pretty damn awful.
"Yeah, you couldn't tell jokes about Tito without being arrested, you couldn't really trust most people to not rat you out, and my family only managed to get a business going because my dad was part of the Communist Party... but things were better!"
Prod_Meteor@reddit
Undeniable worst.
S7AR4RGD@reddit
Worse. Many reasons why, but mostly unchecked capitalism.
RealViktorius@reddit
Idk man, I was born right after the war. I can only go by the stuff my grandparents told me. They kinda miss some stuff about yugo. Not the economy nor the politics. They agree that both was even worse back then. What they miss is yugoslav identity and the fact that ethnic division was not what it is now. And i kinda get that. My grandmother is a catholic croat, my grandfather an orthodox serb, and both where able to live in peace in bosnia in an muslim village.
Wonderful_CG@reddit
Who think is worse has some mental problems
Pidrshrek@reddit
Ahahahahahahahaha
-Against-All-Gods-@reddit
We definitely don't have as much optimism as our grandpas had in the 60's-70's.
alexlazar98@reddit
Based on stories from people that lives in ex-communist Romania and me comparing that to now, it’s much better now
Ok_Simple5287@reddit
are you serious? we literally came from a shithole in the comunism to some kind of normal life now
FarTrick2260@reddit
Different in every way, most of everything it is different time. It was more than 35 years ago that YU broke apart. Everyone of course happily remembers times when she or he was a kid, and is aware of differences between then and now, no matter YU or not YU. World changed, YU remained in history.
XRaisedBySirensX@reddit
A lot of this is gunna be dependent on income/assets then vs now. Some people were okay then and are poor now. Some people were poor then and okay now. Which group is bigger? I'm not sure.
8r3a71@reddit
Now is much much better for sure.
Illustrious_Bed2937@reddit
We have more, but live worse.
EmaRap1923@reddit
For Romania at least, the people who say it was better before (before 1989), in 99% of the cases that nostalgia is based on the fact that they were young then and now 70-80 years old, in no shape or form the quality of life could even be compared with the one from today.
LurkingWeirdo88@reddit
It is easy to figure it out by looking to which direction people were fleeing and who was building walls to keep them in.
mambacaramba@reddit
Sorry to ask, are you dumb or something?
Bubbly-Release-2270@reddit
Can’t be a serious question …
OrangeTheFruit4200@reddit
Different flavor of shit.
TheGodGiftOG@reddit
Worse
Acceptable-Stock-686@reddit
Worst because now jobs are rare
RustCohle_23@reddit
How is this even a question?
My father was waiting in lines to buy me milk and my wife just bought our 2 year old daugher her 12th pair of 100€ shoes just because "bare shoes are good for her legs and it is nice to have more than 1 pair".
Winter-Bed-2697@reddit
Your wife has a problem with over-consumption. There are many ethical issues regarding fast-fashion and consumerism.
RustCohle_23@reddit
that's a whole another topic, it is just a simple example that the comfort we have compared to 30 years ago is uncomparable.
ivanp359@reddit
Kids outgrown their shoe sizes like 2-3 times a year. Given that barefoot shoes are a trend now, and if you have them in good condition you can resell them and get good chunk of money back
Jealous-Evening5662@reddit
Some naive questions: Seems like it was normal to buy a house during the communist era? People went to the govermental bank and took a loan? Did they build the houses themself or hired someone for doing so? How about flats, rent or buy, or maybe both systems? Could you buy a house in Soviet union?
Secret_Criticism_732@reddit
Who the fuck thinks socialism was better? WHAT?
bagaski@reddit
Things were also better in western capitalist countries back then. Previous generations had more stability could afford having children with one parent working having a house etc.
Kradembakarsvakidan@reddit
Green was happiest
Historical-Habit-729@reddit
As a romanian that remember how it was before the fall of comunism, i would say it’s infinetly better now. But if you ask my grandfather he will tell the opposite and it’s somewhat true. People in rural parts of the country had more stability back then.
harubax@reddit
Better period.
No-Department2949@reddit
In Romania is apparently better for some reasons. But still a complete chaos without anything substantial. No real development. Just another EU puppet good for market consumption.
Kapepla@reddit
My In-laws lived in the GDR, I am married to a women from East Germany and studied there. The answer is a strong „yes“.
