Comment by bobthepanda
13 hours ago
the "world" part of world war is also important. pretty much every economy involved was at least undergoing heavy handed rationing of goods, encouraging people to donate scrap metal, etc.
Russians are not under food rationing yet.
Here’s hoping they feel the war in Moscow and St Petersburg this year. A bit of rationing wouldn’t hurt them.
More than the war, they’ll feel the peace. More than 100% of the economic growth of the last few years has gone into war production, meaning the civilian economy has shrunk. When the weapons factories are scaled back the economy is going to hurt something fierce. Even Muscovites will notice.
This is why Putin can’t stop fighting. When the fighting stops Russia will face a reckoning. Better to postpone that day hoping that Europe runs out of steam.
ww2 history begs to differ. The USSR has seen massive economic growth in 1946-1950s.
That was a very different situation. The USSR was still catching up in industrialisation, and despite its huge losses still had vast reserves of labour in the countryside to tap. It was much more like the process of industrialisation in China that’s seen huge growth there over the last generation. Russia has already industrialised so it doesn’t have a catch-up growth opportunity in the same way. They are much more labour and resource constrained these days.