Was Yugoslavia Actually A Good State? (Not really)

[@LivingIronicallyinEurope]

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[@SteveInLava]

Titochad 🗿

[@officialneverfar]

pookie i will enjoy it

[@officialneverfar]

@@SteveInLava tito pusi draza chad

[@bunk_foss]

🟦🟦🟦🟦🟦 ⬜⬜⭐⬜⬜ 🟥🟥🟥🟥🟥

[@bunk_foss]

Bring back the superpower.

[@madace1870]

I lived in Yugoslavia for about 5 months and then tanks appeared and it was over or to quote my mom: "Čim si se ti rodio, sve je otišlo u kurac"

[@tommyschmierer4627]

😂🤣🤣 damn ...

[@Simon1si]

Lol

[@tomato9349]

Your fault

[@tunityguy]

​@@tomato9349 bot

[@rich1.3o3]

​@@tunityguywdym bot

[@befeleme]

For us, Czechoslovaks of the 70's and 80's, Yugoslavia was a paradise. To be able to go there for holidays was a dream - but still far more realistic than travelling to the West. The iron curtain was porous on the Yugoslavian border. Unlike with all the other communist states, the Yugoslavs did not shoot people who tried to escape it. I took advantage of this in 1981 when I illegally crossed the border to Austria and ended up in a refugee camp in the town of Traiskirchen from where I eventually ended up in Australia and never returned. I will forever be grateful to Tito for having made this possible. Yugoslavia literally saved my life!

[@slavicemperor8279]

@@befeleme We actually had a lot of immigrants jump into our borders with bullet wounds from their own country's border guard, particularly Romanians. Thousands risked lives trying to escape into Yugoslavia

[@HenryBanrson]

Hello Dear 💐

[@andysemenov1131]

As someone from Russia, I deeply regret what the USSR did to the countries of Eastern Europe. Without the USSR's influence, your country would've enjoyed more freedom (more than zero)

[@lukalevstek7851]

In Yugoslavia did shoot on people who tried to run away! There were soldiers patrolling the mauntins on border with Austria and they were usually Serbian.

[@danielm6319]

Tito didn't save your life. It's state, country and border and military officials and personell who decide not to shoot. Btw, Tito was in Russian jail during WW1 as Austrian (Croatian) soldier.

[@thatjunkerguy5392]

Kind of Ironic how, during the cold war, Yugoslavia was the only european communist country that was almost seen as a utopia compared to the backwater countries of the eastern bloc. But during the 90's, it seemed that most of the ex-eastern bloc countries were looking toward a brighter future free from communism, while the ex-yugoslav countries sat in the rubble of their once prospering state

[@nirol1539]

yugoslavia would be one of strongest european countries if tito didnt die and greedy serbs tried to make great serbia again, heck if serbia was left out of union,yugoslavia would be 5 times stronger

[@zx921]

That's because Western countries didn't bother making propaganda against Yugoslavia in order to have good relations with it and ensure its neutrality in case of a wide european war.

[@aurelije]

​@@zx921YU had military airports built by NATO standards, Koca Popovic was making plans for joint defense of Italy and Greece, we had alliance with Greece and Turkey as NATO members and had mobilization i 1956 and 1968

[@tommyschmierer4627]

@@nirol1539 that's just not true ... But anyway... ✌🏽❤️ bro

[@tommyschmierer4627]

@@zx921 it was Tito that wanted neutrality and not the other way around ... ✌🏽❤️

[@ChipitaDraws]

Another flaw I see as an outsider is how much the system relied on Tito as a strong-man figurehead. After his death nobody was able to fill his shoes.

[@ssir5927]

There was a successor, he just happened to die in a very suspicious plane crash in 1977...

[@alexouretski115]

The fate of all personified dictatorships is very similar and due to its very nature they can only exist while their dictator is in alive and in power.

[@TurtleChad1]

One thing is for sure. What happened after it fell was definitely not good.

[@sayori265]

turtle guy is everywhere

[@echidnanatsuki882]

Slovenia and Croatia laughing at this comment

[@TrisMacLife]

You’re everywhere lil bro

[@johnmccarthy6775]

What dude? Lol​@@echidnanatsuki882

[@slavicemperor8279]

@@echidnanatsuki882 Croatia and Slovenia stacked up so much foreign debt in last few decades they exceed the debt of entire Yugoslavia at it's absolute worst. Sure, the standard of living is higher than in other republics, but they're far from being good economies

[@stefanatanasov4336]

18,9b$ of foreign debt while the gdp is 70b$ makes the foreign debt at at around 30% of gdp, which is very low, at least by today standard.

[@HenryBanrson]

Hello Dear 💐

[@hmerki]

Stefane, nemoj vjerovati u to. Jugoslavija je praktički bankrotirala 80tih godina samo to nitko nije imao hrabrosti priznati. Zapad je prestao financirati kreditima i pomagati idiotski socijalistički sustav. Krediti su došli na naplatu jer krediti se moraju i vraćati. Ne može se vječno živjeti na dug. I što su komunisti tj. glupi političari napravili. Donijeli su odluku da naštampaju još novca i još novca. Dinar je slabio jer ga nitko nije htio. Brutalna inflacija, svi odmah mijenjaju dinar za njemačku marku. Nestašice goriva jer ti nitko ne želi prodati gorivo jer ne žele tvoj dinar, a ti nemaš niti dolara niti maraka. Dakle, Jugoslavija je bankrotirala, a socijalizam se urušavao kao kula od karata u Poljskoj, Čehoslovačkoj, Mađarskoj, Rumunjskoj, Bugarskoj i na kraju i u Jugoslaviji.

[@dzonikg28]

@@stefanatanasov4336 Yugoslavia gdp calculated by modern standards would be much higher, Yugoslavia had free Healthcare, education, there was no ownership tax, and only that is close to 50% off USA GDP and in Yugoslavia was 0, not to mention so many stuff were not taxed, like every city had multiple green markets where tax was 0

[@natebox4550]

@@dzonikg28And then it collapsed due to internal strife. It wouldn’t exist today, it would collapse all the same.

[@pileckipilecki3724]

Which is a clear sign of an economic assassination.

[@alekodoko5789]

I mean compared to Soviet aligned Bulgaria, and the land of paranoia and misery that was Albania. Yugoslavia was amazing

[@willbass2869]

Making comparisons to Albania is a pretty low bar to clear.....

[@HeathenDance]

@@willbass2869 Socialist Albania was a great, respected, independent and honourable country. Enver Hoxha was top notch marxist-leninist leader.

[@willbass2869]

@@HeathenDance I like your sarcasm, you saucy girl ....

[@dom8929]

Bro except Croatia all the rest of u are poor af . Yugoslavia was always a garbage and today’s Serbia is shithole . 100 time summer vacations in Albania than Serbia .its funny that you try to show power when u never was something important

[@lypcizhenaf8988]

@@HeathenDanceI am myself albanian, and no person who lived through hoxha likes him. Only Those who were employed by the party. People legit got arrested for saying “Oh my God”

[@slavicemperor8279]

Honestly, I don't think Yugoslavia was by any means perfect, it's just that it's successor states (one of which I was born in) are riddled with ineffective governments, corruption, debt and generally seen as completely irrelevant on global scale. Yugoslavia was once seen as powerful player in Cold War that could be a useful ally to both East and West, and this role was somehow reduced to a few microstates serving as military bases for NATO and travel destinations for Western tourists with very weak future prospects. This ,,lost glory" is the primary reason why Yugoslavia is remembered fondly by a lot of people here, in my opinion.

[@Wert-vl2dy]

I mean it was useful as a buffer between Nato and the Warsaw pact but it was nowhere near a great power

[@ticijevish]

There are no NATO bases on any of the countries of the former Yugoslavia. There is a NATO peacekeeping mission in Kosovo at the moment, but that does not count as a NATO base.

[@Asterion_Mol0c]

​@@Wert-vl2dyit was a strong continental power but that's about it

[@d3thkn1ghtmcgee74]

Dont forget it was a founder member of the non aligned movement

[@ARES-zf5fz]

@@Wert-vl2dyIt was a great power on a global scale. Here in Mexico, we still remember Yugoslavia with endearment, our countries exchanged so many good things, mostly in cultural aspects, plus being nonaligned was crucial at that time.

[@jakobschleicher9062]

I'm from both sides of the Iron Curtain, and in my childish experience: Yugoslavia was much better. Yes, there was the stench of chemicals, two- stroke engines and coal, too - but the people! Much more engagement, satisfaction, optimism and happiness than in the classical, Stalin-influeced "communist" countries. And THEY COULD LEAVE to work somehere else! It was fascinating in comparison....

[@MrSloika]

The people who worked abroad sent back heaps of foreign currency to relatives...US Dollars, Canadian Dollars, Australian Dollars, Deutsche Marks, Austrian Shillings, Swiss Francs, etc.

[@gareginnzhdehhimself]

The Yugoslav government actually encouraged people to work abroad. They had a very high population of skilled workers and educated people but also high unemployment. Those working abroad sent remittances back home. A lot of poor countries still do this today.

[@RobespierreThePoof]

What a life experience you have had. Your story doesn't surprise me, but I'm a historian. As a child Yugoslavia was always a mystery to me. I knew it was different somehow but no one in the West could explain it to me.

[@eranbenavraham]

I'm Australian and lived in Yugoslavija for 2 years as a kid. I loved it. I returned again after the war and visited Ex Jugoslav states every couple of years. I moved to Novi Sad in 2020. Crazy, I've never been a socialist or communist but I loved Jugoslavija.

[@slavadoko556]

Yugoslavia was the most unsuccessful European country of the 20th century. There is no country in Europe that, in its seventy years of existence, from December 1918 to January 1992, was created twice and dissolved twice in seas of blood of its citizens - in the world, interstate and civil wars of its "South Slavic tribes" and its "brotherly peoples and nationalities". The first Yugoslavia lasted less than 22 years, and the second less than 47 years - together they survived less than the average lifespan of European citizens. All economic and political arrangements were tried to preserve that country: it was capitalist and socialist, monarchical and republican, unitary and federalist, pluralist and monist, the king's right-wing and the marshal's left-wing dictatorship. She was in the West and the East, undecided and unaligned. Nothing helped. She used the most violent methods of dealing with war enemies and political opponents. Yugoslav military forces killed tens of thousands of Croatian, Slovenian and other prisoners of war and civilians in Slovenia and Austria after the formal end of the war in 1945. This was not discussed in historiography and politics until the collapse of the state, partly because the state hid and erased the traces. of her crimes and because she forced millions of inhabitants to remain silent through intimidation - to live in a kind of schizophrenia in which they could not forget the past and were not allowed to remember it.

