> This attributes too much to Putin. The collapse of
> the ruble in 1998
> created, in Keynesian fashion, domestic demand for
> Russian products and by
> implication investment in Russian industry absent
> since the 1980s.
> Complementing this was the rise in oil prices.
> Neither was planned by
> Yeltsin or Putin.
This is true. But it is countersensical to assert that the creation of stability has _nothing_ to do with it.
It was not
> just Russia that
> experienced this growth in the new century, but
> Urkraine, an acceleration of
> growth in the Baltic states, Belarus, etc.
>
I was under the impression that this was mostly piggy-back growth on the back of the expanding Russian economy? Ukraine is a transit point for Russian gas and a market for Russian products; Belarus exports to the Russian market; the Baltic States depend on Russian money coursing through them to Scandinavia, no?
> Putin occasionally jabs at the US, as Doug asserts
> with Yukos, but
> alternates that with fawning support for the most
> reactionary elements in
> the US government.
>
Huh? It is somehow in Russia's interest not to have good relations with the United States? Russia is interested in having good relations with everybody.
> Putin may have helped ensure Russian pensions got
> paid and salaries too.
Pensions and public-sector salaries have doubled under Putin.
At the same time Putin introduced
> privatized pension
> systems, although almost nobody contributes at this
> time, and wants to
> remove people's in-kind benefits and replace with
> cash, which can then erode
> the real value of these if not properly indexed to
> inflation.
This is wrong. I posted the new benefits here:
http://www.mail-archive.com/pen-l@sus.csuchico.edu/msg02382.html
The former benefits system was throughly unworkable. In fact the new system costs the Kremlin six times as much money.
===== Nu, zayats, pogodi!
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