Swanky-Pants098@reddit
Uncomparably better
SnooOranges1642@reddit
Under communism, there was nothing to buy; now there’s everything, but no one can afford it.
Administrative_Bid51@reddit
I wasn't alive during the socialist era. But most shit is awful nowadays.
filtervw@reddit
If you think that anything socialist was better than the "awfully stuff" in our days, just imagine a world where your were missing basic necessities like decently heated home in winter, stable power grid, food diversity, confort transportation (AC or heated) and work conditions. Anything you consider bad today is order of magnitude better today, and I don't even take into consideration the freedom to complain about stuff.
tarolingo@reddit
I hope ppl here are aware that those questions on here are only to feed LLMs and fuel dispute. Basically every post is a question about a hot/semi-hot political and/or ethnic topic. Don't believe me, look it up yourself.
basedfinger@reddit
maybe we should all give nonsensical answers to fuck up the LLMs
No-Championship-4632@reddit
In 1-2 decades the humanity will have gotten dumb enough to outsource all the thinking to LLMs. So that might be a surprisingly good idea, haha.
limoncello35@reddit
Look up Geoff Woods. We’re already there.
c1t4d3l@reddit
Wise man right here!
__Rosso__@reddit
Based on what I heard from my parents, it was better, relatively speaking of course, here in Bosnia
Simpex80@reddit
Here in Slovenia people like to complain how everything was better in the past but in reality things are so much better now. Sure, we have problems with healthcare, among other things, but back in the day nobody but the select few had much and we were somehow happy with it. I remember my mother stashing sunflower oil in the 80s because there were months when you couldn’t get any… So yeah, things are far from perfect but it’s much, much better now for most of us.
Papa_Jacques_RO@reddit
I was born in 1975, in Romania.
Socialism/Communism is a mental disease, an insanity that'll eat your soul from inside out. It is misery and foul smell, it is fear and coldness and hunger, it is wasted time.
I remember my mom waking me up at 4 AM to get milk. I think I was 10 y.o. or so. It was late fall maybe end of November but I can't remember exactly. I didn't understand why do I have to wake up so early. We had to go buy some milk. On the path there, my mom told me that we should behave like strangers when we sit in the queue. Otherwise the other people sitting in the queue might argue that we're cheating (???!!!). So she gave me the money needed for 2 bottles of milk. Each "person" could buy at most 2 bottles of milk (1 liter each). No more.
Maybe my mom thought or knew from experience that "a person" is only considered a full grown adult. So one adult and his child would be still considered as one person. (Do you understand now why it is an insanity?).
One hour or so latter, the milk truck arrived in the back of the store and they began selling milk bottles right from the truck platform. The people started to push each other, each trying to get first at the milk. I ended up in the middle of the mob, separated from my mom, pushed and pressed from all directions. Somehow I managed to get in the front. The seller, a woman had a table covered in some plastic wrapping. On that table it was some kind of pot full of change (small denominations). I was pretty frightened and instead of giving the money to the seller I threw them on that pot. It was a brief moment that will forever remain on my memory. The seller asked me how much money I threw in the pot and I told her 9 lei (the equivalent of 2 bottles of milk). She looked at me for couple of seconds and decided to hand me 2 bottles of milk when the mob started to vociferate. My mom didn't actually managed to buy any milk. It ended up before she could get any.
And that's only one of my stories from my communism years.
So, yeah. Speaking from my personal experience, take your communism/socialism and shove it in your ass.
And please don't argue with me about "that wasn't communism or socialism or anything" and "we can do it better now" because that's implying those rulling Communist party people were stupid and you are smart. And you're definitely not.
Bargothball@reddit
It’s worse for us, because back then we actually used to be a democracy, albeit flawed. Now we’re a dictatorship.
Neat_Grapefruit_1047@reddit (OP)
In my mind, Erdogan always governed Turkiye, when I was born, Erdogan already was the president!
basedfinger@reddit
you were born in 2014?
Traxe0@reddit
his party is in the power since 2002
abandonedtulpa@reddit
Didn't Erdoğan get elected for the first time in 2014?
basedfinger@reddit
Probably meant prime minister, he's been PM since 2002
Depressivenetwork@reddit
That's the same for our generation as well 🥲
Rough_Typical@reddit
You still have free elections no?