[@BobSaint]

In words of Abdulah Sidran: "No, Yugoslavia wasn't good. But even if it were 10X worse, it'd still be 10X better than what we have today."

[@HeathenDance]

Lol, damn, that's pretty shitty (today.)

[@BobSaint]

@@HeathenDance You bet.

[@figurapatrik]

As somone, who grown up next to the border of Hungary and Serbia. I mostly heard that from the older generations, that Yugoslavia was their "window to the west". They bought there better quality clothing, foreign vinyls and a lot of stuff, which was not avaible in our country. They were even sometimes jealous to their relatives who lived there. And from the perspective from some one, who did serbian studies in uni, the culture (music, poetry) was more vibrant in Yugoslavia than the countries in the Eastern Bloc.

[@TheLoyalOfficer]

I will say this about Tito - while flawed, he was not a crook. He cleverly shook down the superpowers for aid, and then he made sure that it was not stolen.

[@TheLoyalOfficer]

@GreenFiatMultiplaMPV I largely agree with you, but I would like to add: Yugoslavia became Tito, and Tito became Yugoslavia. I'm shocked that Yugoslavia even lasted the eleven years that it did after Tito died in 1980.

[@CrazyAndMadz]

@GreenFiatMultiplaMPV You know Tito was a Croat, right?

[@yogisub8648]

@@CrazyAndMadz He was half-Croatian (Father) half-Slovenian (Mother). He was born 5 minute walk from Slovenia-Croatia border but on the Croat side.

[@greenockscatman]

IMF money printer goes brr

[@akrecu]

@GreenFiatMultiplaMPV are you from the region? your way of thinking is very different, that's why I ask

[@bigpapa8225]

One of the best descriptions I have heard for SFR Yugoslavia came from an old Croat man I met in Dubrovnik: “it was a charming mess”

[@mandalePP1999]

Probably a fascist ustaša

[@ila9063]

this is such a poetic description. my parents agree.

[@health019]

Macedonia becoming independent and now realizing their once again trapped in the boxing ring with bulgaria and greece

[@Yalbou]

They wanted to be in yugoslavia. But when war started in slovenia and criatia, and when milisovich started making plans with greece to divide macedonia, there was no point staying in yugoslavia any more

[@health019]

this is based on the past, joining with Serbia is even more unrealistic then joining with Bulgaria atp

[@damyr]

@@health019 Truth to be told, Macedonians are Bulgarians. The same genes, the same language and the same alphabet... Why not to admit that?

[@Mastakilla91]

@@Yalbou Milosevic never made such plans.

[@GromobranGromobranski]

​@@damyr The alphabet is not the same it is different. The language is similar but that is true even if you compere Macedonian to Serbo-Croatian The genes of the Macedonians and Bulgarians might be close but only because many Bulgarians have Macedonian origins since many Macedonians settled in Bulgaria after the Balkan Wars. The Macedonians also have the same genes with today so called Greeks in Aegean Macedonia because the same reason

[@jovanajelic-d3s]

0:44 Gallup poll questiion was "Did Yugoslav breakup hurt your country" so it's not about loving or hating Yugoslavia.

[@vardekpetrovic9716]

Oostalgie.

[@HenryBanrson]

Hello jovana 💐

[@flipogreen]

@@vardekpetrovic9716 ja genau

[@Chaosproscho]

at 08:30 you mention the large external debt at 93% of the GDP. However it should also be mentioned that today for serbia, slovenia and croatia their external debt also hovers somewhere between 70 and 80% of GDP. While France, Italy, Spain, Portugal and not to forget especialy greece the USA are all way above 100% and you don't see any of those falling apart anytime soon or have their economic systems break down or considered "propped up" by outside forces like the IMF.

[@mishaf19]

The difference is large economies can afford big debts due to strong control over their currency. Yugoslavia did not have a strong currency so debt hit them harder, that’s why greece sank into the swamp due to debt, the Euro was not in their control.

[@ReaperCH90]

The amount of debt / gdp doesn't matter if the interest rate is low. Now who do you think pays a higher interest rate, the USA or Serbia?

[@methatis3013]

"you don't see any of these falling apart any time soon" Well, Greece sure seems so...

[@TheStepa85]

Pensions are paid from yearly budget in Serbia, around 5 billion euros per year. There is no independent pension fund, or private pension funds, that pay out pensions from dividends. So one should add around 100-130 billion euros to Serbia dept, and that would push it above 100%. Slovenia and Croatia - dont know

[@greggor07]

Yeah, the issue isn't the public debt itself but the capability of a country to repay it and the strength of its currency. I only have informations for Croatia where the debt fell from 85% of GDP when we entered the EU to 65% last year. This year it'll probably drop to under 60%. This happened due to a responsible fiscal policy, the fact that our currency had been pegged to the euro basically since the introduction of kuna in 1994. - way before we even applied to the EU ascension, and very low inflation. Last year we finally switched to the euro altogether, over the last couple of years our economy has been growing at the second fastest rate in the EU, unemployment is at the all time low, the credit rating has for the first time gotten into the A- category and the inflation has finally dropped almost to the 2019. levels.

[@neromastic4512]

My Grandfather (That still lives today from the date I write) was a Yougoslavian Soldier He told me of his experience in the Army as well as the war that happened (My father was also in the war) He told me how he had pretty much everything and anything someone could want,as for example Bosnian as our family was,we were technology wise far behind any other country by many century. Only after WW2 all became more better when Yugoslavia formed and as it say all were equal,as many were on the bottom that were brought up to the same level of all aspects in life. While my Grandfather had been a farmer and held animals,the army needed people and paid them alongside too,he didnt got much and had to give 70% of what he got to the state,but as his experience he had everything a simple living human could need in that time period. Music,Food,Shelter,Clothes and much more,heck even military training. While my grandfather was a full fledged Yugoslavian Soldier,my father was a Conscripted soldier right before the breakup of Yugoslavia,a war he wanted to stay away from at all costs. My mother told me how she and my grandmother would hide in the hut where the corn was drying up while my father and grandfather where fighting on a higher hill in the area they lived. Both my Father and Grandfather said that "We were fighting our own brother's and it hurt so much to the soul" but they had no other choice Even when the NATO came in to stop it all the fighting,it was difficult to tell who was who's side on. Apart from the War,Yugoslavia was with culture quite rich in every way possible like food,music,parades,art and many more,even technology and small innovations that were quite nice. You could get to a caffee each morning and expect to see people chatting,driving all kinds of beverages,in some city you would find music playing with a live performance,even the Olympics where on it too for the sport part. The Country had everything what was balanced between Democracy and Socialism in my perspective,if it only addressed the many things that were flawed in the country,we could still see it to this day. I can write more stories my grandfather would tell me about Yugoslavia,but would take a long time and a paragraph as long as this,but stretching 10x. One thing is for certain,Yugoslavia was alright for its time.

[@user-vy2hv5pp7k]

@@neromastic4512 Bosnia was one of the countries most hurt by the breakup, current system in place is horribly inefficient

[@HenryBanrson]

Hello Dear 💐

[@neromastic4512]

@@user-vy2hv5pp7k I am aware,I am bosnian

[@Teutius]

How exactly was Bosnia centuries ahead technologically???

[@neromastic4512]

@Teutius we were not if you read correctly Ahead of its own past,as Bosnia was more or less just peasants in the past,and that's to Cold War Era all the technology advanced equally across Yugoslavia Who would afford it depends on the situation you've made yourself. Like having multiple children and / or getting yourself in debt somehow. I can remember when PC's were introduced and my father would buy the first one from the shelves long before anyone would As we would not waste money on going to clubs or gambling it away.

[@LivingIronicallyinEurope]

Also, when I say Rakosi, meant Kadar. Just an FYI

[@hank780]

nem baj az, főtörzs

[@gamer468]

egy kutya

[@milsu6282]

I grew up in Yugoslavia and the sudden break up has left life-long trauma! A lot of the information you presented is correct. However, to truly understand why so many still see break-up of the country as unfavourable, you would have had to have lived there! It is not all about economics, though economics did play a big part! It was also largely to do with the social, cultural and family values that Yugoslavs held close to their heart. To really understand this, it would require a paradigm shift. Western values are all based on free market economics. Everything is seen through dollars. And yes, there's an enormous wealth generated, but somehow there's still a huge homelessness issue, cost of living crises, drugs and crime issues, none of which Yugoslavia had (or were contained in tiny pockets at a minuscule scale).

[@DanieĺȘerban-s6z]

The West is hell in earth. Egotistical people runing after money. Yugoslavia was way better, very humane.

[@katr2773]

THIS!!

[@fica375]

I grew up in ex-Yugoslavia. I had the best childhood experiences a western kid can only dream of..freedom, lots of friends, and unsurpassed safety

[@harromsi9227]

I'm sure for the slavs it was better than hell

[@fica375]

@@harromsi9227 I’m not sure I understand your point. Are you implying that Slavs were happy because they never experienced life in the west ?

[@dzonikg28]

@@harromsi9227 People in the west could never understand it, also guy who made this video and who never actyaly lived in Yugoslavia

[@fica375]

@@dzonikg28 Razumem))

[@JessicaDainese]

My (Italian) parents went to Yugoslavia for their honeymoon in 1973. They loved it.

[@pc_paintrain3304]

The first time I saw someone looking for food out of a trash bin was in a country in Western Europe, not in Yugoslavia.

[@SelfProclaimedEmperor]

Thats because in Yugoslavia, the homeless were simply taken away and disappeared.

[@Ezekiel_B_Gruntfuttock]

@@SelfProclaimedEmperor Pretty much this. Poverty implies incompetence, and you cant have people thinking the Socialist Regime is inept, can you?

