USSR

[David Kleinecke]

The war in Ukraine has stirred up a lot of talk about how Putin's
Russia compares to the old USSR. In the course of this I have learned,
I think, what a Communist government meant in theory in Stalin's
day. Today I think communist as an adjective means: There are no
employees or equivalently everybody works for the government.

Everybody has, on paper, a job and everybody gets a wage (which
might be ridiculously small). Duties are not very well monitored
there is considerable opportunity to develop one person business.
But you can't hire any help. If more than one person is needed you
must form a cooperative association. And that gets complicated.

This a coherent idea and maybe Marx would have approved. But,
at least as the Russians did it, not one that worked very well.

What do you think "communist" means?

[Mack A. Damia]

The ignorant peeps kick the word around on Facebook every time they
want to vent their rage at being uneducated.

Various definitions depending on the author/theorist. Common
ownership of the means of production, elimination of private property,
equality, absence of social classes and the state, "From each
according to his ability, to each according to his needs" (Marx).
Lenin added the Dictatorship of the Proletariet until the populace is
sufficiently politically and socially conscious to govern itself.
(Woke"?)

[Arindam Banerjee]

Communist means one who communes with others in a commune, where the all for one and one for all logic rules. One is kindly, friendly, altruistic, sociable, living to enjoy life according to the best and most enduring traditions. One is rational and Scientific, jolly and caring, good at arts and sports. One opposes injustice, fights poverty and disease. No racism, no bigotry. The priority is given to children, who are safe, cared for and well educated on a group basis allowing for individual excellences.

Such are my impressions as a child of 7 in the Soviet commune my father managed in Ranchi back in 1962-65. Some of the best years of my life. I had a unique, marvellous childhood.

Capitalism is the way of the selfish-greedy all-polluting fearful cannibal swine, that must grow, anyhow, in order to exist.

Cheers,
Arindam Banerjee

[Paul Wolff]

On Sat, 13 Aug 2022, at 18:37:31, David Kleinecke posted:

The word may be used in a social context or in a political context.
Socially, it should mean 'pertaining to a communal social structure'.
That's been pretty much a minority meaning since Marx. Politically, it
means the suppression of all other parties, and of opinions tending to
other parties, to the advantage of the communist party, in the pretence
that this conduces to the good of the state and of all the people living
under it.
--
Paul

[J. J. Lodder]

How many meanings do you want?

Jan

[Janet]

In article <fab1305e-bacc-4ae2-8638-
ec118f...@googlegroups.com>, dklei...@gmail.com
says...

Next week

"What have people in America been told Socialism means".

Janet

[Jerry Friedman]

And to start with, in theory or in practice?

--
Jerry Friedman

[Ken Blake]

And do you want a definition of the noun or the adjective?

[Mack A. Damia]

Difference between Marx/Lenin communism and Maoism, is that in
Marx/Lenin, the "Revolutionary Vanguard" is made up of the
proletariet.

In Maoism, the vanguard is the peasantry.

[Kerr-Mudd, John]

On Sun, 14 Aug 2022 08:16:46 -0700

Whatever happened to the Trotsky-ites (word?) of the 80's?
(but I do recall a jolly ditty about some Heroes)
(Oh no! I've become Yet Another utube shill!)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gfIgA-PYyQ

(Lovely miming!)
--
Bah, and indeed Humbug.

[Kerr-Mudd, John]

On Sun, 14 Aug 2022 08:16:46 -0700

Yeahbut the Popular People's Judean Liberation Front are purer Marxists.


Issit a fake poster trolling again ?

[CDB]

On 8/14/2022 11:48 AM, Kerr-Mudd, John wrote:
> Mack A. Damia <drstee...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>> Mack A. Damia <drstee...@yahoo.com> wrote:

>>> David Kleinecke <dklei...@gmail.com> wrote:

[communism: the theory]

>>>> What do you think "communist" means?

[that all the swines commend it]

> Whatever happened to the Trotsky-ites (word?) of the 80's? (but I do
> recall a jolly ditty about some Heroes) (Oh no! I've become Yet
> Another utube shill!)

> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gfIgA-PYyQ

> (Lovely miming!)

<mime> "Non!"

[Mack A. Damia]

In "What Is to Be Done?" (1902), Lenin argued that the working class
will not spontaneously become political simply by fighting economic
battles with employers over wages, working hours, and the like. To
educate the working class on Marxism, Lenin insisted that Marxists
should form a political party, or "vanguard", of dedicated
revolutionaries in order to spread Marxist political ideas among the
workers.