Kaamos_666@reddit
Yes but media is controlled. And the opposition media is under pressure. They are constantly fighting to take them down. Press freedom is in a bad position like it has never been except maybe military coup times.
Ceziboyn@reddit
On the surface; yes, in practical terms; no.
basedfinger@reddit
Kenan Evren ruined everything
TIRBU6ONA@reddit
Thats great, but Turkey was neither in the Eastern Bloc, nor in the Balkans in general
betacarotentoo@reddit
Life is better now because I can spend my summer holiday in Greece, I have a car, and medical care is better. There are no food shortages, and the TV programs matter no more (we have internet and lots of TV posts). I can speak relatively freely, and so on.
On the other hand life is worse now because I'm in my sixties, while in "socialist" times I was a child, a teen, and a young man.
SnooSuggestions4926@reddit
eastern vs western europe
_Sebil@reddit
As my parents said a consumerist society is not healthy for the people (nor phisically nor mentally) so they prefered what was the early 90-s in Hungary where the dictatoric nature of the socialist regime wasnt so apparent
Long-Comparison-7708@reddit
I wast born just after communism fell so I didn't experience it, I only know stories. That being said let me be perfectly clear: it's waaaay better due to the simple fact that I'm free. I live in a democracy and can choose what to do with my life. And that's enough.
LyuboUwU@reddit
Are you retarded?
Romania2019@reddit
The socialist era was hell in Romania... and I thank the countries of the European Union that helped us get out of misery... and obviously billions of thanks to NATO... now it's time to help Moldova
foxtrot813s@reddit
I really depends on who you ask abd what life, job, social status, ambitions etc. they had. I've met a lot of people who had it very easy back in the day. They had easy jobs, connections with the socialist party that helped them get easy access to good and services for which normal people had to wait weeks, months and even years and once things have changed, they've lost everything and obviously they want things the way they were.
On other hand, people who had ideas, dreamed big, were capable then most people around them and were nobody's without zero connection to the socialist party hated the guts of the past and wouldn't want to go through that ever again.
My mother once told me that when her neighbourhood was finally getting telephones, her parents were the only family that didn't get one, because back then you needed to have a good reason or good connections to have one and while some of the neighbours were either in the military, local militia as they call it, gad a family member from the party, had a family member from the USSR, had someone in a high position and countless other examples, they could have a telephone. But since my grandparents were nobody's, they couldn't have a telephone. To add salt to the injury, my grandfather helped during the digging for the telephone cables.
Imo, there's no such thing as a bad and good system, but rather than it all depends on which side you're on. A poor person wouldn't be happy in any system and a rich and powerful one will enjoy all of them and each and every system has both.
Cututul@reddit
Without any room for interpretation life is better now than before 1990.
In some countries, which joined the EU, by a huge margin. In others by less. But 1000% it is better now.
Of course, there are winners and losers among the people, but for the vast vast majority life is better under the liberal democracies.
realtennisguy@reddit
Life now is 100 times better. You don't have to be old to realize this.
Eastern_Click_4361@reddit
I really don't know what type of question this is. How can you compare communism to what the EU has offered?
InkOnTube@reddit
I am a Yugoslav who loves idea of Yugoslavia and hates Socialism.
In essence, life was better but not because of Socialism but it was a different era. Yugoslavia was socialist but had some Western influences and certain freedom which non green socialist countries could only dream about.
Multipolar world gave us an opportunity where we had two ideologies competing for the hearts of people and had better opportunities to flourish. Today, we have democracy but it is heavily tainted by corruption as people in power manipulate people to vote for them and life seems like a facade of a beautiful life but we are constantly under stress, online content is rewiring our brain where we have very low focus, inability to find time for friends and giant corporations are keeping us in our echo chambers.
Regarding Socialism, I think it is not able to make money, does not innovate enough (yes USSR had initial advantage in the space program but it is only due to this competition with USA who pushed capitalist ideology, in fact USSR was lacking severely in many different areas). Socialism is also extremely fragile to corruption - it keeps army like structure where people in lower ranks simply are not allowed to say or challenge certain things. This keeps people's minds closed and society regress. It was so bad that when green area got democracy, didn't realised what that mean and actually went to war.
