Russian Economy General News: #4

Russia Jumps 29 Places in Human Capital Ranking

http://russia-insider.com/en/business/russia-jumps-29-places-human-capital-ranking/ri6895

The World Economic Forum has just published its Human Capital Report 2015, and there’s good news for Russia, which has jumped from 55th place to 26th place on the back of its strong education system.

http://reports.weforum.org/human-capital-report-2015/rankings/

More detials here http://reports.weforum.org/_static/human-capital-report-2015/RUS.png

Record $6bn run on Russia’s biggest bank was planned provocation – chairman

Hope it works.
Russia offers to discuss BRICS prototype of SWIFT global system

​Islamic banking in Russia may ease effect of sanctions – head of Sberbank

I am two sided on this one. While Islamic banking, which is found in Iran has worked wonders as it is more honest banking, I hope that religious aspects of it are not found. In other words, I hope that it will be available at same rules for non-muslims who wish to bank under it. As well, hopefully the push for the Orthodox banking is also allowed too.

http://tass.ru/en/economy/772034

Some opinions claimed that 40% of Russian economy is "underground" economy and that increase the durability, sustainability of Russia, enable Russia to overcome Western sanction with mininal causualties.

http://www.newizv.ru/society/2015-05-27/220147-zhizn-v-teni.html

higurashihougi wrote:Some opinions claimed that 40% of Russian economy is "underground" economy and that increase the durability, sustainability of Russia, enable Russia to overcome Western sanction with mininal causualties.

http://www.newizv.ru/society/2015-05-27/220147-zhizn-v-teni.html

thats 40% thats not taxed. gotta strip mine that economy and expose it to sundry for taxman to collect. come on guys how are you supposed to finance all this neat tanks etc. with just oil money in spite of low oil and sanctions.

higurashihougi wrote:Some opinions claimed that 40% of Russian economy is "underground" economy and that increase the durability, sustainability of Russia, enable Russia to overcome Western sanction with mininal causualties.

http://www.newizv.ru/society/2015-05-27/220147-zhizn-v-teni.html

Well, the one thing I remember reading was that the black economy, grey economy or whatever you want to call it (all goes through different names), is that people get paid pure money, which in turn isn't taxed and thus that money can be used to buy goods and thus that helps stimulate the economy. The bad thing is the lack of taxable money meaning it becomes quite hard to pay for social projects which now Russian government is talking about cutting back (there are other ways to deal with this but that I will talk about later). The other issue is that there is no way to distinguish if it is purely corporations to pay under the table or illegal activities. I know I have been told that in many institutions, official wages show are garbage like $1000 a month, but that there is usually under the table payments like an extra $600 or so. Good things are some companies like Sukhoi and I believe Uralvagonzavod has opened up modern condo complexes for their employees and they cover things like utility and provide some sort of allowances for other things like gas and phone costs. There are many things that are considered grey economy so it is very hard to determine if it is actually good or not.

higurashihougi wrote:Some opinions claimed that 40% of Russian economy is "underground" economy and that increase the durability, sustainability of Russia, enable Russia to overcome Western sanction with mininal causualties.

http://www.newizv.ru/society/2015-05-27/220147-zhizn-v-teni.html

This figure of 40% is not credible. It is the same figure that was being cited in the early 2000s. A lot of the shadow economy
came into the light over the last 15 years. A more realistic figure is under 20%. The federal government budget is affected by
the overall economic situation and not the shadow economy. It really would be a waste of resources and effort to beat this
part of the economy into submission. It is like trying to get rid of corruption totally. An almost impossible task. It is better
to do what can be done and tolerate some resistant residual. Or one could go for totalitarianism to "solve" this problem.

kvs wrote:

higurashihougi wrote:Some opinions claimed that 40% of Russian economy is "underground" economy and that increase the durability, sustainability of Russia, enable Russia to overcome Western sanction with mininal causualties.

http://www.newizv.ru/society/2015-05-27/220147-zhizn-v-teni.html

This figure of 40% is not credible.   It is the same figure that was being cited in the early 2000s.   A lot of the shadow economy
came into the light over the last 15 years.   A more realistic figure is under 20%.   The federal government budget is affected by
the overall economic situation and not the shadow economy.    It really would be a waste of resources and effort to beat this
part of the economy into submission.   It is like trying to get rid of corruption totally.   An almost impossible task.   It is better
to do what can be done and tolerate some resistant residual.   Or one could go for totalitarianism to "solve" this problem.