[@denisplazanin6967]

@@SelfProclaimedEmperor thats not true. total nonsense

[@grgacvarak1267]

@@SelfProclaimedEmperor So not true. There was no homeless people in socialist yugoslavija. Even more, many families had several properties. In addition to apartments in the city, which were practically given by the state, people kept houses in the countryside where they came from, but also built weekend houses on the coast. I'm not saying that everything was perfect, and it wasn't the same in all parts of Yugoslavia, but a certain level of social security and stability was guaranteed to everyone. There were no millionaires like in the west, but we had houses and we were the owners of the lands we cultivated, and the idea of ​​real estate tax that Europe is now slowly imposing on us did not even exist. It is a certain kind of wealth and freedom that people raised in the West rarely understand. From our perspective, Americans are significantly poorer because if you have to pay taxes on your property, then it's not your property, you're just renting it from the state. If you lose your job due to illness, crisis or any other reason, you also lose those assets. And what's all the money worth if you can't even own your own house. Ultimately, money is just paper, land is real.

[@dhmhtrhsantwnoloukas4492]

​@@SelfProclaimedEmperor Or maybe the state cared for the well being of it's people and built facilities to accommodate and feed the less fortunate ones instead of leaving them to fend for themselves in the streets?

[@navisolim]

It was ok, kind of... It wasnt that different for a average citizen. People who speak about it in a good sence are more nostalgic for theyr youth and lets face it 90% people look back at theyr 20s as probably the best part of theyr life.

[@Lucian00311]

In Romania, we call the people that rant about the "good old times" as "pupincuristi" (means subservient, read as a$$ kissers). Those were the people that during the communist regime either held positions of power, or had family members or close friends in such positions and could abuse their status to live a good life. To be fair, they probably had a good time... unlike everyone else.

[@damyr]

That's exactly what I wanted to say. I lived in ex-yu, but I can't say it was actually better than today. The only thing which was "better" was that there were no big financial gaps/differences between majority of people, like for instance - today. That's how little is needed for more happiness in the world - just less financial gaps between people. As long as there are rich classes, most of other will try to reach their level... and that brings so many problems in society, like envy, greed and corruption.

[@rubatsch1713]

@@Lucian00311 The people who are nostalgic about Yugoslavia aren't necessarily from an elevated social tier though. Many of them simply loved that the country was more relevant. They even hosted the Olympic games at one point. Pretty much unthinkable for any of those small countries now. Their country was even "multicultural" and "multiethnic", though, of course, to an average outsider they all kinda look the same and speak the same language. In addition, their youth basically escapes to live in Berlin, Vienna and the US/Canada where they connect with other ex yugoslavs, cause it simply feels right.

[@TheBorg01]

bruh its not just nostalgia its also hardcore facts about many things being better than currently !! Lets just start with basics like purchase power ... as stated by Zagrebs economic school dekan : Our purchase power in yugoslavia was 30% more than today ! meaning you get 30% more for your money.... and that was way before today infaltion , euro ,corona ,ukraine war !

[@damyr]

@@TheBorg01 That was true for about two decades after reconstruction... Until western and eastern powers stopped investing into Yugoslavia, trying to sway it on one or the other side.

[@john9353]

2 seconds in and Bosnia doesn't exist anymore, but Kosovo is a country. This is gonna be good.

[@lungeranon7645]

I noticed that right away. Wtf.

[@roblogez]

@@lungeranon7645 it is a joke

[@lungeranon7645]

@@roblogez 😂 K. I legit wasn’t sure because the “joke” wasn’t extended to Kosovo.

[@roblogez]

@@lungeranon7645 he commonly says that Kosovo is Hungarian and similarly autistic stuff, i mean the channel is just hungarian autism is somewhat verbal form

[@davidg5077]

Since it's a hot topic now in Serbia, do you plan to do a video about military service in the Balkan states? The shenanigans going on there and the state of it in general.

[@nikko4454]

same goes for croati first they offered like 800 euros for 2 months which is ok but its half a salary and the training was supposed to be in pozega which wasnt well recieved so nobody signed and now its mandatory as like a summer camp and they'll probably be ignoring students so no university baby (I am so fed up with this failure of a country)

[@CG-yq2xy]

If I remember correctly, in the Balkans alone, only Greece and Turkey have mandatory conscription for their male citizens. I think that the rest of the Balkan nations have either gone to a fully professionalized armed forces or they use it if the voluntary recruitment quota is low.

[@roblogez]

@@CG-yq2xy they want to start forced military service again in Serbia and no one is taking it well from the younger generations

[@rodneydelboy6910]

​@@CG-yq2xyCroatia reinstated it like a month ago

[@CG-yq2xy]

@@rodneydelboy6910 Damn, I guess you learn something new every day.

[@Springbok295]

Yugoslavia had it all, and the greedy blew it. Not to mention that once Tito died and the Wall came down, the country was bound to break up. The West no longer needed the country. My father ran a student exchange program with Yugo for 32 years 1960-1992. He tried, along with the University of Zagreb and the Uni of Belgrade, to see the merits of introducing a free market economy. Some listened, and others wanted nothing to do it, most notably the Serbian Academy in Belgrade (which was probably under the influence of the UDBA). My father never had a problem with the program when he was in Zagreb. I remember going to Pionirski Grad every Summer from 1973-1976, and most of the kids made fun of those from Bosnia as being rather thick-headed. I can't recall any animosity between kids from other ethnic groups. As Americans, my two sisters and I were quite the oddballs at the camp, being from the U.S.

[@aurelije]

Yugoslavia had pretty free market economy in comparison to other Socialistic countries. In YU price was not prescribed and engraved in product like in USSR but was negotiate on the market. Yes domestic market was protected from import by huge taxes and some foreign companies had to open joint venture factories in Yugoslavia to have their products sold in YU market. But that is what independent country does: protect itself

[@edwinhof2090]

Ante Markovic did try to reform the Yugoslav economy but was Milosevic and Tudjman sabotaged everything.

[@rabbidcrazy787]

Would reverting back to being the Kingdom of Yugoslavia save the country from breaking apart?

[@ivanalukic1612]

​@@rabbidcrazy787No, people seem to forget that before ww2 the kingdom was in a horrible position.

[@gulinp1]

@@aurelije I'ts bit more complicated than this. Yugoslavia didn't have free market ( nor export) until economic problems and 1960s. After economic growth from 1946-1950 on wave of post war rebuild, public actions, massive reconstruction and building or rebuilding factories and comunal buildings, economy started to die off, due inefficient prospect of planned economy. By 1965, Yugoslavia was alraedy in trouble and kept economy afloat by massive loans. In 1965 they are forced to open market to a world. But one other thing happened in that period. You could ( finally) get a fuck out of Yugoslavia. Before that it was illegal to leave Yugoslavia ( don't you just love concept of being trapped in broken country? Beautiful! ) But Yugoslavia didn't even bother to count them as people who left, economy was so broken that they liked idea of workers (over 1 million of them) working in Germany and Italy, but sending money to their families to Yugoslavia. From numbers i could gather, 70% of "temporary" workers- never returned, but whole families left fron Yugo. HOWEVER, opening market also started massive unimployment problems and that opened flood gates to first economic hell ( late 1970s, complete collapse 1980s ) and later war.

[@kg7162]

One things i like with Yugoslavia it's his foereign policies, the creation of the 3rd bloc non align with soviet bloc and western bloc

[@iGamezRo]

I went to Serbia a few months ago and went to an archaeological museum. There, they played us movie in Serbian with Romanian subbing. It was how the Yugoslav students found the prehistoric skeletons and tools of a civilisation that lived around the Iron Gate I area. I know they smiled and looked happy for the camera, but it seemed genuine. Not like any Romanian film of the time that I've seen. Even the 70 years old farmer whose field they dug seemed genuinely happy. Now that I realise, those students are mostly dead or 80 to 90 years old now.

[@greggor07]

In my opinion the generations nostalgic for Yugoslavia is mostly nostalgic about their own youth. I was a kid in the 1980s and personally I remember growing up not too much differently from the kids in the west. The country, at least from experience in Croatia and Slovenia had pretty much abandoned communism and started liberalization, both economically and socially. Western tourists were visiting in millions, I grew up with Commodore 64 computer, a VCR and a Sony Walkman...I remember listening to western music and watching western movies in the theaters; Alien, Superman 3, Terminator 1 and Top Gun were huge hits, there were no cues or empty shelfs at supermarkets...etc. We often went to shopping to Leibnitz, Klagenfurt or Graz in Austria for electronics that weren't available in stores back home or were actually cheaper there, or Trieste, Italy for the latest fashion. Crossing the borders to the west wasn't a problem at all. On the other hand I remember us going shopping for cheep food behind the iron curtain in Hungary a couple of times...and that was a bit traumatic, not gonna lie. First of all, there was a razor wire along the border, they had military and the guard towers on the border, even on regular border crossings. The most surreal thing was, the first people you'd meet weren't Hungarian but Soviet soldiers with frickin Kalashnikovs front and center, hands on the weapons. They would check your passport first. Then you had to pass the Hungarian soldiers serving as border guards at the second razor wire. Only once you'd pass them, you'd be controlled by the regular Hungarian police and customs officers. It was like something out of a movie. Quite an unpleasant experience, not really worth some cheep cheese and sausages, lol! I do remember the hyperinflation In Yugoslavia too. I was a dinar billionaire even as a kid. Alan Ford, a super popular comic book I was collecting would one week cost 10k dinars and the next week 25k dinars. The price of bread would regularly change on a daily basis. The topic of financial and economic reforms was a permanent fixture of daily news. I remember the constant strikes too. That said, my dad is a construction engineer and actually had a decent salary at the time but only because many Croatian construction companies, including his, had large projects abroad, mainly north Africa and the Middle East, so by working abroad he actually managed to earn significantly more. My mom as a lawyer in a large Zagreb company had an even better salary than my dad. I also remember so many people in Croatia and Slovenia alike, blaming the federal government for the economic crisis, plus the narrative about the two rich republics financing the poor ones was becoming increasingly popular throughout the '80s up to having become the dominant narrative by the end of that decade. So initially, as Slovenia and Croatia started giving up on Yugoslavia, it wasn't about ethnic background at all. That only came later as a response to Milošević's rhetoric. All in all, Yugoslavia was a very flawed country, but it wasn't a complete failure altogether. Not at all. In fact, regardless of its flaws it was still so much ahead of the Soviet block countries - all of them. Without nationalism and with proper reforms, including further decentralization, it might've even survived. At the very least it could've broken apart in a peaceful and civilized manner like Czechoslovakia.