As a kid, I grew up in Yugoslavia, present day Serbia. Serbia was sort of mediocre federal unit in Yugoslavia, but I had lovely childhood, I had everything my eyes desired. All I had to do is to be a good Yugoslav: to be an excellent student and be polite. My father was electrician and could afford those things. My mother was a typical housewife. Truth to be told, certain things were lacking in Yugoslavia. There waren't that many these small items to bait your eyes like various snacks. We had Smoki as the only flips while in western countries you would have so many different brands and types. But I was happy what I had.
Today kids have so many option but a lot of families simply can not afford even essential things. I am sad that some kids have worse experience than I do.
Today, we have neoliberalism and it is exploited badly at the expense of people. People are blinded by their freedom while being tired of life.
VladShanghai@reddit
Communist repression is the only reason why Yugoslavia managed to be created after WW2. Without it, the awareness of crimes against Serbs abs Jews would have been much higher and Yugoslavia itself would have been relegated to the trash bin of history where it eventually ended up after a bloody war. Without the recreation of Yugoslavia after WW2, we wouldn’t have faced all horrible events of 1990s.
InkOnTube@reddit
It is difficult to assume what would happen. Let assume that Yugoslavia v2 did not happen, how would borders look like? Because these borders that we have now are created within Yugoslavia as part of AVNOJ seating. Would new borders be according to the ethnic majority? How these mini countries would fair? Would they still be independent or part of NATO or Warsaw Pact? Would these power stage proxy wars among these mini countries as they did all around the planet?
CharmingArmin@reddit
Im part of the diaspora, and every time I get the chance to speak with someone 40+ I always ask them how life is and if it was better before.
The answer is always the same, life was much better before the fall of Yugoslavia than now. Today, the entire political atmosphere seems designed to divide us rather than unite us.
The rich get richer and the poor stay the same.
This is a problem i belive every nation in Europe is facing now tbh.
Hudi1918@reddit
Please tell me you're fucking kidding
drminjak@reddit
worse
Kioz@reddit
I can undersrand why a Serbian would say that. Its kinda messed up that when the fracture happened, Slovenia and Croatia inherited the industry but Serbia inherited the debt of Yugoslavia.
On top of that I am aware, Yugoslavs were allowed to work in Austria esp and they were earning a lot of money compared to others
iSee_Audience@reddit
It's worse now. Back in the day you could have a wife and a house and children. Now those things are luxuries reserved for very few men. I have asked a lot of people who lived back then. They told me the same story. All of them. That it was better. One dude even told me that he could make 3 houses. One for him and his wife. One for his son. And one for his daughter. He even said that he is happy now and can die happy because all of his family members are safe now. So yeah, IT WAS WAY BETTER. TRUST ME.
Kioz@reddit
Better. Undeniably better.
BigBaibars@reddit
My father studied for 6 years in St. Petersperg in the late 80s, and from what I've understood, "life" was better due to cultural factors, but the economy was definitely worse.
kka2005@reddit
Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay better!
BigBaibars@reddit
Percentage of respondents who approve of change to capitalism: Poland: 85% East Germany: 83% Czech Rep.: 76% Hungary: 70% Slovakia: 71% Lithuania: 69% Bulgaria: 55% Ukraine: 47% Russia: 38% Source: Spring 2019 Global Attitudes Survey, Pew Research Center.
hudabuba@reddit
I'd say better, but there's more stress.
Jolly_Speed_8980@reddit
It's just as bad, but in a different way. We are historically obligated to not have nice things in here like at all.
Cefalopodul@reddit
Objectively better for everyone who was not an aparatcik.
CyberDumb@reddit
As the grandfather of my wife who was born in stalinist USSR (Georgia) told me
"Socialist life was a way of life, for some people it was better for some it was worse, usually the rich people didn't like it."
Some comments after reading some of the replies. There is not 100% capitalist and 100% socialist system. Socialism resides within capitalism and vice versa. I personally only judge the intentions of leadership.
Romania had cooperation with IMF from the 70s. Soooo this indicates a lot of problems with their leadership and their life.
Comparing today's life with 70s - 80s life in socialist states ,or even capitalist states, is totally unfair. I would argue that even though we are richer today we get more exploited because the production is infinitely more developed. Technology has made our life better not just capitalism.