You know, economic totalitarianism isn't that bad of an Idea. Total planned economy on the medium/large scale while small enterprises be 100% private. Why I say this is that one relies entirely on an individual or set of individuals who may or may not set up production for something that is desperately needed. I am not talking of handbags, Tshirts and what not, but I am talking about high tech and heavy industrial production. And even then, textiles for basic needs may not be such a bad idea either. I don't suggest that all enterprises be total control of government, but that the government should have a company in each major sector to set a "standard" and all other companies who want to compete can be private. But in the end, you do not become entirely dependent on the others and will always have a facility that produces. Doesn't have to be high quality high end stuff, but something like basic T-shirts, jeans/dress pants, basic shoes, etc. Because look what happened after soviet union? Majority of textiles were even imported and small companies that remained were barely producing or were producing for a very small segment of the market while rest is simply imported. Now, people are scrambling to set up a new textile plant in Russia or contracting out their foreign made goods to local producers just to get cheaper goods into the local market and meet the new, growing demand (well, technically the new demand in Russia due to drastic reduced spending, is in discount stores.

sepheronx wrote:You know, economic totalitarianism isn't that bad of an Idea.  Total planned economy on the medium/large scale while small enterprises be 100% private.  Why I say this is that one relies entirely on an individual or set of individuals who may or may not set up production for something that is desperately needed.  I am not talking of handbags, Tshirts and what not, but I am talking about high tech and heavy industrial production.  And even then, textiles for basic needs may not be such a bad idea either.  I don't suggest that all enterprises be total control of government, but that the government should have a company in each major sector to set a "standard" and all other companies who want to compete can be private.  But in the end, you do not become entirely dependent on the others and will always have a facility that produces.  Doesn't have to be high quality high end stuff, but something like basic T-shirts, jeans/dress pants, basic shoes, etc.  Because look what happened after soviet union?  Majority of textiles were even imported and small companies that remained were barely producing or were producing for a very small segment of the market while rest is simply imported.  Now, people are scrambling to set up a new textile plant in Russia or contracting out their foreign made goods to local producers just to get cheaper goods into the local market and meet the new, growing demand (well, technically the new demand in Russia due to drastic reduced spending, is in discount stores.

共産 (public fund) and 資本 (private capital) is two side of an economy and they have dialectical, mutual relationship. 共産 is used to increase 資本 of each people, and 資本 of the people is donated (by taxes or etc etc) to establish a 共産.

Marx and Lenin did not planned to eradicate all 資本 in socialism, neither did they want to establish a huge goverment. Socialism means 共産 is used to serve the society.

Imperialist goverments like the current White House or the former British empire use the 共産 to invade other countries, create an army and wage wars everywhere, and only the 資本 of the rich fat cats increase like most of the common people become poorer and poorer. On the contrary, in socialism, 共産 and 資本 is carefully used to establish powerful domestic enterprises, increase productivity, develop technology, educate people and establish a sustainable high actual living standard, and all citizens are benefited from that.

共産 and 資本 each has its own pros and cons. 共産 has the ability to mobilize huge amount of capital and manpowers for enormous programme. Like building an army, like nuclear developments, space programs, industrialization, scientific researches... 資本 is used for medium and small-scale enterprise, in service or light industry sectors, has excellent flexibility and creativity potential.

Economic totalitarianism, nationalization is to increase 共産. Privatization, market economy is to increase 資本. Now the issues here is which one should be use in which places and which time ?