[J. J. Lodder]

Praxis, you mean?

Jan

[Jerry Friedman]

On Sunday, August 14, 2022 at 9:48:55 AM UTC-6, Kerr-Mudd, John wrote:
> On Sun, 14 Aug 2022 08:16:46 -0700
> Mack A. Damia <drstee...@yahoo.com> wrote:

...

> > Difference between Marx/Lenin communism and Maoism, is that in
> > Marx/Lenin, the "Revolutionary Vanguard" is made up of the
> > proletariet.
> >
> > In Maoism, the vanguard is the peasantry.
> >
> Whatever happened to the Trotsky-ites (word?) of the 80's?

...

I don't think there were all that many Trotskyites or Trotskyists (no
hyphen) in the U.S. then, but there are still a few, such as one of my
favorite SF writers.

http://dreamcafe.com

--
Jerry Friedman

[David Kleinecke]

Around 1950 in Berkeley you could go down to just outside Sather Gate
and watch the Communists. They generally spoke standing in the bed
of a pickup truck or in the crowd around some speaker. The Trotskyites
heckled the Stalinists and the De Leonists heckled them both. The marxist
theory they expounded often got amazingly scholastic.

The De Leonists were the old traditional US Marxists (as in IWW) who
did not accept Lenin's ideas.

I wasn't doing what I should have done in AUE - addressing usage. I
was proposing a kind of core meaning for communism we could test
ideas against to see that Putin's Russia is not communist and Kim's
Korea probably is.

[Mack A. Damia]

Trotsky was assassinated in Mexico City in 1940, and he is buried
there in a suburb of the city. Ice pick in the ear or something like
that. Putin is more like an autocrat, nothing communist about him. I
don't know enought about Kim and North Korea, but probably so. Also,
Vietnam.

[Mack A. Damia]

On Sun, 14 Aug 2022 16:46:42 -0700, Mack A. Damia

Also, communism is more adaptable to an agrarian society rather than
an industrial one. Russia was fairly agrarian before the revolution,
and Lenin called for speedy industrialization ("electrification")
after the revolution. Industrialization doesn't fit too well with
theoretical communism. Totalitarianism/fascism work best in an
industrial society. Think "money culture and profits".

North Korea was traditionally agrarian but industrialized as well
after the communist takeover, but they industrialized along military
lines. Kim is an autocrat, a dictator, and they have worked out their
own brand of communism that really isn't communism. Vietnam forged
economic alliances with the U.S. and other countries to industrialize
after their takeover in the early 1970s.

[Madhu]

* Mack A. Damia <i14jfhdftavug68ko...@4ax.com> :
Wrote on Sun, 14 Aug 2022 17:27:54 -0700:

it just needs some adaptation to make it fit in the "industrial
context". would you fit this statement "the rule of the people made
effective through the agency of their servants, the scientists and
engineers" in the context of the above question

quoted from wiki from here

"The technocratic movement has its origins with the progressive
engineers of the early twentieth century and the writings of Edward
Bellamy, along with some of the later works of Thorstein Veblen such
as Engineers And The Price System written in 1921. William H. Smyth,
a California engineer, invented the word technocracy in 1919 to
describe "the rule of the people made effective through the agency of
their servants, the scientists and engineers", and in the 1920s it
was used to describe the works of Thorstein Veblen."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technocracy_movement

[Peter Moylan]

That's a very interesting question. It's my belief that the Russian
communists had been defeated by about 1920, by which time the
bureaucrats and petty dictators and the power-hungry had taken over.
(Which seems to have happened in many revolutions around the world, at
various times.) But the country continued to call itself "communist",
and for many people that shaped their belief about what communism means.

There aren't many examples of genuine communist communities in the
world. The Israeli kibbutzniks succeeded to a large extent, but few others.

--
Peter Moylan Newcastle, NSW http://www.pmoylan.org

[Peter Moylan]

On 14/08/22 22:11, Janet wrote:

> Next week
>
> "What have people in America been told Socialism means".

An equally interesting question.

Most civilised countries today are socialist to some extent. I doubt
that you could find any examples of pure socialism, though, because it's
always stirred in with a mixture of other philosophies.

This is particularly noticeable in countries that have a regular
alternation between left-wing and right-wing governments. The
left-wingers try to bring in more socialist policies, and the
right-wingers try to destroy them.

