There has been some confusion over the latest Russian article that I wrote with Jeff Sommers. Those of you who know my background know that there’s no way I ever could be a pro-Russian apologist.

What I am trying to encourage there is recognition that they need to set up a construction industry, not merely manufacturing as their perverse reading of “Marxism” led Stalin to do. The great failure of Russian capital investment was to ignoreconstruction — just look at what they built as far west as Dresden and Riga, buildings that were hopelessly crude with only a 20-year lifetime.

They have a steep learning curve in construction, and have to begin SOMEWHERE. Better to build condominiums and apartment buildings and office buildings than tanks.

One also could criticize China for building cities that are largely empty. My point was that the cost overruns are typical of most Olympics and other fairs. that’s endemic. I was pointing to the double standard at work.

For Russian economic planners, the fact that construction does not yield a “profit” (unless used for rack-renting) often means that the sector should be ignored. Or, under Stalin, it was viewed as a “consumer good,” not capital investment and thus was ignored. Jeff Sommers and I wrote this largely for Russian consumption along lines we’ve been urging them to follow in re-thinking their economic planning.