You are talking about the Soviet Union. Remember, of course, that its progress is from the wreck of the Romanov dynasty, a society rotten to the core.
The Soviet economy never adopted the discipline of the market. It was always adept at demanding sacrifices. Unable or unwilling to reward those, it did not get them. Without the discipline of the market, it could only use fear. Fear does not bring out competence. It is telling that Soviet physicians who left the USSR for America had to be retrained in many aspects of medicine as those from most European countries (most of which have socialized medicine) don't.
The rate of 7.8 abortions per Soviet woman sounds like an exaggeration -- but a country with no market system that tries to raise its birth rate by not making birth control readily available gets such a result. Add to this, as many Christians will, an amoral society that rejects all religion in the name of socialist progress can make people callous toward the unborn. Even of abortion is legal in America it is an ethical crisis. I'm also guessing that prostitution was rampant in the Soviet Union, and abortion is practically a condition of employment as a prostitute.
The Soviet Union was a poor country. It rejected the market on everything and remained a command society in its economics to its end. Countries with free enterprise do their socialism better than countries without free enterprise.
The Soviet economy never adopted the discipline of the market. It was always adept at demanding sacrifices. Unable or unwilling to reward those, it did not get them. Without the discipline of the market, it could only use fear. Fear does not bring out competence. It is telling that Soviet physicians who left the USSR for America had to be retrained in many aspects of medicine as those from most European countries (most of which have socialized medicine) don't.
The rate of 7.8 abortions per Soviet woman sounds like an exaggeration -- but a country with no market system that tries to raise its birth rate by not making birth control readily available gets such a result. Add to this, as many Christians will, an amoral society that rejects all religion in the name of socialist progress can make people callous toward the unborn. Even of abortion is legal in America it is an ethical crisis. I'm also guessing that prostitution was rampant in the Soviet Union, and abortion is practically a condition of employment as a prostitute.
The Soviet Union was a poor country. It rejected the market on everything and remained a command society in its economics to its end. Countries with free enterprise do their socialism better than countries without free enterprise.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.