The most effective way to destroy socialist initiatives is tax cuts to
the rich, leaving the public sector unable to carry out its proper
functions.

[Richard Heathfield]

Another very effective way to destroy socialist initiatives is
tax increases to the wealthy, driving them abroad and losing
their tax revenue altogether.

Taking other people's money and spending it like water is not a
policy. It's theft.

--
Richard Heathfield
Email: rjh at cpax dot org dot uk
"Usenet is a strange place" - dmr 29 July 1999
Sig line 4 vacant - apply within

[Bertel Lund Hansen]

Den 15.08.2022 kl. 05.37 skrev Richard Heathfield:

> Another very effective way to destroy socialist initiatives is tax
> increases to the wealthy, driving them abroad and losing their tax
> revenue altogether.

Here you defend rich people.

> Taking other people's money and spending it like water is not a policy.
> It's theft.

And here you explain that they are criminals and immoral.

--
Bertel

[David Kleinecke]

I was just thinking how the US could become a communist country of
the type I proposed. The IRS - I will assume - knows about everybody's
income. They divide income into two types - private and public. The goal
is to end private income. Private income is wages, pension, annuities
and the like. This step is easy. Tell all the private sources to stop paying
and start the government paying the same amount. It was easiest to get
the sources to pay the government what they used to pay as private
income. Voila - no employees. Communism and no change to anything
else.

What remains is organizations. I leave it as an exercise to the reader to
work how that might be done. Lenin and friends went wrong at this
point. They tried to have government take over all the organizations.
That will not work and they proved it.

[Richard Heathfield]

On 15/08/2022 5:10 am, Bertel Lund Hansen wrote:
> Den 15.08.2022 kl. 05.37 skrev Richard Heathfield:
>
>> Another very effective way to destroy socialist initiatives is
>> tax increases to the wealthy, driving them abroad and losing
>> their tax revenue altogether.
>
> Here you defend rich people.

No, sir. I neither defend nor attack them. I just point out the
effect of a myopic tax policy on the overall tax take. But your
mistake is a common one; you confuse objectivity with partisanship.

>> Taking other people's money and spending it like water is not a
>> policy. It's theft.
>
> And here you explain that they are criminals and immoral.

It is governments that take other people's money and spend it
like water. Rich people who spend money like water don't stay
rich very long. And rich people who extort other people's money
with menaces must answer to the law, but governments can set the
tax rate as high as they wish without fear of prosecution.

[CDB]

On 8/15/2022 2:59 AM, Richard Heathfield wrote:

> Bertel Lund Hansen wrote:
>> Richard Heathfield:

>>> Another very effective way to destroy socialist initiatives is
>>> tax increases to the wealthy, driving them abroad and losing
>>> their tax revenue altogether.

>> Here you defend rich people.

> No, sir. I neither defend nor attack them. I just point out the
> effect of a myopic tax policy on the overall tax take. But your
> mistake is a common one; you confuse objectivity with partisanship.

I detect a degree of myopia: it is the rush towards globalisation that
gives some support to your position. Those measures, which I have
opposed since their beginning in Canada, make it possible for production
to move offshore and escape taxes. Let the filthyrich live on the Costa
del Sol, as long as their enterprises stay at home and pay taxes.

>>> Taking other people's money and spending it like water is not a
>>> policy. It's theft.

>> And here you explain that they are criminals and immoral.

> It is governments that take other people's money and spend it like
> water. Rich people who spend money like water don't stay rich very
> long. And rich people who extort other people's money with menaces
> must answer to the law, but governments can set the tax rate as high
> as they wish without fear of prosecution.

But not without electoral consequences. You have described a brutal
dictatorship.

[Richard Heathfield]

On 15/08/2022 11:54 am, CDB wrote:
> On 8/15/2022 2:59 AM, Richard Heathfield wrote:

<snip>

>> governments can set the tax rate as
>> high
>> as they wish without fear of prosecution.
>
> But not without electoral consequences.

This turns out not to matter, since the choice is between sides
that are increasingly difficult to distinguish.

> You have described a brutal
> dictatorship.

Not brutal, no. Just a dictatorship of do as I say, not as I do,
with a mechanism in place for occasionally voting out the
dictator and voting in a new one. And you must vote for a
dictator (or a dictator's party) because, if you don't, the wrong
dictator might get in.

