When my partners and I landed at the airport (Sheremetevo?) in 1991, we were stopped not 1 minute into the car ride. A cop saw our yellow foreign plates and basically wanted and got a bribe. On the way to our apt, we saw holes in the whitehouse where the tanks had fired into. The wild wild west? That's an understatement. We traded commodities there and it might as well have been on Mars. Almost finished a huge copper deal only to be stopped because some local governor in didn't think his cut was big enough. Did turn $1,000 into $10,000 by trading stocks at the sidewalk exchange. (No, I'm serious about this, I traded stocks by exchanging money for little pieces of paper that were traded outside some building - I basically took a "ride" and sold it about 2 weeks later - lmao) Had AK's pointed at us, had a night club rip us off blind. Foreigners are easy marks there so you have to have a "partner" if you're going to do business. And it's still no guarantee that they won't change their minds later. It's a way of life over there. The gov't is the biggest mob, then the leaders a little down the ladder, somewhere in between are the big mobs run by former KGB and other ex-military guys. But the people are great at heart. Sounds like any other country huh? Rich get richer, the poorer gettin' poorer...
'Foreigners are easy marks there so you have to have a "partner" if you're going to do business. And it's still no guarantee that they won't change their minds later.' Well said, I knew one big business house who were ripped off by the their local partners teaming up with mafia in Russia. It is so bad that for mere few millions, the Russian practices end up 'turning off' several billions of investments seeking good places to get above average returns. 'It's a way of life over there. The gov't is the biggest mob, then the leaders a little down the ladder, somewhere in between are the big mobs run by former KGB and other ex-military guys.' Russians and EE are people whom I think are the BIGGEST fuckers of their own countries. Talk about destruction mentality. Capitalism has flourished in West and now in China and India and Asia because ethical practices were put in place in the majority. In Russia and EE it was wild party of self destruction. In Poland it succeeded somewhat due to the same reason...........there is only 5% mafia there when compared to Russia and Former SU. Ronald Reagan was right.........SU was a third world nation with nuke tipped missiles, a fake superpower. Thank you Gipper, you had a real foresight and vision, a good sign of a leader!
Newbunch, In current usage, laissez-faire generally means anything goes, a free-for-all. To add more precision to your definition, it means non-interference by anybody, including governments. Economic totalitarianism? No, state assisted capitalism. Compare this to the political expedience of Thatcher selling off the UK nationalised industries on the cheap in the 1980's to create a "share-owning democracy". Which is closer to socialism? Thatcher's method, or Putin's? Have you seen the way they collect unpaid taxes? Camouflage fatigues, Kalashnikovs, and they don't knock before entering. Grant.
Ditto Asia. You still get people flying in and thinking they will walk away a winner in a deal with some guy who is on his own ground has been dealing with naive foreigners for 20 years.
That may be how you define laissez faire, but not the common definition: Wikipedia: From the French diction first used by the eighteenth century Physiocrats as an injunction against government interference with trade, it became used as a synonym for strict free market economics during the early and mid-19th century. Columbia Encyclopedia: in economics and politics, doctrine that an economic system functions best when there is no interference by government. It is based on the belief that the natural economic order tends, when undisturbed by artificial stimulus or regulation, to secure the maximum well-being for the individual and therefore for the community as a whole. Webster's: a doctrine opposing governmental interference in economic affairs beyond the minimum necessary for the maintenance of peace and property rights "Economic totalitarianism? No, state assisted capitalism. " If it is state assisted capitalism, it can't be laissez faire.
america is just more subtle in its corruption....more sophisticated....but the results are the same....most of the wealth finds its way to a "select minority" of the population.....america is the most corrupt country in the world.....its tools are just more covert in nature.....so.....no you don`t have blatant bribes.....but you have senators getting preferential stock options on ipo`s before they are released to the public all the time.......where they get these options at 12.00 and sell them the day of the ipo for 56.00.....happens all the time-----and you wonder why they vote the way they do on legislation-----just a more subtle form of bribery....same result----a select few control the majority of the wealth of the country and the world.
One must make a distinction between the "wild East" of Russia and its former Russian speaking territories, and the Central European countries which are already part of the EU (Poland, Czech+Slovak Republics and Hungary). In these countries business is booming and people are known to have come back alive and well managing to keep $$ earned over there. Its funny how countries will shape themselves up once they have a goal they need to meet/achieve. Getting back on the subject of Russia, Putin and his former East German KGB buddies have been pushing for this natural gas pipeline going through the Baltic Sea to the west. Now this is straight out of Lenin's doctrines, Russians are selling the West, the rope that they will eventually hang on...
And in China the Multinationals and Governments are walking into a confucian web as they fall over themselves to get a piece of the market.
Exactly. These mofos think that the country leader should just gives up its wealth to greedy corporations. They are just sore from the raping they received in the Russian debt crisis. Ehh not so fast. You need to stop using USA controlled media for your information. Once you mentioned Czech, I can tell you do not really know how it works in Eastern Europe. Hope you know who really owns & runs Prague.