[@dzonikg28]

I lived in 80s in Kragujevac Serbian part off Yugoslavia, i also got commodore 64 in 1986,had vcr, music station in my room, tons off cassettes, new house in suburbs, we lived nice life, we did not travel to west but to Croatia and Montenegro for vacations, only one time to Napples Italy, we had Adria camping trailer which my father bought in 1979,.. And everything with just my father working, my mother did not work, only when Serbia economy went to sht in 90s my mother got a job because my father salary went rock bottom

[@viking4476]

Yugoslavia had an incredible music scene. And to some extent it can be attributed to the fact that the state was much more liberal than other socialist states. Unfortunately, in that artistic freedom and self-management in economy and politics lies the germ of future wars, paradoxically. in the nineties. It would have been better for us to have stayed in the Eastern Bloc than to take a different path. If we were in the Warsaw Pact, there would be no wars in the nineties. It is so that there would be no such kind of cultural and economic creativity. We would listen to everything Moscow says, and after the collapse of socialism at the end of the eighties, we would turn to Brussels. In that case, we would have listened to them and peacefully disbanded. Like Czechoslovakia. This is how, through non-alignment and self-governance, we have developed a sense of uniqueness that will later lead to pride and nationalism.

[@tatjanarad]

Stay in the Eastern Block?? Yugoslavia wasn't in the Eastern Block, it was non-aligned.

[@YeDickrider]

yu-mex is my jam

[@anthropolis4427]

But there were also wars in Moldova and Azerbaijan and there were part of the Eastern block.

[@belstar1128]

most countries had good music in the 80s it was just a better time for that stuff everywhere form Switzerland to Angola it was all good. i am not sure why most people turned to techno and rap and "pop" in the late 90s and for the last 25 years music has been bad maybe even for over 30 years. speaking of brussels i am from Belgium and i noticed that while in the 90s most countries still made good music. it seems that a lot of the bad styles started here or in the Netherlands and got more popular world wide in the early 2000s and never went away.

[@dandaratramadol3007]

Very shallow view of history. Hatred amongst South Slavic peoples was not invented in the 90s, nor in the World War II.

[@Hostefar]

The balkaners knew they can not change society, so instead of reflecting on themselves they blamed the beasts...

[@IkeSan]

That Guilty Gear reference lmao

[@maximk9964]

Better than USSR, I'd bet (before watching the video). After watching: Yes, commie economies always suck, but at least Jugoslvija had the good sense of having some free market and was open to foreign products

[@Feffdc]

"Commie economies always suck" China and Russia laugh at you (Especially Russia considering what happened after communism)

[@TzuuiiZzz]

​@@Feffdc china is no way communist economy

[@royale7620]

​@@Feffdccommunist apologetic spotted

[@bibimir]

@@TzuuiiZzz it is socialist, though. Enemies of China: China bad because socialism! China doing good because capitalism, not socialism!!!

[@Boti-vr5hv]

​@@FeffdcChina has a communist government, but its economy is complete capitalism

[@Svevsky]

From what people around me say about the fall of the berlin wall (im east german) i guess people dont really miss the communism, they just feel cheated because capitalisn was supposed to be better, instead all they got was communism but with much more criminality and poverty

[@schurlbirkenbach1995]

People in Eastern Europe in those days had illusionistic ideas about capitalism.

[@Ved000000]

They thought they would get to keep the social safety net, cheap housing and universal healthcare, and other gains of socialism, while also getting all the treats and "freedom" of bourgeois society. Instead they lost what they had, the promise of capitalism proved to be a mirage, and now they have neither. Bird in the hand and so forth. No refunds.

[@dhmhtrhsantwnoloukas4492]

To be fair back during the cold war and for around 15 years after it capitalism worked quite well for the west. People could afford to buy cars, houses, expensive clothes and take loans (which they could usually repay). This has obviously changed since for a number of reasons. I didn't live in Yugoslavia or the DDR but from what I have read and seen life doesn't seem to have been too bad. Especially in Yugoslavia where you didn't have things like the mass surveillance that STASI did. Although I think the reunification didn't exactly help the former DDR too much. I have heard that many citizens of the DDR believe that instead of a reunification what happened was an annexation and the somewhat unique east german culture that was developed was destroyed.

[@gulinp1]

@@schurlbirkenbach1995 still doesn't change fact living in capitalism is x30000 better than in socialism (becuse it wasn't socialism but comunism , like always)

[@schurlbirkenbach1995]

@@gulinp1 x30000 times better ?

[@BalkanOdyssey_]

This is a great video, through and through. I appreciate the nuance and you highlighting both the positive achievements and the various flaws and negative aspects in a respectable and well-researched way. Although arguably there were plenty of more achievements that could've been mentioned in more detail (e.g. women's rights, cultural revival, literacy rates, housing solutions, internationalist foreign policy, opennes to the world, advocacy for sports etc.), I still think you did a great job staying quite objective. It's nice to see respect and credit where credit's due despite your clear ideological disagreements. There were a few unnecessary politically loaded phrases such as "communist dictatorship" and such which really don't mean anything - might as well call every capitalist country a "capitalist dictatorship" which is what it essentially is, a dictatorship of capital and the ruling class. Such inserts just feel like obligatory platitudes so nobody accuses you of being pro-communist. But I understand what you mean and nonetheless appreciate the result. As a communist myself, there isn't anything too dramatic I'd add or exclude when critiquing Yugoslavia, except maybe a bit more context as to why the flaws occured as they did and more emphasis on the positives. All in all great job man!

[@roblogez]

damn wasn't there some stupid drama between you two

[@markonehazard]

My 80 year old grandfather still says that it was the most humane system ever that only needed some changes to last.

[@d_rooster]

Choosing to ignore the Balkan comment wars below. I will say this. We (the leftover countries) have many of the same problems SFRJ had, and some more of our own. When we talk about how good or bad the old country was, we are trying to justify why we destroyed it and trying to convince ourselves that we are better off now. Looking at most of these countries, I would say "democracy" is far off, prosperity even farther. So, judge your own countries by their own merits and leave SFRJ to rest in peace. It wasn't good enough for you? Fine, lead by example then.

[@airrik2653]

Amazing how children of the people who were born and lived in the former Yugoslavia assume that they know BETTER than their parents what Yugoslavia was like back in the times of their parents' youth. Apparently it never occurs to them that they might have been brainwashed (yet they are sure their parents were)...😂

[@schurlbirkenbach1995]

That's in all countries the same. Said already my mother to me.

[@fica375]

@@airrik2653 I remember being asked by kids and adults alike if we had TVs in Yugoslavia back in the 80s? ))

[@Cucumber74]

Good point. I mean we were looking towards a better future back in Yugoslavia by learning, listening and remembering. For the social betterment of all. Now I come and visit Croatia and Bosnia and a better future is leaving for the west. Balkans have fallen in line with what the US has been peddling - individualism where others are just a walking dollar sign ready to be milked.

[@BoomKing72]

You mean their parents who did ethnic cleansing?

[@A_Haunted_Pancake]

People DO tend to develop rose-coloured glasses for the time of their youth. It takes exceptional hardship for older generations not to claim "things were so much better back then".

[@septentrioedit]

And why were they ''harmed''? Because the main source of income just became independent, Croatia and Slovenia making up 53,9 % of Yugoslavias GDP which was of course sent to Belgrade and distributed ''equally''

[@andrejfric3764]

I think one important factor was not mentioned in the video - the economical emigration. Many people went abroad to find work, mostly to Germany and France. At some point there was almost 20% of active population working abroad, saving money to later return and build houses or just send money to their families. Many stayed abroad. This had major 2 effects on Yugoslavia: apparently lower unemployment and also apparent wealth and development.

[@54032Zepol]

Rest in Power Yugoslavia! 1918-1992

[@erdood3235]

Appropriator

[@cathat9622]

Piss*

[@tonijelecevic9238]

Cringe

[@Hallo77756]

Pieces

[@bljet4388]

kingdom yes, satanist commie state after '45 no

[@23uncbball]

Great videos bro, balkans while not united now i feel will always have more in common with each other to be a family, even when dysfunctional and needing to improve economically.

[@DerDoMeN]

One funny side effect of Yugoslavia is that here in Slovenia I know a few people who have retired and have high pensions than you'd expect (for e.g. my father has a higher pension than I ever had the salary). And the surprising part is that all those people either had less paying less important public jobs after Slovenia's independence or (like in case of my father) had jobs with grander titles and far more people under their control while having only the top boss above them but still the reason for the high pensions is the inflation adjustment of the salaries they got back in the Yugoslavia days. To the extent where some wanted to work some more but went into pension due to the fact that their current Slovenian salaries would lower their pension if they'd continue working and retire later. Just one more fun fact that makes it hard to say what time was good and what bad :) (but at least we no longer have to go to Austria to get the diapers and can buy random plastic garbage in our local shops :) )

[@54032Zepol]

yall hear about how Albania making a new nation associated as a Muslim Vatican in southern Albania?

[@deongjoni7896]

yeah at least albania will have a record now

[@Loterrach]

@@deongjoni7896 Yeah, at least Albania will be relevant now (not)

[@2SSSR2]

Not surprising move giving that recently more and more Albanians are becoming Christians again.

[@cukko]

only country in europe to have islam as its official state religion idk how that will be received in Western europe

[@jowilkie8477]

I just went to Albania. Supposed to be 50% Muslim but they all drink! Two biggest UK female stars. Dua Lipa and Rita Ora. Albanian.

[@SuperRemion]

Never trust anyone comparing now vs. then. Memories of „back then“ distort over time as emotions are disconnected from what we remember. Tough and depressing times, maybe with an occasional suicidal thought, become “life was good back then” in memory, while emotions from recent events get exaggerated because they can be felt right now.

