The Hidden Hand Hits Again

The BBC reports that rush privatize following the break-up of the Soviet Union brought with it a rise in mortality among men.

The UK study blames rapidly rising unemployment resulting from the break-neck speed of reform.

The researchers said their findings should act as a warning to other nations that are beginning to embrace widespread market reform. . . .

The researchers examined death rates among men of working age in the post-communist countries of eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union between 1989 and 2002.

They conclude that as many as one million working-age men died due to the economic shock of mass privatisation policies.

Following the break up of the old Soviet regime in the early 1990s at least a quarter of large state-owned enterprises were transferred to the private sector in just two years.

This programme of mass privatisation was associated with a 12.8% increase in deaths.

The latest analysis links this surge in deaths to a 56% increase in unemployment over the same period.

But privatization is always good! So says Alan Greenspan, Margaret Thatcher, Lawrence Summers, Rahm Emmanuel, Bill Clinton, and on and on.