9 - Special features of industrialization in planned economies: a comparison between the Soviet Union and the United States

Summary

My original assignment stated in the first half of the title implied some comparison between a number of planned and nonplanned economies. The limitation of my knowledge and time and of the reader's (estimated) patience has restricted my set of countries to the Soviet Union and the United States, who appear sufficiently different to make the comparison worthwhile and yet similar enough in many essential features to make it meaningful. A broader coverage would, of course, be preferable, but it should be done by someone better versed in the economic history of a number of countries than I am.

If I had a free choice of variables to be compared, I would try to relate the economic performance of each country to the training given to, and the use made of, the 5 or 10 percent most able persons of its labor force. Some American information on the use of ability exists, but I have never seen any Soviet data. Hence, I had to turn to the more conventional, if less interesting, variables, such as capital formation, price movements, labor productivity, and the like, in the hope that this well-worked mine had not been completely exhausted. Not aiming at the specialist in Soviet economics, I have thought it useful to present a number of tables containing some basic facts about both economies over several periods. But such materials, in their impartial purity, are just as boring to read as they are to assemble from known sources.