[@rincontibio7664]

A professor once explain Yugoslavia as "a Father that takes loans with no intention to pay" the subsequent crisis as "the only thing he left you and your siblings is a debt to pay and no job" and the Yugoslav wars as "also all of you hate each other, since he never bother to teach any of you what brotherhood and family means"

[@renchsf5]

For me, Yugoslavia in a nutshell compared to micro states that formed after it, was: You had a life, a house, in many cases multiple houses, vacation every year and you had a decent, human worthy life and a great life experience. Yeah, it was pretty much impossible to get filthy rich, but people were equal. Now, we only have a chance to get filthy rich and buy million dollar cars, yachts and houses, but practically no way of getting there while most of the poeple are miserable because they don't reach the standards of society as far as financial wealth is concerned. All in all, at least 50% of people would still prefer Yugoslavia than what we have today, just because of that. And yeah, if you said anything against the regime and Tito too loudly, you could easily get sent to Goli otok, fair or unfair, does it really matter? When it kept the people in check? My grandfather was a liutenant colonel in the Yugoslav army and then he was a headmaster in many primary schools. It only took one sentence: How can a cleaning lady in our school have almost the same paycheck as me? And it was enough for a formal inquiry with a real chance of him being incarserated in Goli otok as a political enemy of the state. Luckily he wasn't and in the end, him and my grandmother along with my father and his brother and a few friends built a house in my hometown and a house in Croatian Dalmatia. My grandmother was a simple teacher btw, and they had enough money to travel the world, build 2 houses, raised a loving family and both are still alive. How can a headmaster and his teacher wife do all that today?

[@TheSerbification]

I think you are downplaying the wider geopolitical influence the US exerted that lead to its downfall from 1980 to 1991. Had ppl like Tudjman, Izetbegovic, and Milosevic been politically nurtured and financial and political reforms been carried out it could have been saved. Billions of dinars in damage, and thousands of lives lost or destroyed could have been avoided.

[@bibimir]

Yeah. Tito and some of his trusted associates were the unifiers. Most people saw him as a liberator, although I've heard he didn't really read letters from the people. But overall, yeah. He still fought for them. And while economy might not have been great in all parts of Yugoslavia, many of Yugoslav companies had many business opportunities in Libya, China, etc, and were well known elsewhere. It wasn't perfect, but stable and albeit some saying a dictatorship, still provided democracy (people voting officials).

[@HolyDarkness767]

@@bibimir“Most people saw him as a liberator“ is only a true satement if you jumble the ethnicities together. It‘s the same as „most people miss Yugoslavia“. The majority of Croats would disagree and most likely half of Slovenia. If you read the memoires of Milovan Djilas for example, you realise that Tito‘s „war of national liberation“ was first and foremost a communist power grab.

[@bibimir]

@@HolyDarkness767 Even most Croats at the time. The Ustashe were pretty bad, even to Croats. Also, Partisans generally didn't care about ethnicity, hence they were generally accepted by all ethnicities. Nah, war of national liberation was an actual fight for survival, unlike other movements such as the White Guard, Chetniks, etc, who all served the Axis during the war. Thanks to Partisans, Germans and italians didn't get to genocide us.

[@Azmodan3000]

Yugoslavia failed because Tito was the only yugoslav there, after he died ethnic war broke ! People praise him, but are oblivious to what he tried to do. Instead of working together thy killed each other, for control.

[@royale7620]

Or because communism is a dumb dictatorship ideology with no clear successor, at least with a Kingdom you get heirs trained from birth, look how thwe Spanish King treated the Catalan wannabe indepedence movement and kept the country united. The Yugoslav Kingdom could have been preserved easily imo if not for WW2

[@goranmarinic2923]

Tito never declared himself as an yugoslav.😂

[@damyr]

Tito was a power hungry egomaniac. He didn't care about anything but to be a dictator. If there was no war, he would try to instigate one just to get to a throne of power. That's how some people are, and they bring some good as well as some bad things with them. That's how humanity works.

[@Pollicina_db]

He was a drunk zagorec, not a yugoslav 😂

[@KirovAirship]

Tito's succesor should have been his son if he ever had one.

[@CyrusBluebird]

I suggest asking for Slovenian news archives at RTV Si, I remember a replayed segment from the news talking about the inflation problem. What was Slovenia doing, because it was seemingly doing its own thing, even media wise. Heck My mum talked about a disco in Ljubljana which DJ plaid the newest Albums he could buy in Trieste. Example being Alice Cooper's DADA. Why that was played in a disco idk, but based lol

[@ukraine7249]

I was a UN peacekeeper in 95, then NATO for two tours. Loved the country and people. Even the ones who shot at us were lovely once you got to know them.

[@XvrS1]

Better than socialist Bulgaria my friend .. at least you could trade to/from west east

[@rabbidcrazy787]

Were American & Western European products banned in Warsaw pact countries? Did Looney Toons not exist in the countries until the 1990s? Did Italian cars like Lamborghinis not sell in those countries until the 1990s?

[@stevendobbins2826]

@@rabbidcrazy787 No on all accounts. Of course if you had connections you could get things like denim jeans or rock albums smuggled in, but they were unobtainable for your average person.

[@Sholim85]

At 09:55 you're saying the the system was favouring high-skilled workers over low-skilled. My father, who worked in EI (Elektronska industrija Niš - Serbia) told me the opposite story. They would organize a meeting of all the people in his firm (EI comprised multiple firms, he was i one of those) and they'd need to decide who would be given the appartment that the company bought for the workers. So basically they needed to vote. The problem was that everybody was treated equal, so if you're a top-notch engineer or just a janitor, you'd have an equal opportunity to get it. He was dissatisfied as he was in the group of former :) thinking that he brings more value to the company than the latter. Eventually they formed a new company within EI where only top engineers were transferred to and thus solved the issue more or less. Bottom line - no, high-skilled workers were not favoured over others.

[@z000ey]

Exactly this! But there was one problem, that was the administration / bureaucracy workers: those were very influential in all larger companies, having more sway than the workers and specialists (engineers, scientists, teachers, doctors etc.) as they tended to be members of the party more than the other two groups, as well as the nepotism to get a job in that group was highest. This resulted in huge (mostly unnecessary) numbers of administration workers burdening the companies, lowering the overall wages, while that group dominated and got most of what THEY needed. As this grew even more, both the high skilled manual labor AND the high skilled specialist labor started to economically emigrate into mostly western Europe but also to the Americas and Australia, causing both a shortage of high skilled manual labor AND a brain drain of scientists, doctors, engineers etc. The influence of administration then swelled enormously as they were the ONLY ones that could NOT emigrate as there was absolutely no need of their labor abroad. This is what imho the author wanted to point out.

[@dzonikg28]

@@Sholim85 My uncle worked in EI Nis as engineer and he build giant house just from sallary (like 350 square Metter, it has 4 floors ) and in all that part off Nis (Durlan) all who worked in EI Nis build big houses, so whenever my family visit his family for 2-3 days we had whole floor just for us

[@mariobukna984]

Dude, we became a state after the devastating war with 11 percent of the total pre-war population killed, a destroyed economy, and an average of 65 percent of illiterate people. In 30 years we, the people of Yugoslavia rebuild everything and grow. Maybe the system was rigid but it was changed . Unfortunately, national chauvinism was stronger.

[@nicknovic3828]

Correct western powers like Germany did help with fuel to the fire

[@mnemonija]

Well, one way to think about it is that Yugoslavia served as a nursery for many of its nations. But it is hard to stay strong and independent when there are always predatory states in the world. And it has its costs. One of the costs was goli otok. When Tito broke up with stalin (over support for the greek socialist revolution, among other things), maybe they felt they needed to arrest any Stalin's sympathizers that could have been used to set up the new puppet government if soviet tanks rolled in, thus making it less appealing for the soviets to invade. And did you say 300 died? Does not seem like an extermination camp. USA incarcerates larger % of population than Yugoslavia sent to jail in goli otok and pretty sure people die in USA prisons, too. 6200 died in 2020 in USA, which seems in the ballpark, per capita (also just a single year for usa and goli otok victims accrued over a few years). Maybe the question to be asked is why does USA today resemble the goli otok yugoslavia from 1949? But, economic growth in the first 22 years of yugoslavia after ww2 was higher than the economic growth of croatia in the 22 years after the war. So something was working with socialist enthusiasm at that time. Maybe it wore off later. Also over time, the security state was getting relaxed. Since the 70s I felt it was more liberal than the west. You could travel visa free wherever you wanted including USA, Cuba, all of europe, the rest of the nonaligned countries in the world. And people walked tall, proud of their country. And you need to compare it with the rest of the world at the time. You think USA had freedom? With McCarthyism and the Klan? How long was the police cracking heads to anyone asking for equal rights? They still crack heads if you are trying to protect your reservation from being destroyed by a new pipeline. Plus Yugoslavia never had projects like Tuskeegee experiment. So compared to the world at the time, i think people were able to appreciate their freedoms appropriately.

[@stevefrompolaca2403]

a bit rose tinted, but yugoslavia was way better than the eu....biggest mistake we ever made was joining the eu and the euro... sovereignty sold for what? a few euros. I still think a new yugoslavia would be far better than carrying on with the current lunacy.

[@XOFInfantryman]

...bait used to be believeable

[@natebox4550]

@@stevefrompolaca2403And how would a new Yugoslavia form exactly? Serbia is a Russian ally, Croatia, Kosovo, and Slovenia are all Nato aligned? Etc, etc? All the ethnic tension still exists. It’s just cope.

[@stevefrompolaca2403]

@@natebox4550 we need to grow up, f*** nato and the eu, they are dragging us all into hell

[@user-nh1lg7vg3g]

thet broke up before eu but they should of focused more longevity though​@@stevefrompolaca2403

[@EntDominion]

It was so great that tens of thousands immigrated for a better life to western and northern Europe in the 60s, 70s, and 80s...

[@polarbear3262]

So same as today? Even worse today I would say.

[@ΔημήτρηςΒλαχιοτης]

the government promoted emigration to Germany since they had and agreement with the west german government to provide them with workers since the supply of german workers couldn't keep up with industrial demands and migration from Yugoslavia was still smaller compared to greece and turkey two capitalist countries

[@kawaiilotus]

and how many people immigrated out from those areas you mentioned?