Also capitalism gives good life to some but also exports its poverty in 3rd world largely. Something socialist states did not do and have the ultimate respect for that, but they had to distribute poverty within them.
Ambitious-Tea-9923@reddit
The common saying was “the state pretends to pay me and I pretend to work “ plus now there are choices for anything and everything and no fear of police persecution. Best of all no images of a loser leader hanging just about every where. Lastly, no more sandpaper like toilet paper.
1000Zasto1000Zato@reddit
Worst. No one has been talking about workers rights for the past 35 years. We’re living in serfdom again
Red_Z_Sword@reddit
I think Yes.
But most of the commentators did not live in the socialist era or were children. My personal opinion as a person from a country with a brutal dictatorship is that we are much better now.
Loife1@reddit
Albanian and Bokshevik "socialism" is very different to Yugoslav socialism. I don't think I've seen any Albanians saying it was better.
Red_Z_Sword@reddit
Yes that’s true
harvestt77@reddit
Those that think that Albania was better before 1990 are not redditors and I really doubt that they stay much online. Indeed, Yugoslav socialism was different, not only when compared to Albania, but to some other former socialist countries, as well!
Euphoric_Judge_8761@reddit
I’d say better , but most of our old people claim that it was better during communism, but they only say that because of the flaws they took advantage of , especially in rural areas
One_Bad_6636@reddit
Lithuanian here. I haven't lived it myself but what i heard from my mom makes it sound like a 3rd world country. She said, she didnt know what a banana is, most of the fruits and stuff we take for granted were unheard off. Mandarins were only available very rarely and people waited in massive lines to get them. Granted the 90s transition to capitalism was also quite rough since all the formerly soviet backed enterprises and facilities went bankrupt, there were criminal gangs, massive emmigration, unemployment and birthrate drop. We joined the eu in 2004 and since then our economy grew massively and we live leaps and bounds better than before
Justanotherbastard2@reddit
Life under communism was objectively worse but psychologically better.
By every indicator quality of life is much better now. Salaries are much higher compared to costs; good are now widely available so you don’t have to wait 10 years for a car or five years for a washing machine; credit is now available so you can buy a house or a car immediately as opposed to waiting 10 years; life expectancy now is higher; healthcare is better; crime is lower. You can criticise your boss or the prime minister without fear of repercussion. You can go abroad for holidays or to work. The list is endless.
HOWEVER perception is not reality. And perception very often is that life under communism was calmer, more safe, more peaceful, more sociable, more pleasant. Society just felt better.
There are a couple of reasons for this:
Media only reported nice things under communism – the wheat was overachieved; the president had another great meeting with a friendly country. In contrast today’s papers and social media are full of crime and bad news– economic woes, another murder, another accident, et cetera. Paradoxically while crime was much higher under communism fear of crime was much lower as it was never reported.
Inequality is much higher now and that creates depression. In the old days, maybe you had a rubbish house or a crappy car but so did the neighbour. Now the neighbour’s son is driving a mercedes and she has 3 grandchildren, while your own children are struggling.
Life milestones are being achieved much later these days, which also creates depression. Getting married, house, children- it’s much more of a struggle now. What’s the point of being richer when you’re spending it on IVF to have kids in your 40s. It's not necessarily a communist thing that life milestones were easier to achieve then, but that’s how it’s perceived.
Hope that makes sense
VladShanghai@reddit
Well said👍
Scary_Examination841@reddit
I don’t think anyone really misses the totalitarian socialist period. It was a time when people were oppressed for their religious beliefs and opinions. On top of that, the poverty caused by a failed economic model devastated Eastern Europe. If Eastern Europe hadn’t fallen under Soviet influence, it could’ve reached a certain level of development , maybe not as high as Western Europe, but still much better off.
milic_srb@reddit
idk everyone older I talked to says Yugoslavian era was much better than now. Even the quite religious old people who were against Yugoslavia ideologically still say things like "at least there was some order back then"
Scary_Examination841@reddit
I think that’s because of the civil war.
VladShanghai@reddit
I think it’s because many people have a feeling they live in unjust societies where crime can go unpunished if you have money and political connections
micek663@reddit
Depends on the country.
Yugoslavia was the best of the lot. Very "free" by comparison.
Rainbow_Mosquito_927@reddit
Only someone who has not lived during this time would say it was better.
