this post was submitted on 24 Feb 2026
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In China a notable example is the raising of the median income significantly, to almost 40k USD last I checked, essentially lifting a huge amount of people out of poverty.
The USSR raised life expectancy and HDI significantly, and when it collapsed both fell sharply in the resulting countries.
Was that income after Deng opened up China as the world's manufactory? That giant amount of support from capital seems to be more effective than any decision communism made.
You cannot take that "support" out of the context of the decisions made by communists. Without the efforts made in "Mao-era" china, agriculture, industrialization, education, etc., the reform and opening up would likely have gone differently, china would probably look more like India and Brazil. And during (and after) reform and opening up, china actively steered the economy and set priorities, they continued to hold, as dessalines points out, the commanding heights of the economy, and used 5 year plans. So yes, you can say it was the "support" (capital) that came into china which made them richer, but only in context.
Reform and Opening Up was a plan devised by communists to more quickly achieve communism, and was made in such a fashion that built upon the existing socialist system, not undermining it.
Both Mao and Deng era's both had foreign investment, and high growth rates compared to capitalist countries.
Both are still built on the foundation of socialism: 5 year plans, no private land ownership, public ownership commanding the heights of the economy, and a smaller capitalist sector for foreign investment.
it did a lot of harm before the party leaders learned how to control it and it led to occupy wall street style protests in the late 80's which included the tiannamen square protest.
that event forced the party to devise ways to neuter the harmful aspects of capitalism that were taking root in the country because of deng's reforms and it's been a continuous try/fail effort ever since.