The Soviets - Ivan's War

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i read recently a phenomenally interesting book called ivan's war, ah, by katherine meridel. And she chronicles the sort of daily of the soviet soldier in warwar too. Tny issue with that is that i'm not really sure what kind of growth they actually had. An alternative explanation is that there was a measurement issue. When people became part of industry rather than agriculture, a lot of stuff that wasn't being measured is output. That's one issue. Second is, i think it was mismeasuredi

Daron Acemoglu of MIT and author (with James Robinson) of Why Nations Fail talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the ideas in his book: why some nations fail and others succeed, why some nations grow over time and sustain that growth, while others grow and then stagnate. Acemoglu draws on an exceptionally rich set of examples over space and time to argue that differences in institutions--political governance and the inclusiveness of the political and economic system--explain the differences in economics success across nations and over time. Acemoglu also discusses how institutions evolve and the critical role institutional change plays in economic success or failure. Along the way, he explains why previous explanations for national economic success are inadequate. The conversation closes with a discussion of the implications of the arguments for foreign aid and attempts by the wealthy nations to help nations that are poor.