Because of these "benefits":
living under a constant surveillance and oppression
where a joke can land you in prison (or concentration camp)
where a select people in the government live ultra luxurious life using national funds
where people disappear and no one knows why or is too afraid to ask even
where you're rewarded for being lazy equally to someone who is working his ass off
and many more horrifying "perks".
I can name a few positives
people were so poor and miserable, they helped each other.
Gypsies were forced to work and go to school, and were not causing trouble
poverty made people humble and they respected each other much more than today.
socialism does not work, has been proven many times in the past - as it almost certainly leads to authoritarism. We live in flawed democracies, where the mafia rules us, but at least we are allowed to dream
East-Raccoon135@reddit
China and Vietnam are still run by socialist parties and doing fine
eirc@reddit
This is a false comparison imho for many reasons.
* People bring in political ideology to answer this. If they believe in communism they'll say then, if they don't they'll say now.
* Better is pretty subjective, different people value different things.
* There's a million different extra reasons that affect human lives, including the simple fact that we're talking about a whole different era.
So, I don't think there's value in wondering if things were better then or now. The only thing that's useful is to make a decision on how we move forward from the current state of the world. Again this decision is not just communism vs capitalism, east vs west. It does include these questions ofc but also much more.
angelfishy@reddit
Just because it's better now than it was back then, doesn't mean that it shouldn't be a lot better than it is now.
Odd-Percentage-407@reddit
Slovak here. Morning much better.
e2g3@reddit
My Albanian relatives in Albania (us from Kosovo) said after the system has changed the conditions were better, because they had only if max 1 time per month meat on the table. And she didn‘t knew what strawberries were in Albania before. She almost fainted once she tried a strawberry in Germany when she escaped Albania in 1992.
ManVSReddit@reddit
Strawberries were everywhere, you could plant them in your garden. Not sure where your cousin lived but they were everywhere in southern Albania
dan7ebg@reddit
Tricky question. Depends on what you value, really. If you ask me - its better now. But if you ask my dad - it was better than. But we value different things you see.
I like that I can be informed about foreign and domestic politics and news. I like the variety and choices we have. I like that I can do and work whatever I want. I like competition and innovation. I like that my success (or lack there of) is in my hands alone.
My dad on the other hand - liked that things were more disciplined. No choice in the store, but what was there was supposedly good. That older generation in general liked that you had your whole life planned out by the government. You didn't need to think about anything. You could buy a home with the money you were making.
So bottom line is - depends on what you value. Personally, I like the freedom of choice. I like an open market. I despise what socialism did to our nation. IMO its a propaganda machine that worked TOO WELL. To the point where older generations don't want things to be better, they want it the way it used to be. They want 1 person to be at the helm and make all the decisions - the cult of personality as its called. They liked not having to think and being basically a potted plant.
prodigioustimekiller@reddit
In Greece even though we didn't have a socialist era, we had the memeworthy PASOK party which signified the days of actually existing socialism in Greece. You could get hired almost everywhere with just a primary school degree and just a few party connections. If you had a party membership then you could seriously become your work's manager or chief. They also had the bouzoukia culture where they would go clubbing as they say with sunglasses as they would leave the clubs literally the next day. People would ritualistically burn drachma banknotes to show off their affluence and no need for money. Former discos turned to bouzoukia and then to the famed Greek night life kolobara a direct translation of night clubs with a bit of stripping and escorting. Because when our beautiful Eastern European former communist states collapsed, angelic but now completely penniless women flocked our country. And as they used to say you could now even see an elderly peasant who could barely speak clear Greek being escorted by a breathtaking young Eastern European woman.
I personally had the "blessing" to work with some legendary remnants of that era. One drunkard farmer turned public sector employee in a job post of "security". He cannot guard even himself as he is constantly under the influence. He exists for the sole purpose of constantly getting favors from the more sensible coworkers and annoying people who actually have something to work. His contemporaries say that if there wasn't that historic political party, he would have probably died from hunger as we wasn't ever really capable of anything. So now he lives proudly getting paid for being completely blindly drunk on his work. And never being on post.
mssarac@reddit
Worse
Unable-Stay-6478@reddit
Definitely worse.