============

The Soviet Union started to decline after Stalin died in 1953. After the death of Stalin, the WW2 military generals topple Stalin-backed industrialists and established a military dictatorship based on an alliance between military generals and corrupted politicians. The military regime tried to retain the "communism in war time" although the war was long gone, in order to protect the priveleges of military leaders. Stalinists toppled Khrushchyov in 1964, but the goverment fell into the hand of Brezhnev, another militaryman, and Soviet military dictatorship was becoming even worse under Brezhnev... until 1991 when the USSR could sustain no more and collapse.

Russia experienced a dark period of chaos in 199x when 5th columnist and pro-West fanboys rampaged everywhere in the society. But then Putin went in in 2000, promote Stalinist-style technocrats regime (without Stalin style of tyranny, of course) and we have Russia today.

If you consider Stalinist USSR to be a successful example of industrialization, then well... I think it's time to see a psychiatrist.

Walther von Oldenburg wrote:If you consider Stalinist USSR to be a successful example of industrialization, then well... I think it's time to see a psychiatrist.

I think it's time for you to hit the history books.
It was a very successful example of industrialization, along with Lenin's electrification and literacy campaigns in the 20s.

The USSR basically achieved in 20 years what it took for Britain, the US, etc... to achieve in 100.

Ok.
So what exactly did Stalinist USSR achieve except building a massive military industrial complex at a huge cost?


In healthy economies heavy and light industries develop naturally alongside each other (and they can grow with minimal help from the government). In USSR that was obviously not the case - you had massively over-invested heavy industries at the expense of almost non-existent consumer industry.

FDR got most of America (including remote rural areas) electrified in the span of about 10 years - and there was no Holodomor in USA.

Walther von Oldenburg wrote:Ok.
So what exactly did Stalinist USSR achieve except building a massive military industrial complex at a huge cost?


In healthy economies heavy and light industries develop naturally alongside each other (and they can grow with minimal help from the government). In USSR that was obviously not the case - you had massively over-invested heavy industries at the expense of almost non-existent consumer industry.

FDR got most of America (including remote rural areas) electrified in the span of about 10 years - and there was no Holodomor in USA.

So FDR did? Wasnt private then.

Sorry, but planned economies tend to work, while private gives us McDonalds and Wally World.

Russias industrialization brought:
Mass textile industry
Heavy industrial production
Tooling industry
technological development, created framework for space and electrical development.

Walther von Oldenburg wrote:Ok.
So what exactly did Stalinist USSR achieve except building a massive military industrial complex at a huge cost?


In healthy economies heavy and light industries develop naturally alongside each other (and they can grow with minimal help from the government). In USSR that was obviously not the case - you had massively over-invested heavy industries at the expense of almost non-existent consumer industry.

FDR got most of America (including remote rural areas) electrified in the span of about 10 years - and there was no Holodomor in USA.

Your point looks completely ridiculous once you realize that Hitler never attacked American soil and killed tens of millions of America's working population. The fact that the post-WW2 USSR industrialized to the point of being recognized as a super power, despite 27 million working population dead and a largely destroyed industrial base (considering most of the Russian Empire/USSR industrial infrastructure was in the Western part of the country), is a miracle in itself. No one else has ever completed the same feat.

sepheronx wrote:

Walther von Oldenburg wrote:Ok.
So what exactly did Stalinist USSR achieve except building a massive military industrial complex at a huge cost?


In healthy economies heavy and light industries develop naturally alongside each other (and they can grow with minimal help from the government). In USSR that was obviously not the case - you had massively over-invested heavy industries at the expense of almost non-existent consumer industry.

FDR got most of America (including remote rural areas) electrified in the span of about 10 years - and there was no Holodomor in USA.

So FDR did? Wasnt private then.

Sorry, but planned economies tend to work, while private gives us McDonalds and Wally World.

and BMW, Mercedes, Samsung Galazy S6 and SpaceShipTwo.

IT & Communications industry owes it's entire development to market-driven research since at least 1980s.