[Ross Clark]

When I was a child, little roadside signs with the red and white
yin-yang symbol (see the above article) and the word "Technocracy" were
a common sight on rural highways around Vancouver. They must have had
some followers in the area, but I was never aware of any activity on
their part, or any reality beyond those signs.

[Peter T. Daniels]

On Sunday, August 14, 2022 at 11:38:00 PM UTC-4, Richard Heathfield wrote:
> On 15/08/2022 4:11 am, Peter Moylan wrote:
> > On 14/08/22 22:11, Janet wrote:

> >> Next week
> >> "What have people in America been told Socialism means".
> > An equally interesting question.
> > Most civilised countries today are socialist to some extent. I doubt
> > that you could find any examples of pure socialism, though,
> > because it's
> > always stirred in with a mixture of other philosophies.
> > This is particularly noticeable in countries that have a regular
> > alternation between left-wing and right-wing governments. The
> > left-wingers try to bring in more socialist policies, and the
> > right-wingers try to destroy them.
> > The most effective way to destroy socialist initiatives is tax
> > cuts to
> > the rich, leaving the public sector unable to carry out its proper
> > functions.
>
> Another very effective way to destroy socialist initiatives is
> tax increases to the wealthy, driving them abroad and losing
> their tax revenue altogether.

That is the English way, It didn't happen here.

When JFK was president, the top tax rate (on people/families
like him/his) was 90%, but no one actually paid 90%, because
there were so many exemptions.

> Taking other people's money and spending it like water is not a
> policy. It's theft.

The mantra of the greedy rich.

Property is theft.

Even Heathfield approves of the "socialized medicine" provided
by the NHS, but whenever something like it is proposed Over
Here, it is denounced as "socialized medicine." Look at the panic
caused by the "Harry and Louise" ads against "HillaryCare" in 'the
Clinton administration. ObamaCare barely passed -- and is now
sacrosanct.

Truman wanted to do an NHS-style system after WWII. The
"Do-Nothing Congress" controlled by republicans did nothing.

LBJ wanted what is now called "universal Medicare" or "Medicare
for All," but just as now, the medical establishment feared for its
income. (Pharma put on some half-hearted ads against the bill
Biden is about to sign, which was again passed without a single
republican vote, which has the very limited provisions to allow
Medicare to negotiate over drug prices and to cap individual
drug spending at $2000/yr -- but couldn't even get the $35/mo
cap on the price of insulin for the pre-Medicare diabetic.)

Oh, plus they're upset that the IRS (= "Inland Revenue") is being
properly funded, so that (on the one hand) regular people will
be able to get through on the help-lines and (mainly) there will
be auditors to catch the tax-dodgers of the Heathfield class.
That last is expected to yield tens of billions of dollars per year
(they always report them in 10-year chunks, which are more
impressive but too abstract for quick comprehension).

[Peter T. Daniels]

On Monday, August 15, 2022 at 2:59:49 AM UTC-4, Richard Heathfield wrote:
> On 15/08/2022 5:10 am, Bertel Lund Hansen wrote:
> > Den 15.08.2022 kl. 05.37 skrev Richard Heathfield:

> >> Taking other people's money and spending it like water is not a
> >> policy. It's theft.
> > And here you explain that they are criminals and immoral.
>
> It is governments that take other people's money and spend it
> like water. Rich people who spend money like water don't stay
> rich very long.

Don't they know about Foundations in England?

Around the turn of the last century, the most successful
"robber barons" -- perhaps due to a fit of conscience,
perhaps due to altruism -- devoted their fortunes to Good
Works. The most prominent are Rockefeller, Carnegie,
and Ford, but they are legion -- and they are not a quaint
holdover from the past: Gates, MacArthur, etc. Their
endowments do not dwindle.

> And rich people who extort other people's money
> with menaces must answer to the law, but governments can set the
> tax rate as high as they wish without fear of prosecution.

Awfully naive, this chap.

[Peter T. Daniels]

On Monday, August 15, 2022 at 6:54:52 AM UTC-4, CDB wrote:
> On 8/15/2022 2:59 AM, Richard Heathfield wrote:
> > Bertel Lund Hansen wrote:
> >> Richard Heathfield:

> >>> Another very effective way to destroy socialist initiatives is
> >>> tax increases to the wealthy, driving them abroad and losing
> >>> their tax revenue altogether.
> >> Here you defend rich people.
> > No, sir. I neither defend nor attack them. I just point out the
> > effect of a myopic tax policy on the overall tax take. But your
> > mistake is a common one; you confuse objectivity with partisanship.
>
> I detect a degree of myopia: it is the rush towards globalisation that
> gives some support to your position. Those measures, which I have
> opposed since their beginning in Canada, make it possible for production
> to move offshore and escape taxes. Let the filthyrich live on the Costa
> del Sol, as long as their enterprises stay at home and pay taxes.