KarloReddit@reddit
Depends on who you ask. Those that benefited the most, surely miss it. But for the most part it was absolute oppressive shit and people fled in droves, if possible. I remember bringing instant coffee as presents when visiting my grandmother and it was like a BIG deal. Instant fucking coffee. Yeah, times were shit back then.
Extension-Garlic-822@reddit
I'd say a bit better
Tile7@reddit
ExYU - Way worse. By a looooot.
StrumpetsVileProgeny@reddit
Ppl will say how poor we were in socialism, but this is very biased and applies only to extremely rural parts of the ex-country. My grandfather who was raised an orphan found a sales job at 19. He worked for the same company for 20 years and was happy. My grandmother finished her, free, studies and got a manager job with which she was able to live much more than comfortably. When my aunt and mom grew up, they were both schooled, one was even sent to L.A. on a uni. They were not rich ppl, they were proper middle class, a cozy apartment, one car, no weekend houses or any craziness. But they had a nice saving account, decent wardrobe and other commodities and the apartment they had was mortgage free, paid by their own labor without any credit scores. They never lacked for anything. Was there poverty? Yes as always was, but huge social givings as well, easy employment, free schooling, free healthcare and many other benefits.
Then the war came, my grandad was drafted, got ptsd and committed suicide after. The newly formed Republic of Croatia seized my grandfathers pension and incomes and my grandma took them to court. This was in 1995. She won the case in 2015…..
I have two degrees, A-grade student graduated with honours same year. And I struggle finding work, I struggle paying rent that is 70% of my income, I struggle paying food that takes the rest of it, not to even mention getting my own place or having a nice savings account.
So was it better I dunno, I was there but too young to judge. But I know what would my parents say and what would my friends and acquaintance parents say. Maybe if our state wasn’t led by thieves and criminals for all this time, things would be different for my generation, but they are not.
Unable-Stay-6478@reddit
It's definitely worse now.
m0mchilo@reddit
I love talking to my grandparents who swear that life had never been better under Tito, but seconds later start talking about 50s food shortages, horrible living conditions in their village (no electricity, running water, infrastructure etc.), how they had to move to one of the larger cities in the 70s with no government support (they had to build their own house in the suburbs and didn't have paved road or sewage up until 10 years ago), how grandpa was badly mistreated while serving the army in Croatia and so on. But hey, at least they had their glorious leader who smoked in the white house and were repetedly told they were significant on the world stage by the national TV. Reading this kinda makes it obvious why they're voting for V*čić, they've been conditioned all their lives to blindly trust the government and government media to the point where they can't even think rationally.
liumbiwe@reddit
If you don’t want to travel outside of country or to be able to live in the city if you are not born there and have 2 week free vacation every year on the same place, then yes you would like it. You can’t speak against the “party”, in Bulgaria’s case - BCP - bulgarian communist party. Cmon guys, who wants to live under such regime. Basically prisoner of your own country. And so on and on… Many old people like it because they don’t know how other countries live, they never left Bulgaria or if they did it is once or twice and of course they don’t like it because its too expensive outside of Bulgaria. Some of them have not even seen our own sea more than 10-20 years or at all. Those people are victims of the regime, they lived their young years in it and thats why they like it, of course I like it more when I was younger, not because it was better but because I was younger.
TLDR: Now its better :)
HungarianAreRomanian@reddit
A lot better, not as good as it could be but I wasn't expelled and became a teen worker as my dad
Lannes51st@reddit
You have reddit & can question things.
That says it all no?
Romanian btw.
Allesal@reddit
It's basically the same and it depends from person to person but if I have to speak in general there were many poor people back then and even more poor people now. Both regimes have their problems and advantages. Just saying it was the worst back then or it's perfect right now is delusional.
TotallyCrazyGreek6@reddit
PASOK BEAUTIFUL YEARS
Jancsika50@reddit
It was much better…….. I was young!
Vegetable_Radio3873@reddit
Yeah, we didn’t reach communism. We were so close though - the golden age and golden men.
mrbrightside-987@reddit
The answer depends if you grandfathers or father left you some real estates properties or land from which you can get passive income..
LibertyChecked28@reddit
Worse, a successful country wouldn't still reside, exploit, and maintain Soc.Era utilities and industries of prior +70 years.
But trust me bro, we are the most modern Western European nation there is!
