The Worker’s Share

During the communist era, because everything belonged to the entire people – which effectively meant it belonged to no one –people learned to steal as much as possible and work as little as possible. Lies, theft, and corruption were perfected to an extraordinary degree during the communist years.

Unfortunately, this harmful habit persisted after the fall of communism, undermining the economy and slowing the return to any sense of normalcy. This theft of what belonged to everyone came hand in hand with a form of acceptance: It doesn’t matter that someone else is stealing, because I do the same. It was a kind of split personality. Hence “the indifference” with which people passively watched all the scheming that followed communism’s collapse – the fraudulent appropriations, in one form or another, all benefiting those who orchestrated them.