Communism

The cry we shall never forget usually last only one or two generations. Most people alive today do not remember the start of the cold war that ended with the demise of the Soviet Union in 1991. The Soviets led by Stalin promoted communism while the West led by Truman pushed for free market capitalism. The best picture of this 40 year struggle can be seen in Germany. Germany was divided, part going to the Soviets and part to the West with Berlin the capitol city in the East. The entire country was destroyed during the war so each side started from scratch. By 1989 West Germany's income per capita was $17,700 and in the East it was $9,600. Life under communism was so bad that East Germany had to build a wall to keep its citizens from fleeing to West Germany. The news showed pictures of empty grocery shelves across the Eastern section. While this was going on the same thing was happening in Korea which was divided in 1953 into communist North Koran and capitalist South Korea. Both countries were leveled by war but by 2006 the economy of South Korea had a per capita GDP of $20,000 while North Korea struggled with a per capita GDP of $500. To this day the people in North Korea are starving while living in fear of their lives. Young people today often express a desire for a more socialist type of government. This happens when ever the wealth gap in a country gets too large and some charismatic leader comes along with a promise to redistribute the wealth. This has been tried many times but always failed. The most recent example is Venezuela. It starts off great but in ten or fifteen years it all falls apart. As Margaret Thatcher said, socialism is great until you run out of the other guys money. It the West today a little socialism works to balance things but the temptation is always there to expand and those who have forgotten are not aware of the dangers.