Talk:Economy of East Germany

'familiar'
Why are western economies more familiar a priori? removed 'familiar' in the introduction

Communist state
East Germany was a self-declared socialist state and is only referred to in the West as a communist state. Hence, the introduction should not say "Like other Eastern European Communist states". Changed it to: "Like other states which were part of the Comecon ...". This should incliudes: --Ramon1928 (talk) 19:51, 8 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Asian countires with a centrally planned economy
 * Does not imply that a centrally planned economy is crucial for communist state (especially for self-declared communist states)

Coffee Crisis (1976–1979)
The GDR Coffee Crisis and the generic German coffee culture is subject of a research project of University of Hamburg and Bundesstiftung zur Aufarbeitung der SED-Diktatur. I have done a german article on the subject and will translate it into english, first draft on my user site. Help and suggestions are warmely welcome. BR --Polentario (talk) 19:28, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

P.S: other project include interesting subjects as e.g. "role of hunting in Eastern Germany" and relations of both german states to Yugoslawia.

Where does all of that information come from?
There's no ref list at all. This article could, frankly, be deleted. One could start by listing (here?) the most appropriate and authoritative sources. Is there an ex-GDR economist around? Tony  (talk)  02:55, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

This and its references could be a start. I don't speak German. Tony  (talk)  03:01, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

Private Enterprise (legal and otherwise) in the GDR (and other socialist countries)
Reckon this deserves an subject deserves an article in its own right. A single section in an "economy of the GDR" article doesnt do it full justice and doesnt answer a lot of questions. How heavily taxed/regulated were such businesses ? What was the official attitude taken to business owners -particularly by the Stasi ? How many obstacles (bureaucratic and otherwise) were there to setting up and running such businesses ? Were these businesses allowed to employ people ? If a business turned out to be particularly successful did it not risk being expropriated by the State ? 86.112.55.209 (talk) 13:41, 1 August 2010 (UTC)

oddly missing information for the last years of the countries existence?
There is no info for the last days of the gdr? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.31.97.82 (talk) 07:55, 8 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Some very interesting material could be included.

Use of forced labor
The article contains no information regarding use of unfree labour in state-owned production facilities nor the East German practice of intermingling criminal and political prisoners in those facilities, see "Ikea Admits Forced Labor Was Used in 1980s". User:Fred Bauder Talk 13:38, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

"The estimated 100 billion worth of reparations taken from the East,[1] had it been invested in the East German Economy, with East Germany's average 18% rate of return on investments,[2] would have compounded to give East Germans a per-capita income 15 times the level of West Germans."

This is nonsense, really. If the "return" is the creation of more physical capital, this runs into immediate problems of decreasing marginal productivity. If it means a financial return (to be constantly reinvested!) then there are quite simply no assets that guarantee an 18% return over any significant period of time, not to mention the fact that they would have to be reinvested outside of the GDR. Also, the source provided for this source is "The triumph of evil". Not only is it an extremely biased source, but it makes a number of nonsensical economic comparisons, much of which rely on taking East German prices and exchange rates at face value, which is absurd in the context of a non-market economy.

I am in favour of deleting the passage.

79.6.161.75 (talk) 20:57, 13 March 2014 (UTC)

Possible unreliable source
I have tagged the following claim from the Reparations section as dubious: "The estimated 100 billion worth of reparations taken from the East,[1] had it been invested in the East German Economy, with East Germany's average 18% rate of return on investments,[2] would have compounded to give East Germans a per-capita income 15 times the level of West Germans.[3]". A per-capita income of 15 times West Germany is clearly absurd, but is that what source [3] really claims? Page 92 (chapter 2) of that source does indeed make that claim, but its accompanying note 1 on page 285 appears quite confused as to how investments and interest rates work in the real world. Page 92 claims 15, but its page 285 note claims "5-10". Even 5 times is clearly absurd. I seriously doubt that source has been peer reviewed and is at all reliable. The claim of 18% annual return on investmments over decades is also absurd but I cannot find source 2 "Von Ulbricht zu Honecker. Naumann, G. and E. Truempler. published 1990 East Berlin". I can read German so could anyone direct me to a readable source or source fragment? -84user (talk) 23:13, 7 April 2015 (UTC) Yes I agree with you — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.148.55.246 (talk) 12:23, 27 May 2015 (UTC)

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other source
According to the Economist Gerhard Heske, the GDP growth of the GDR was in Sum higher than in Westgermany, in his Studies he argued, that it was not the fault of the GDR economy, that the GDP was lower than in the West, but because of the worser starting condition.

According to him the GDP of the GDR rose between 1950 and 1989 about the factor of 558, while it rose in the west only 534. A short article about it: https://www.zeit.de/wirtschaft/2009-11/gerhard-heske-ddr The book: https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/40986016.pdf

I guess this study also should be used, because of neutrality. --188.216.212.16 (talk) 11:01, 7 December 2020 (UTC)


 * This is bullshit. The $ United States Dollar GDP per capita figures that can be found in all references on socialist countries are all based on their OFFICIAL exchange rates, which were always much different than on the black market, even though the demand for foreign currency on the black market was curtailed by the fact that you could be executed for buying foreign currency. --Yomal Sidoroff-Biarmskii (talk) 06:53, 17 March 2021 (UTC)