Your point looks completely ridiculous once you realize that Hitler never attacked American soil and killed tens of millions of America's working population. The fact that the post-WW2 USSR industrialized to the point of being recognized as a super power, despite 27 million working population dead and a largely destroyed industrial base (considering most of the Russian Empire/USSR industrial infrastructure was in the Western part of the country), is a miracle in itself. No one else has ever completed the same feat.

I was talking about period before ww2 - so your argument is completely misplaced.

Whatever was done in that period could be done at least several times better - and without a humanitarian catastrophe.

Walther von Oldenburg wrote:

sepheronx wrote:

Walther von Oldenburg wrote:Ok.
So what exactly did Stalinist USSR achieve except building a massive military industrial complex at a huge cost?


In healthy economies heavy and light industries develop naturally alongside each other (and they can grow with minimal help from the government). In USSR that was obviously not the case - you had massively over-invested heavy industries at the expense of almost non-existent consumer industry.

FDR got most of America (including remote rural areas) electrified in the span of about 10 years - and there was no Holodomor in USA.

So FDR did? Wasnt private then.

Sorry, but planned economies tend to work, while private gives us McDonalds and Wally World.

and BMW, Mercedes, Samsung Galazy S6 and SpaceShipTwo.

IT & Communications industry owes it's entire development to market-driven research since at least 1980s.

BMW and Mercedes are car companies that are no different other than branding. Smartphone tech isnt new, and most known tech is derived from military. Internet is good example. Spaceship2? You mean to tell me no one flew to space before? Nice try kid. Government insititutes built the path and then released what was allowed to public and hence what we have now. Be it American or otherwise. Like dual core technology in processors came from a government corp lile MCST whom sold it to Intel.

Walther von Oldenburg wrote:
Whatever was done in that period could be done at least several times better - and without a humanitarian catastrophe.

Pure supposition, because no one else has ever done it...and the country that came closest to such a huge turn around was China, another state planed economy, with 5 year plans, that was installed by the USSR.

If you want to bring up human rights, why not talk about the transatlantic slave trade that both the American and British economies financed and profiteered on? What about the cold blooded genocide of indigenous people of North America, all the way to Australia, or the first concentration camps which were created by the British in South Africa...oh that's right, you went out your way not to mention them....how convenient.

Nice

The World Bank has improved the forecast of Russia's GDP

Walther von Oldenburg wrote:Ok.
So what exactly did Stalinist USSR achieve except building a massive military industrial complex at a huge cost?


In healthy economies heavy and light industries develop naturally alongside each other (and they can grow with minimal help from the government). In USSR that was obviously not the case - you had massively over-invested heavy industries at the expense of almost non-existent consumer industry.

FDR got most of America (including remote rural areas) electrified in the span of about 10 years - and there was no Holodomor in USA.

Stalinist USSR achieved something like 15% yearly GDP growth at the cost of totalitarianism and massive amounts of human lives. It made China's current meteoric economic rise look like EU-style stagnation.

If the economy was left to 'develop naturally' then a few years later down the line Nazi Germany would have invaded the USSR and completely steamrolled it.

I think you can agree - fk the fking consumer and light industries.

Walther von Oldenburg wrote:Whatever was done in that period could be done at least several times better - and without a humanitarian catastrophe.

Feel free to offer alternatives.

If Stalin hadn't collectivized the grain in 1932/1933 and sold it to the West in return for industrial equipment, the USSR might have been able to avoid the worst of the famine - but would also have gotten nowhere.

flamming_python wrote:If Stalin hadn't collectivized the grain in 1932/1933 and sold it to the West in return for industrial equipment, the USSR might have been able to avoid the worst of the famine - but would also have gotten nowhere.