[@Samsung-1.9Cu.Ft.Microwave]

​​@@polarbear3262definetly worse today, the brain drain in the balkans is concerning and every balkan country is massively corrupt after the rapid privatization of the countries

[@tomgu2285]

​@@ΔημήτρηςΒλαχιοτης yep

[@flavius5722]

As a Romanian who never step in a ex- yugoslav country , I must said that this country had a good reputation in Romania , and is the only one about who even many romanian nationalists and Ceausescu nostalgists will said that was better than ours , wich is very weird

[@PentaKillMedia]

Was it good in a certain point in time? Sure. Was it bad at some other point in time? Also yes. But this can be said for every single nation in the world. Every nation went through its ups and downs. But I feel like Yugoslavia wasn't really given a chance or enough time to solve its problems and prosper and reach a golden age. It feels like so much potential was lost when it fell apart. It had the potential to become one of the strongest European powers, and who knows, maybe it would have become that, if it managed to hold itself together for a bit longer. Also we can't forget the fact that the western world including America kinda sanctioned Yugoslavia and had a dislike towards it because the West was democratic and Yugoslavia was communist, so the ideological clash made it hard to maintain good relations. And also because Yugoslavia refused to be a western satellite which was a thorn in America's side.

[@dzonikg28]

Yugoslavia maybe has 2 bad years, and even then sallares and pensions were 10 times off that in east Europe then and 90% off the world

[@willbass2869]

It would have taken Yugoslavia 100+ years to equalize the internal differences. Maybe not even then. Just trying to advance the poorer regions without hurting the richer regions would require a Herculean task. Trying to get Macedonia or Kosovo or central Bosnia up to the level of Croatia or Slovenia is unimaginable. On top of the purely economic & financial hurdles there is ALWAYS some plotting politician willing to point fingers about some historical events from 200 or more years ago just so they can use the chaos to advance or profit themselves Multi ethnic, multi religious unitary states are just powder kegs waiting for some fool to light a match.....

[@PentaKillMedia]

@@willbass2869 It still would have been better than being divided into a million smaller states. And on the topic of multi-ethnic and multi-religious unitary states being powder kegs... USA is exactly that, and it has kept itself together for more than 150 years. Which is a living example that it's possible. Not saying it would be easy, far from it. But at least it's possible.

[@Krmelj1308]

Living in Yugoslavia was great, as long as you had ties to the higher ups in the party or you weren't religious. If you were a Christian, you were treated as a second class citizen. My grandma had to hide the fact that she went to church out of fear for losing her job as a teacher.

[@hdmonster3327]

Still much better than under Hoxha, or the Bolsheviks and Stalin, or most other Eastern Bloc countries for that matter. Yugoslav communists and Tito were relatively soft on religion.

[@HolyDarkness767]

@@hdmonster3327 Well, if we ignore the murder of about 600 priests, nuns, monks and seminarians, during and immediately after the war, then yes. Later on they were relatively soft on religion, but it was still terrible. As Krmelj said, if you were anything higher than a peasant or normal worker, going to church could lose you your job.

[@hdmonster3327]

@@HolyDarkness767 During the Spanish Civil War, the Catholic Church and most of its clergy (unsurprisingly) supported the fascists. Same thing happened here. The Ustase, infamously, were clerical fascists. Chetniks too. It makes complete sense that the fans of the so-called "traditional values" would support and endorse the reactionary fascists. Now, tell me, what do you do with the "Christian" priest who in actuality is a fascist sympathizer? ...Send him straight to hell where he belongs, that's what.

[@hdmonster3327]

@@HolyDarkness767 During the Spanish Civil War, the Catholic Church and most of its clergy (unsurprisingly) supported the fascists. Same thing happened here. The Ustase, infamously, were clerical fascists. Chetniks too. It makes complete sense that the fans of the so-called "traditional values" would support the reactionary fascists who violently enforce them. Now, tell me, what do you do with a "Christian" priest who in actuality is a fascist sympathizer? ...Send him straight to hell where he belongs, that's what.

[@zendr4]

@@HolyDarkness767 that is a lie, you just like the author of this clip did not really live in YU, (as adult person who understands what's happening around), but has been told how it was from someone biased.. like schoolteacher nowadays..

[@dakunssd]

After being to Slovenia and Croatia, and then visiting Constanta in Romania, I gotta say at least in those regions, the Romanian RSR did much more damage to the land and to social cohesion than Titos' regime did. Though, being closer to Austria and western Europe did mean Slovenia and Croatia got a head start on investment and tourism, and also less Russians. Never underestimate the corroding effect of Russians (jk). (edited for accuracy of glorious Republica Socialistă România)

[@francine895]

True comment👍

[@MrSloika]

Slovenia and Croatia were part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. All the central Euro countries that were part of the old dual monarchy...Czech Republic, Slovenia, Croatia, Hungary, Slovakia...are generally ahead of the countries that weren't like Romanian, Bulgaria, Albania. Before WWI many people felt that you were no longer in Europe after you crossed the border from Croatia to Bosnia.

[@oskargrabnar2869]

Slovenia was already decades ahead of other yugo countries when it joined kingdom of yugoslavia

[@zikaperic2133]

100%

[@BoomKing72]

Romania was not a part of the Soviet Union

[@themanwiththegoldengooch9811]

both my parents lived and grew up in Yugoslavia (specifically in Bosnia) and grew up during the 70s and 80s and for them they always said it was a great time during that period. but they would always bring up that they knew yugoslavia wasn't perfect and that they could only speak to their experience of when they lived there. so when it came to the stuff that happened in the early 60s and 50s they were always wary when talking about it

[@SkywarpG1X]

From my perspective based on the history and introspective videos about Yugoslavia. The country was a ticking time bomb waiting to happen. Tito was the glue that keep the country together and. Ethic hatred still existed but was brutally surpressaed. And of being a communist every was poor. Looking at it in retrospect its no wonder why the Yugoslav wars happened. And why the Balkaners still hate each other even to this day.

[@simotopolovac5384]

Likw it or not , it was still way better what happened after it. To give you an idea , to quote what they say for the Croatian town of Vukovar " Taj grad je imao više radnika negobšto danas ima ljudi"

[@HolyDarkness767]

Are we going to conveniently ignore the fact that the Yugoslav „People‘s Liberation Army“ almost razed it to the ground?

[@ADogNamedElmo]

​​@@HolyDarkness767Milosevic supporters did that, not Yugoslavs They just happened to be wearing JNA uniforms

[@GHOST_CROATIA]

​@@ADogNamedElmo it was officially the JNA. And the yugocommunist regime made it possible for chetniks to grab power. It was doomed from the start.

[@ADogNamedElmo]

@@GHOST_CROATIA it was de facto the serbian milosevic nationalist loyalists, not the yugoslav people's army

[@GHOST_CROATIA]

@@ADogNamedElmo ok. But my point still stands. The government was built in such a way to benefit chetniks.

[@seneca983]

9:00 I think you've misunderstood. The definition for hyperinflation used by the economist Phillip Cagan was inflation over 50% *per* *month.* That means an inflation of almost 13,000% per year. Of course, this is just an arbitrary definition by one economists. Still, I don't think "mere" 50% annual inflation would be considered hyperinflation by most.

[@ris2203]

Slovenia is the only winner in this mess. We benefited from cheap workforce by being the richest socialist yugoslav republic and after it's fall we again benefit from cheap workforce by being the only non-failed ex socialist republic. And the best part about it is that we always got to blame our southern brothers for all our problems. We blamed them back than and we still do today. Some things never change. Also fun fact about the student protest. They were not anti-communist. The opposite, they were communist protests, that demanded more socialism and claimed that the party strained to the right. Old Tito went on live TV to apologise and said that the students were right. Find me any other leader in history that did that, i doubt there's more than you can count with the fingers of your hand.

[@seanmurphree4716]

How come people always talk about Tito and Yugoslavia, or Hoxha and Albania, or Ceasescu and Romania, but not many people talk about the other Balkan socialist republics (Bulgaria, Hungary outside of 1956)? I also have no clue what Greece was up to at the time, other than it wasn't socialist.

[@David_Box]

From what I can tell, Bulgaria and Hungary were, for most of their communist history, more alligned to the USSR than Romania and Yugoslavia. As such they are most often talked about in terms of their culture and industry during that time, kind of like Czechoslovakia and East Germany, instead of their geopolitics, since their regimes weren't really that unique.

[@TeutonicEmperor1198]

In Greece we had a civil war between 1943 and 1949, Marshall's plan's money which wasn't enough to rebuilt the country, a semiterror state was created to hunt down the remaining communists ,entrance to NATO, American interference about whatever was happening, a good economic boom during the 50s and 60s, new American interference during the middle of the 60s(because the opposition was about to make a joined government with the leftists and the communists), 7 years of dictatorship which was neutral towards both the USA and the USSR, the Attila invasion of the Turks in Cyprus, the reinstallment of a western democracy, the entrance to the EU, a good (but fake) economic prosperity until 2008, the economic crisis of 2008-2018, Covid etc

[@belstar1128]

i guess its because those countries were 2 extremes i think people talk a lot about the others too only Bulgaria seems to be ignored often .

[@skojuzija]

True. Nobody talks about communism in Poland, Bulgaria, Hungary or Czechoslovakia and their leaders

[@yordanstefanov5570]

Cause they were the most cruel enigmatic and egotistical commie leaders. Bulgaria, Hungary, Czechoslovakia had "boring" leaders who actually tried their best within failed commie system, instead of well... what Causescu was doing.

[@EdMcF1]

In the mid-1980s, I read in a British newspaper that an activist who said that there were no human rights in Yugoslavia was sent to prison for slandering socialism.

[@a_mp.r.a6635]

Well they were wrong

[@yukitakaoni007]

Thank you socialism for all the good childhood before the darkest era come and take it all.

[@_petrovic179]

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jasenovac_concentration_camp

[@stefangherman8408]

Romanian's always escaped Ceaușescu through Yugoslavia

[@MrSloika]

The Albanians escaped Hoxha through Yugoslavia. I know a Polish woman who got a Visa to Yugoslavia for a holiday then she escaped to Austria.

[@stefangherman8408]

@@MrSloika That Polish woman reversed the escape of Fanek Dolas aka Grzegorz Brzęczyszczykiewicz. He escaped from Austria to Yugoslavia, that woman escaped from Yugoslavia to Austria.