In the new bill, the US joins the global "15% minimum tax" on all
(international) corporations. (With considerable assets, watch
for multinationals to break themselves up into units just under
the minimum size.)

[Peter T. Daniels]

On Monday, August 15, 2022 at 7:06:59 AM UTC-4, Richard Heathfield wrote:
> On 15/08/2022 11:54 am, CDB wrote:
> > On 8/15/2022 2:59 AM, Richard Heathfield wrote:

> >> governments can set the tax rate as
> >> high
> >> as they wish without fear of prosecution.
> > But not without electoral consequences.
>
> This turns out not to matter, since the choice is between sides
> that are increasingly difficult to distinguish.

In England?

(Where the system is rigged so that the Out party never has
a chance to make its case.)

> > You have described a brutal
> > dictatorship.
>
> Not brutal, no. Just a dictatorship of do as I say, not as I do,
> with a mechanism in place for occasionally voting out the
> dictator and voting in a new one. And you must vote for a
> dictator (or a dictator's party) because, if you don't, the wrong
> dictator might get in.

Where only a tiny minority of the people have a say in which
dictator they're going to get.

[Mack A. Damia]

I think the adaptations that I am aware of are decidedly
anti-communist. Theoretical communism is highly "democratic"
embracing democraric principles. In Marxist theory, a new democratic
society will arise through the organised actions of an international
working class enfranchising the entire population and freeing up
humans to act without being bound by the labour market. I see more
totalitarianism is today's "communist" nations.

A capitalist economy is not democratic.

[David Kleinecke]

Assuming civilization does not collapse people in the far distant
future will not understand how wage slavery is better or different
than chattel slavery.

[Mack A. Damia]

Most of us suffer from a kind of collective cognitive dissonance. The
political system is largely democratic based on equality while the
economic system is based on inequality. We may not be able to explain
this dilemma, but it is palpable. Consequently, why is there so much
(displaced) anger and rage?

[lar3ryca]

I can only hope there will be electoral consequences in Canada. There
should have been some in the last election, or more fittingly, there
should have been jail terms for the leader.

--
roses are 0xFF0000
violets are 0x0000FF
all my base
are belong to you

[Anders D. Nygaard]

Den 15-08-2022 kl. 13:06 skrev Richard Heathfield:
> On 15/08/2022 11:54 am, CDB wrote:
>> On 8/15/2022 2:59 AM, Richard Heathfield wrote:
>
> <snip>
>
>>> governments can set the tax rate as high
>>> as they wish without fear of prosecution.
>>
>> But not without electoral consequences.
>
> This turns out not to matter, since the choice is between sides that are
> increasingly difficult to distinguish.
>
>> You have described a brutal
>> dictatorship.
>
> Not brutal, no. Just a dictatorship of do as I say, not as I do, with a
> mechanism in place for occasionally voting out the dictator and voting
> in a new one. And you must vote for a dictator (or a dictator's party)
> because, if you don't, the wrong dictator might get in.

There are other political and electoral systems than the British and
American ones, you know. Ones where "compromise" is not a dirty word,
and where dictators are close to impossible.

But I admit that the sides are increasingly difficult to distinguish
here too.

/Anders, Denmark

[CDB]

On 8/15/2022 7:06 AM, Richard Heathfield wrote:

> CDB wrote:
>> Richard Heathfield wrote:

>> <snip>

>>> governments can set the tax rate as high as they wish without
>>> fear of prosecution.

>> But not without electoral consequences.

> This turns out not to matter, since the choice is between sides that
> are increasingly difficult to distinguish.

>> You have described a brutal dictatorship.

> Not brutal, no. Just a dictatorship of do as I say, not as I do, with
> a mechanism in place for occasionally voting out the dictator and
> voting in a new one. And you must vote for a dictator (or a
> dictator's party) because, if you don't, the wrong dictator might get
> in.

Alas, there are only humans (mortal, guilty) to work with.

Our system allows for the rise of new parties. Even in the US,
committed to a two-party system, there is talk of a new moderate party
that would attract members from the less extreme supoerters of both
current parties. These things take time.

