EXPIRES: 2005
WRITTEN: 1989
The Soviet economy is proof that, contrary to what many skeptics had earlier believed, a socialist command economy can function and even thrive.
Paul A. Samuelson
Economics, 13th edition, McGraw-Hill, 1989, with a convergence graph showing Soviet GDP potentially overtaking US GDP between 2000 and 2010
Written: 1989
Addressed to: 2000-2010
Source: Economics
Author: Paul A. Samuelson
Category: Governance
Annotation
Samuelson's best-selling economics textbook included a graph showing Soviet and American GDP converging, with the Soviet line potentially overtaking the American one. This appeared in the 1989 edition — the year the Berlin Wall fell. It remains a canonical example of how even Nobel laureates can be systematically misled by official statistics from authoritarian regimes.
What Actually Happened
The Soviet Union dissolved in 1991, two years after publication. Russian GDP collapsed by roughly 40% during the 1990s.
#soviet-union#economics#GDP#textbook#nobel-laureate
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