[@andreasgantenbein-k2z]

And how did they escape from idiot apostrophes?

[@stefangherman8408]

@@andreasgantenbein-k2z For the case of that woman, I don't know, but for the case of Franek Dolas, I recomand watching the movie "How I Unleashed World War II"

[@axis7879]

I am Mexican and i love Yugoslavia because they were hard core fans of our telenovelas, movies and music for a second you made us feel like 🌠 stars and thats the best feeling anyone can give ❤️

[@axis7879]

It's really cool being liked by white people and not hate it like americans usually do

[@zx921]

I'd say Yugoslavia's liberalism in economy is often overstated. At its core it remained a stalinist economy, before any long term economic policy could be implemented it had to be aproved by Tito, which could take years at a time. It fared better than it's neighbours because Tito was smart enough to listen to his advisors instead of killing them off like Stalin, Hoxha or Ceaușescu. Hell, Milovan Djilas was even imprisoned for advocating for true libertarian socialism and his critique of the communist sytem in his book "The new class, an analysis of the communist system"

[@denifnaf5874]

When Tito was alive? Yes!

[@HolyDarkness767]

No. Did you watch a single minute of this video?

[@MrLuchenkov]

@@HolyDarkness767 Yeah. I don't consider "Living ironically in Europe", a man who was born after the fall of Yugoslavia (as it once stood) and whose main content revolves around Balkan memes and shitposting, to be a serious source of information. Neither should you. At its heyday, Yugoslavia was a more prosperous, equitable and peaceful country than the mess that followed from 1991 to today.

[@danielm6319]

​@@MrLuchenkov Okay boomer or whatever [Yugo]generation you are from. Yugoslavia was so much corrupted and covering-up affairs, so rasistically behaved, discriminated and Serbian-founded [one side independence foundation in 1878], so one-sided to seriously consider Yugoslavia as more prosperous, equitable and peaceful country tgan countries today. Only size of country by area and km² were countable but everything else were worse.

[@HolyDarkness767]

@@MrLuchenkov That doesn't mean that what he said isn't true. My whole family grew up in Yugoslavia and not one of their experiences contraticts what he said in this video. Nostalgists certainly are also not a serious source of information, because most old people look at their youth through rose tinted glasses.

[@GHOST_CROATIA]

​@@MrLuchenkov one question. How can you support a communist murder regime while having a christian profile pic? Makes no sense

[@Hadubrand1965]

I really like your content. I am Austrian, with Southern-Slavic ancenstors (although my grandfather (who died in the 70s) always considered himself as a "German" Carinthian, but the family name sort of betrays this idea... - During the last 10 years I have several times worked in the Western Balkan region as a consultant for natural resource management in the context of development co-operation projects and of course have been to Croatia for holidays. Most of this was in Serbia, but recenlty also Northern Macedonia and Kosovo. I like the people in all the countries there. I try to undertand all parties' viewpoints, but given the nature of my role in this development aid projects, I am not prone to voice a more strong opinion in either direction. I do hope that sonner or later the ethnical/regligious conflicts will somehow be overcome....

[@zikaperic2133]

My friendly advice, just let them talk and dont try to intervene :), unless you can really speak their language and go deeply in all problems its very hard to give a reasonable opinion. Even myself growing up there during the wars, every time I discover something new. Every family has an own story and they are all right and it is so hard to have an overview of the situation.

[@_petrovic179]

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jasenovac_concentration_camp

[@vampireknight5821]

So question: How was it under the monarchy?

[@danielm6319]

Right question.

[@rodneydelboy6910]

Good for Serbs and not good for everyone else

[@gramsci747]

@@rodneydelboy6910 maybe better answer be: not so good. As I do think the monarchy was better the chaos of WW2. So as I said in my comment the problem lay was the monarchy was what Yugoslavia needed. It needed a confederation like Switzerland but under the monarchy it got a dictatorship.

[@HolyDarkness767]

Great for the Serbs, kind of alright for the Slovenes, bad for the Macedonians, utterly terrible for the Croats. I don't know about the muslim Bosniaks, because they were not really seen as their own ethnicity back then, but rather muslim Croats or muslim Serbs, depending on who you asked.

[@Natalin0]

It was worse

[@crocrox2273]

Short explanation for non Balkan people: Serbian communists wanted all the power in yugoslavia, the installed Serbs in every major position, they leeched money from all nations directly into serbia

[@saccorhytus]

*after Tito died

[@badda_boom8017]

which city is it with the image at 00:21 please?

[@badda_boom8017]

ah I know where it is now! Belgrade!

[@komizaloto]

​@@badda_boom8017 wow

[@SuperLusername]

2:40 this is legit some of the funniest sh*t I've seen this year

[@ljubodraggrujic4872]

Second that

[@alisinanucer]

I mean yougoslavia could have existed to this day if they didn’t make some stupid mistakes

[@red_chicken_not_redchicken1800]

Jugoslavia could exist. If only there was someone know what hes doing instead of Slobodan.

[@danielm6319]

But Yugoslavia didn't rely on Croatian, Slovenian, Bosnian, Macedinian foundation, independence, recognition, diplomacy, military and history. Yugoslavia relied on Serbia and they control state. So without improvement if Croatia, Slovenia as independent country, own diplomacy, military, etc. it would be hard to continue Yugoslavia even 8f there weren't war in 1990s

[@duncan.o-vic]

People still believe a socialist country could have been allowed to exist in a capitalist world. Once Soviet Union fell, there was no use for Yugoslavia to the US. A success of a regime depends on its wealth, and for small countries that are not the US, it means loans in US Dollar.

[@red_chicken_not_redchicken1800]

@@duncan.o-vic In the 80s Jugoslavia was on the way to join Eroupe Union but that stopped when Slovenia declare independence.

[@red_chicken_not_redchicken1800]

@@danielm6319 Jugoslavia couldn't find someone to transition it peacefully and also its because of that Greater Serbia thing by Slobodan.

[@MihailoJokic]

This is video is about communism, not Yugoslavia. And even though it does expose famous myths about communist times, I am not sure that any former state (except Slovenia) can say that today they live better than before the war.

[@duncan.o-vic]

It's not even about communism as it preteyto be, it is about tragedy of any small country in a capitalist world.

[@GHOST_CROATIA]

One thing: you dont get murdered for having a different opinion today. Well, at least in hr and slo.

[@duncan.o-vic]

@@GHOST_CROATIA You mean different opinion like, promoting fascism, or fighting for right to exploit poor people for profit and then use the profit to establish your own oligarchy? Or plotting to overthrow the government? Unlike how whistleblowers and socialists or activists and unionizers get treated in the capitalist countries?

[@GHOST_CROATIA]

@@duncan.o-vic that may be 1% of all murdered people. Maybe read a bit about udba assassinations instead of spewing false information

[@duncan.o-vic]

@@GHOST_CROATIA I am well familiar with it, theat is why I am commenting. There was some setting up and corruption here and there, people ending up for a few years in prison, but wast majority is guilty people, who are now acting innocent. And for murders, that happend only occacionally with high profile enemies of the state. Nothing compared to the headcount of secret agencies of capitalist countries. Even today political opponents in the west are being censored, and prosecuted.

[@catthebird]

I work in a bar in one of the ex-yugo states, and I’ll be damned if I don’t hear “It was so much better back then,” by one of regulars at least once a week. I was born well after Yugoslavia disbanded, but it’s really interesting to see and hear everyone reminisce about how great of a leader Tito was. The stories people tell about him have quite literally become folktales(for example him getting saved by his dog Luks). I can’t help but take all of this with a grain of salt. They all claim of the incredible brotherhood the balkans had amongst each other, but I always wondered, if it was truly so strong, how could there have been a fallout as bad as the war then. I don’t know what I’m trying to say here, but I know I probably wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for how easy it was to move around and find a job in Yugoslavia… And now, we all hate each other again. It’s laughable

[@kuti1643]

Small correction: In Hungary it was the *Kádár* regime that proped up the economy with IMF loans NOT the Rákosi regime. Mátyás Rákosi was our guy before the 1956 revolution. Apart from that great video as always!

[@mrtrollnator123]

Of course just like every other country (besides north korea) it has its benefits and flaws, so it wasnt perfect, but not like hell, it was somewhere in the middle

[@alessandra9232]

North korea also has benefits

[@GHOST_CROATIA]

​@@alessandra9232 Exactly! Many people here are trying to sugarcoat a pile of shit lol

[@hdmonster3327]

Uhhh, I don't think the other fascist dictatorships besides North Korea, those being Iran, Afghanistan, and Assadist Syria have benefits... Neither do third world African countries or smth. All flaws and no real benefits.

[@NightTimeRush]

You can pick 1000 random people from whole ex-yugoslavia and ask them "was it better then or now" 900 of them will say it was better then and that's a fact. Like it or not

[@northernredknights]

The delusion of young Balkan people going out of their way to complain about a state that ended 30 years ago. The Balkans is a shithole with all these freedoms yet videos like this still get made for some reason

[@mariomutaja4317]

Muka je na žalost što ljudi lažu sami sebi i svojoj djeci i unucima. Ja sam 67mo godište i osjetio to zlo. A kad sam 80ih krenuo u Njemačku.... Kada sam vidjeo kako se tamo živi.... Ajme i dan danas se sjetim suza kada sam se vraćao u tu đavolju jazbinu

[@HolyDarkness767]

@@mariomutaja4317Tako je.

[@NightTimeRush]

@mariomutaja4317 I don't know why would they lie about it, what would be purpose of that? The majority of people living in that time loved it. They finished work around 2 in the evening, they had time for kids, they had time for vacations every year (yes every year)...and so on. The vast majority of the people were middle class and than there was very very slim groups of broke/poor people and a small group of very rich people. That's why everyone had a job and if they obeyed the rules there were no problems. (The rules were not so strict like let's say in china or russia or other comunist states, not even close). Of course there were a small % of people who wanted to "stand out" and do things "their way" and for this kind of people I can understand that they didn't like it 😉 just look at all these FREE WORLD how "amazing" it is now 😉 the facts are known and they will never be changed

[@HolyDarkness767]

@@NightTimeRushThis whole video is about how Yugo-nostalgia is misplaced and yet here you are calling the ramblings of yugo-nostalgists „facts“. I guess some people are just too stubborn to learn…

[@rebelfriend5198]

9:31 why is horse in tree?

