Gorby's bad Russian

ChrisD(RJ) chrisd at russiajournal.com
Mon Apr 15 00:25:56 PDT 2002


- -there was a lot of upward mobility in the USSR!

Chris Doss The Russia Journal

- -A truth that?s quite offensive to right wingers. - -I read an article in The New Republic denouncing - -Sheyla Fitzpatrick as a charlatain because he - -wrote there was upward mobility in the 30?s. - -This is quite obvious, since industrialization - -and high growth rates led to a demand for qualified - -professionals, and if there is a expanding educa- - -tional system, so people get a lot of opportunities. - -But I would say social mobility decreased in the - -Brezhnev years due to economic stagnation. - -Am I wrong???

Alexanre Fenelon --------------------------------------------------------

I asked a friend of mine who came of age in the late 70s in the USSR this question and he wrote the following (misunderstanding the question a bit, but hey).:

I would not say there was less social mobility under Brezhnev compared to today. Farmer's son could go to study in the Moscow State University or any other prestigious educational institution. Moreover, children of workers and peasants enjoyed privileges. For example, they could enroll on teh so-called "preparation courses" called "rabfak" - worker's faculty - and in a year they got automatically enrolled in the MSU without exams. These days it's much harder for a child from a depressed family to rise to the middle class level. For example, if I could not afford to pay $1,200 a year for my daughter she would not have been able to get a higher education because in order to enroll in a free higher educational institution one needs either to pay huge bribes or have connections. Children of the riff-ruff become riff-ruff automatically these days. In Soviet era the state cared about such kids much more. Another matter is that during Brezhnev one, regardless of his skills and talens, could not go beyond the so-called "potolok" (salary ceiling)

Chris Doss The Russia Journal



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