--
Actually, IMO it's dogs that are entirely beautiful.

[CDB]

On 8/15/2022 3:20 PM, lar3ryca wrote:

The electoral consequence we need will come in the form of a new party,
or at least the old two-winged Liberals (campaign from the left, govern
from the right) or old NDP. Even the old PC party looks good by
comparison with what's there now.

--
Stanfield, the greatest Prime Minister Canada never had.

[Bill Boei]

Of what would you have convicted him, based on what evidence?

bill

[Mack A. Damia]

On Mon, 15 Aug 2022 08:03:38 +0530, Madhu <eno...@meer.net> wrote:

Thorstein Veblen wrote "The Theory of the Leisure Class" and coined
the term, "conspicuous consumption" to describe their habits.

Also, remarkable that capitalism demands conflict and competition
while communism demands cooperation and consensus.

[lar3ryca]

Acceptance of gifts, as noted by the ethics commissioner.
Attempted interference in the Justice department's stance on the SNC
Lavelin corruption affair.
Use of public funds for personal vacations.

Or do you think that wannabe dictator should not be held accountable for
those things?

--
Which side of a chicken has more feathers?
The outside.

[David Kleinecke]

From a theoretical point of view communism rejects neither conflict
nor competition. It just wants to make them more benign. The
specific conflict Marx objected to was employee/slavery. He was
acute enough to see how little the difference was between the
servitude of the wage slave from that of the chattel slave. Most of
the misery is caused by the bosses seizing the profits generated
by the workers. At that point he, or maybe it was Engels, lost track
of most of humanity and focused on factory workers. He imagined
the workers as the owners - consensus management. I think he
never realized that the notion of worker-management was so close
to government management. But perhaps that can be undone.
The developed countries have gone a good distance in that direction.

[Mack A. Damia]

Theoretically, the only examples of "communism" that have actually
worked out are the communes that have existed throughout the world.
Many times they are associated with faith-based groups but not
necessarily. They generally exist in rural areas and involve farming.
There are thousands world-wide. Cooperation and consensus are
cumpulsory. Many of them are short-lived, but some are quite
successful. "The Farm" in Tennessee was founded in 1971.

[Peter T. Daniels]

Doubtless some kibbutzim are now more than a century old.

(Oh, and their lifestyle is resolutely secular. They may keep kosher
and observe the Sabbath (to the extent that any farming community
can), but you don't hear of Orthodox (or beyond) kibbutzim.)

Noam Chomsky started his political life as a sort of "secular Zionist,"
with dreams or Arabs and Jews laboring side by side to create a
great, peaceful nation of Israel.

It didn't actually work out that way,

[Mack A. Damia]

Yes, I had not thought of the kibbutz system, but I have read that it
is unique to Israel. Supported and subsidized by the state,
kibbutzniks appear to possess a privileged status.

https://www.dw.com/en/israeli-kibbutz-communal-idealism-or-a-privileged-few/a-19261240

[Arindam Banerjee]

> The developed countries have gone a good distance in that direction.t

Communism minus Marxism plus Buddhism and plus Confucianism, ignoring the central area Hinduism of the Cham, works wondrously in Vietnam.

[Arindam Banerjee]

A commissar explained the Govt. owns all, and leases to whoever will lease. Thus one must have some private property to begin with, to do the leasing. Or borrow. It us expected that the brightest will go for such leasing, as they can repay the loans. "We are very interested in clever people. They make money and create employment." No envy here, a contrast from the Indian situation where the primary goal of life is to pull the better person down.

Those not good for the private sector get work in the public sector where the pay is less but the management is indulgent.

Then there are those who have small shops, work in retail.

The Vietnamese we knew sold tasty hot rolls on the streets, ans served us pho, a kind of rice noidle soup. Nothing much better to sit in the cool outdoors on a small stool, eating pho. Very clean place, lots of light and flowers and lakes in Hanoi. The people are calm and peaceful, no sleaze or vulgarity anwhere on screen or public life. No hideous advertising.

There is only one party, so democracy has a different meaning here. Anyone can get elected, not on ideology and promises, but personal quality.

So all are employed, all seem happy on their little scooters, one day flows serenely into the next with little personal dramas no doubt.

My wife remarked that Calcutta wanted to be Hanoi, but evidently things sorta ganged awry.

Cheers,
Arindam Banerjee