The boulevard of broken dreams? : long-run effects of labor-managed socialism

Spruk, Rok (author), Kovač, Mitja (author), Garoupa, Nuno (author)

This study investigates the long-term impact of socialism on economic growth, focusing on the unique case of labor-managed socialism in former Yugoslavia. By comparing Slovenia with OECD and East Asian donor countries that did not undergo postwar socialist transitions, we estimate counterfactual scenarios using synthetic control methods. Our findings show that labor-managed socialism led to a temporary growth deviation, followed by a structural collapse in the 1980s. Our estimates suggest that Slovenia’s per capita GDP would be 22 percent higher today had there been postwar economic and political liberalization in place. By contrast, if socialist policies had continued after 1990, Slovenia's per capita GDP would be 63 percent lower today. These results remain robust across various robustness checks.

• Language: English
• Keywords: socialism, economic growth, synthetic control method, comparative long-run development, Slovenia
• Work type: Article
• Typology: 1.01 - Original Scientific Article
• Organization: EF - School of Economics and Business
• Publication status: Published
• Publication version: Version of Record
• Year: 2024
• Number of pages: Str. 167-210
• Numbering: Vol. 21, iss. 2
• PID: 20.500.12556/RUL-180003
• UDC: 330.3
• ISSN on article: 1824-2979
• DOI: 10.25428/1824-2979/031
• COBISS.SI-ID: 226884355

Copyright

Na spletni strani založnika navedeno, da članki izhajajo pod licenco CC BY-ND 4.0.

• Publication date in RUL: 27.02.2026

Record is a part of a journal

• Title: European journal of comparative economics
• Publisher: Universita Carlo Cattaneo - LIUC
• ISSN: 1824-2979
• COBISS.SI-ID: 15251174

Licences

• License: CC BY-ND 4.0, Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
• Link: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/
• Description: Under the NoDerivatives Creative Commons license one can take a work released under this license and re-distribute it, but it cannot be shared with others in adapted form, and credit must be provided to the author.

Secondary language

• Language: Slovenian
• Keywords: socializem, družbenoekonomski razvoj, ekonomska rast, Slovenija