AcePowderKeg@reddit
My father who's born in 51 was asked this question by my then girlfriend.
He answered simply that 'It's differenty shit now but at least there are no landmines on the border"
Affectionate_Hope868@reddit
How is this even a question?
fickogames123@reddit
My grandma said its worse and grandpa said its better. Obviously it depends on individual
No-Championship-4632@reddit
Vastly better.
rebootvilgax@reddit
Better
Janosh_Poha@reddit
I like reading replies to questions like this, because it really shows how westernized Yugoslavia (in terms of standard of life) was compared to the Soviet bloc nations. I know a lot of Romanians, Bulgarians and Hungarians who would once a month try and go shopping for goods in Yugoslavia. I remember one friend told me that his family would go to Subotica and go shopping for western goods. When returning to Hungary they would try and hide the western products, because if they were stopped and searched by the Hungarian border guards, they would have the stuff taken from them.
In the world of international politics, Yugoslavia was also far stronger and seen as an important nation. Keep in mind that the Yugoslav passport was the most powerful passport in the world.
Loife1@reddit
Overall probably worse, considering that is what most people who actually lived through it will tell you. However the socialist era could have definitely gone without the all powerful party dictatorship, cult of personality and political prisons.
Mmiron0824@reddit
There is a huge difference in Romania even if you compare 2002 with 2025.
The videos from Cineclic say it all. Life was horrible because you were literally stuck in a Matrix.
EpicStan123@reddit
A lot better. We're free now.
You can make the argument that during that period there was some sort of stability even though everyone was poor, but I'd take the uncertainty of modern times because I'm free now.
ifff0@reddit
It’s much better now but only if you are willing to work.
anonumousJx@reddit
100% better, no doubt.
Data supports this overwhelmingly. Ask older people who disagree why it was better back in the day and they'll list anything but objective measurements of quality of life.
Sfdsdas@reddit
The only thing they say that makes sanse is that life was better relative to other countries in the world. But life everywhere was much worse than it is now. In Yugoslav countries difference is slightly smaller than in other european countries.
anonumousJx@reddit
In relation to other countries, sure. Serbia and Croatia were once really good places to live, post war it was horrible, not both are back on track, Croatia has mostly recovered, Serbia is in the process but doing pretty good and I have high hopes for the future if we can win this internal war against our mafia.
In absolute terms, it's not a comparison. It's a bit less insane than asking (Who wins Roman empire or insert x modern day military) it's just not a real conversation.
No-Passage-1804@reddit
Socialism is so bad :(
volim_luk@reddit
Much better; just a few stories my parents and grandparents told me;
These are just some of the stories, hope they were interesting, some were more relevant for early or late SFRJ
PlamenIB@reddit
It depends on who you ask. Some people had it all and even today they dream about that— no need for education in order to succeed, and the country gives you a free apartment in the city just for being part of the communist party. The same now are “pro-Russian” thinking Russia will bring back communism. The topic is really complex.
zet23@reddit
He is asking you/us :)
Old-Pace-5803@reddit
It's much better now than before
Suspicious-Echo-592@reddit
Better but it could be much better.
Nothing_Special_23@reddit
Ultimately, it depends.
You can't generalize that as it's a case to case situation. But in general, I'd say a lot better.
There's also state politics factor, and countrary to popular belief, the poorest countries are doing a lot better now than they were back than, while for the richest it's much more debatable.
In Albania for example, life is a million times better for mostly everyone, as they barely had television before the 90s. Similar situation in Romania for example. While for the richest, Slovenia for example, it's much more debatable, since they were rich back than too, had prosperous lives, as they do now, but may lack some advantages they had back then (e.g free housing).
F16betterthanF35@reddit
Not really.
Aenjeprekemaluci@reddit
Far better
OkoMushroom@reddit
Incomprehensibly better.
Competitive-Read1543@reddit
Totalitarian era you mean? Absolutely better
Technically speaking were still socialist, just of the bourgeois variety
Salt-Historian-4556@reddit
Much much much better
Better-Ad-6944@reddit
Loads better
Agreeable_Tie345@reddit
Infinitely better
Available-Ad-2791@reddit
Better 100%, I've heard si many stories from the elders, that is just kinda sad that they lived smth like that.
kerrybom@reddit
Better! But who am I to talk, Mr Gen Z