[@matejharmunt8725]

it does that sometimes

[@tonijelecevic9238]

Horsing around

[@damyr]

LOL you never saw a horse grazing a tree?

[@konstantinoskolokotronis5042]

I've been absolutely addicted to your channel these days. Love from greece!!!

[@mxjeonsgw]

Yo, while I was researching a bit about the Balkans, I read about Yugoslavia one day and I've found that at some point they imported Mexican films at the point that they developed Rancheras with the "Yugoslavian flavour", and I got fascinated by that fact (I'm Mexican lol) but I couldn't really find more in-depth information about that season in the Yugoslavia anime, I think that'd be a nice idea for a video? You'll evaluate if it's interesting but I'd love to watch a video about that subject with more details about the YugoMex (I don't recall the exact name lol, but I remember the Trio Paloma, if it works). Love ya, János

[@bigboyman5743]

didnt slovenia and croatia benefit after collapse of yugoslavia?

[@matejharmunt8725]

any benefit croatia got was counterweighted by war and horribly managed privatisation but yea

[@mottom2657]

Only Slovenia, arguably. Slovenia already had a working system and it quickly decided to side with Germany and Austria and join EU. Croatia suffered and still suffers due to the Yugoslav Wars.

[@DaleChipplethunk]

There are ways in which Croatia has improved since and ways in which it has gotten worse. It is a mixed bag, unlike in Serbia where basically everything was better back then. Slovenia I am not familiar with.

[@jaredkronk4614]

Well yes but also no

[@FilipCordas]

No they just revert to their natural state of serving German old lady's when they come to see the beautiful old Italian towns.

[@vasilzahariev5741]

Was the country that performed a rapid unscheduled disassembly a good country? Whaaa?

[@bunk_foss]

Before that.

[@vasilzahariev5741]

​​@@bunk_fossThe causes for the rapid unscheduled disassembly were present before it happened, otherwise it would not have happened.

[@mottom2657]

@@vasilzahariev5741 Looks like your criteria for evaluating past countries are not adequate. Not sorry. Learn stuff.

[@vasilzahariev5741]

@@mottom2657 Cope, seethe and mald.

[@milokojjones]

@@vasilzahariev5741 I think it's kind of silly to judge whether a country is good or bad purely on if there were tensions / issues that lead to it's eventual colapse. There are many countries in the past that had problems and eventually collapsed and there are many countries that have problems now, problems that could lead to them collapsing - arguably you could say to some extend, that applies for every country.

[@unstressbar]

the ones that value materialistic shit, say it was bad. the ones that value human connection, family ties and a sense of belonging, say it was good.

[@MidlifeCry]

Wow, such a detailed video just a week after the hungarian history video! Great content!

[@davidebuselli3055]

There are books with more specific about the social economic history? Good video👍

[@KirovAirship]

Yugoslavia does still exist actually.It only changed its name to Germany.

[@seaman5705]

In the 70s Romania fared better than Yugoslavia - but this was because of Western help after Ceausescu opposed Russian intervention in Czechoslovakia . Yugoslavs came to buy cheaper food and clothing , while selling chewing gum and some sweets . So did the Polish , even some Czechoslovaks or Hungarians . Industrial development was also higher and people benefitted of a good time with paid vacations in new resorts and entertainment places . Market was not missing anything but the forbidden Western goods - blue-jeans and electronics . There was a limited freedom of expression and culture . Things went south in Romania in the late 70s , when the Yugoslavs could work abroad already . The 80s were hell .

[@Rocco532]

Dude are you on some medications, Yugoslavia was by far the most developed country in the area definitelly more developed than all Warsaw pact East European countries, how can you even compare Romania to Yugoslavia. You just made me laugh. While Romania had a hard core dictatorship and closed borders Yugoslavia in 70’s was thriving, borders were open everyone traveled wherever they wanted my parents went to Italy for vacation even though you had a Adriatic sea and there was a direct line by JAT from Belgrade to New York with feeder flights from Zagreb and Sarajevo so they went to check New York as well. There were at least 12 international airports in YU, Yugoslav companies were working all around the world building everything from dams to schools and buildings from Arab countries to African to Asian. I know because my father’s company INA was working on oil fields in Libya. Yugoslavia was on a higher economic level in 70’s than Portugal at that time and same around Spain while Spain was still under Franco’s regime, I’m talking about GDP per capita PPP. Romania was super poor, my aunt went to Romania to check it out and couldn’t belive the poorness it was like 20 years behind everything by far worse than Czechoslovakia or Hungary for example. Unlike your hard assed nationalism instilled in by your bullshit Causecu propaganda, Czechs and Polish could at least travel to Yugoslavia and for them it seemed like heaven on earth. Czechs were allowed to go to Yu seaside every two years so naturally you met them and their dream was to be like Yu. Yugoslavia hosted Olympics games in Sarajevo, not even much bigger cities or countries didn’t get to host olympics and def. not any of your Romanian cities. But especially don’t know why there were so many Romanians risking their lives to run away from it. We had in a class in primary school a Romanian refugee whose parents ran from Romania so we were collecting contributions for their family. You can even find here on tube the documentary made by TV Belgrade when they went to Romania during the Causescu fall they couldn’t believe with what technology Romanian television was working with it was like a previous century. Even today anything on the other side of Carpathians looks terrible. At least the Hungarian Romania this part that was Hungarian before 1918 looks ok, like Brasov, Sibiu/Hermannstadt, Timisoara etc. but as soon as you cross to Romania proper, Ramnicu Valcea, Pitesti, Targu Jiu, Ploiesti, Bucharest omg. And you can’t even build highways still today, wherever there is a hill not even a proper mountain the highway stops like at Sibiu towards Valcea. You have basically 2 highways in a country the size of ex Yugoslavia. Yugoslavia already started building it’s highways in 1970 first being finished in 1971. Just take a highway today from Zagreb to Rijeka and Split and see how the highways are built through mountains with plethora of tunnels and 2 of them over 5km long or go from Maribor to Ljubljana to Koper, similar story. What a laugh that Romania was better off than Yugoslavia.👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻😂😂😂

[@polarbear3262]

Your statement doesn't make any sense. How could it fair better if as you say people from Yugoslavia come to your country to buy cheap things? That means prices there are lower and economy too. And then you say that western goods were forbidden... electronics. Like... Those two statements are contradictory.

[@Ballr00mBlitz]

That's not even true, people come to poorer countries to buy cheaper food, smuggle and exploit bad financial situation. Romania was shit before and lot of people were working in Yugoslavia same as we go to work in Germany today. Would you say Moldova is advanced rich economy because Romanians go there to buy cheap food? Also Yugoslavia was going worse during 80s, and best times would be 60s and 70s

[@seaman5705]

@@polarbear3262 You don't understand Communist economic and social system . Cheaper goods means the life was cheaper, inflation was lower , economy was stable and on an ascending path . So life was better and economy was stronger , while in Yugoslavia there was inflation and poor economic achievements . Missing some western electronics on the consumer market, was about restrictions imposed by the Communist government to avoid "capitalist" contamination of the population . Blue-jeans were the emblem of the Western decadence .

[@seaman5705]

@@Ballr00mBlitz You are totally parallel with the subject . See the answer for polarbear and try to understand Communist economic and social system , which you know nothing about . In the Communism people don't go to work abroad , because they are not allowed - Yugoslavia was the only exception , and that didn't happen from the beginning . No Romanian worked abroad on it's own, like Yugoslavians , in the time of Communism. What you are talking , happened in the 90's after the fall of Communism and the terrible 80s . Prices were fixed by the government , it was not a competitional system like the capitalism . Lower prices meant more stable economy , better life for the people. If you sell chewing gum , and buy meat - means your economy was not able to produce meat at lower prices , because was weak and also life was more expensive . If you sell chewing gum - this is what your economy is able to deliver .

[@KonradAdenauerJr]

Yes, the picture was more complex than nostalgia of some would claim. Nevertheless, it’s true that Yugoslavs had greater prosperity and more personal freedoms than existed in neighboring Ceausescu’s Romania.

[@JustGrowingUp84]

Not a large bar to clear, mate. I'm from there, and it was pretty bad. In fact, at the fall of communism, Romania was among the poorest countries. Funny stuff: despite that, you still have plenty of older people still pining for the communist regime. So if people can have nostalgia about that garbage, it's no wonder so many have about Yugoslavia, who was much less garbage.

[@KonradAdenauerJr]

@@JustGrowingUp84 Yes, Romania was at the time the second poorest country in Europe, but that's one thing made the contrast with Yugoslavia so striking. Ceausescu's repression and privations were obnoxious enough to make a stark contrast with Yugoslavia. The latter had greater openness to the West, as well.

[@JustGrowingUp84]

@@KonradAdenauerJr Yes, everybody I knew back then had good things to say about Yugoslavia.

[@petermerse7689]

The most realistic analysis of situation in Yugoslavia I have ever encountered on KZbin. Good job Janos.

[@geoapostol]

Great topic and summary as usual. 👍 One other aspect to keep in mind: people you ask today about how good it was back then are also old today (and hence were young back then). It’s normal to also have a nostalgia for your own youth and see everything as being much better back then. This applies to more developed countries, too. 😉

[@Elongated_Muskrat]

When their respect for Tito exceeds their hate for each other.

[@patriota8970]

A long time ago, when I first arrived in Spain from Yugoslavia, I first saw people begging on the street and digging through garbage cans looking for food. I sat down next to a beggar on the street and it was not clear to me that such a thing even existed. I cried like a child. I gave the beggar some money and went on . Since then, I look at the world with different eyes and for the first time realized that the West is not honey and milk.

[@drunkenpumpkins7401]

Spain wasn't part of the west until Franco died tough.

[@DanieĺȘerban-s6z]

True man. The West is full of shit, always has been.

[@fringeflix]

Thanks a lot Martinović

[@imrem2872]

I'm frankly drunk but I love your videos János, you actually make content about our actual live and showcase that even though we arein europe, the balkans/warsaw pact countiey, the live is not that easy as the rest whk were the colonisers. Can someone link me the rest od the video ending song?