Don't bother, he clearly thinks the West is above using forced labor, when the American and British economies financed and profiteered on the transatlantic slave trade, as well as their financial centers (Wallstreet, and the City of London) who financed and profiteered on the rise of fascism in the world

Here's a highly recommended read, it's probably the the best book on the rise of fascism that's ever been written! It's 'Facts and Fascism' by George Seldes, one of the best journalists of the last century, who had support as high up in the U.S. govt. as the vice president of the United States (Henry Wallace under FDR). It was the first book of it's kind, which documented about how the the top robber barons...err I mean business moguls in the West (US, UK, mainland Europe) financed and profiteered on the rise of fascism, including the forced labor camps. It's free online to read, when you find free time read it, it's highly enlightening:


https://archive.org/stream/FactsAndFascism/FactsandFascism#page/n7/mode/2up


...Someone should update this book to include the multi-billionaire Koch brothers (who run the Republican party) and how their father (Fred Koch) was a vocal supporter of Mussolini, or how George Soros (the man who runs the Democratic party) admitted in a CBS interview that he was indeed a fascist collaborator in his youth, and how he did not feel sorry for his actions.

Viktor wrote:Nice  

The World Bank has improved the forecast of Russia's GDP

The World Bank is full of sh*t like Moody's

http://www.worldbank.org/en/news/press-release/2015/04/29/reforms-are-the-best-antidote-to-exogenous-shocks-confronting-ukraine-says-world-bank

Kyiv, April 29, 2015 – Despite decisive measures in 2014 to stabilize the economy and jumpstart growth, Ukraine’s economic woes worsened mainly due to the conflict in the east. In its new Ukraine Macroeconomic Update, the World Bank projects real GDP to fall by 7.5 percent in 2015, down from 6.8 percent in 2014. This lower forecast is mainly driven by the ongoing conflict that has complicated efforts to stabilize the economy, disrupted economic activities, and hurt confidence of both investors and consumers. A gradual recovery starting in 2016 is possible if the conflict abates and the authorities continue implementing much-needed macroeconomic and structural reforms.

The above is pure rubbish. The 1st quarter of 2015 saw Ukraine's official GDP fall by 17.6%. The GDP decline
is accelerating and I cannot believe that Ukraine will experience a 10% growth in the second half of the year. It could be
possible that the GDP decline stalls, but then we are look at a net decline of over 20% this year.

Any organization that makes such forecasts for Ukraine cannot be trusted on its Russian forecasts. There is brazen
political bias in these "forecasts".

It's cute to see someone pushing South Korean products as products of "the west". No, they are products of Asian countries.
As Truman would sneer, "by those Asiatics". Japan is basically a one party state with only a second party managing to come
to power for the first time since WWII during the last few years. South Korea is the definition of state capitalism with the
chaebols in bed with the government.

These days the west is manufacturing everything in China. Domestic jobs in North America are resource sector, farming, and
mostly service sector (e.g. burger flipping) with low wages.

Thank God Russia is not going to follow this retarded western economic model and will chose a model that works best for itself.

kvs wrote:It's cute to see someone pushing South Korean products as products of "the west".   No, they are products of Asian countries.  
As Truman would sneer, "by those Asiatics".   Japan is basically a one party state with only a second party managing to come
to power for the first time since WWII during the last few years.    South Korea is the definition of state capitalism with the
chaebols in bed with the government.  

These days the west is manufacturing everything in China.   Domestic jobs in North America are resource sector, farming, and
mostly service sector (e.g. burger flipping) with low wages.  

Thank God Russia is not going to follow this retarded western economic model and will chose a model that works best for itself.

Funny you should bring that up, considering a large portion of South Korea and Taiwan's existence, they were one party states, and as far as state capitalism oil companies, agricultural companies, tech companies, banks all receive hundreds of billions of dollars in any given year from the US govt.

The typical case of totalitarianism and Big Government and Corrupted Communism is the United States... the true goverment is not located inside the White House. U.S. true goverment is FED, Monsanto, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Geogre Soros, Ruppert Murdoch... and the NGOs funded by them. What should I say, a dictactorship of billionaire with extensive propaganda about "free world" which does not exists.

Nice

Ulyukayev: economy will emerge from recession in the III quarter