Dwarkesh Patel

They're just probably trapped in this to the extent that they want to keep power.

There's nothing they can do.

Zero, yeah, okay.

During this period between 73 and 85, when they have these huge oil revenues, presumably there was some amount of exuberance.

But did the government recognize and realize that, you know, they're super fragile people?

to the price of oil.

And if that collapses, they need some sort of contingency plan, some rainy day fund.

Or you must notice that like, oh, this is half my budget and all of my foreign currency is coming from oil.

And this is a very volatile commodity.

Nobody noticed that?

A final question.

This is not so much a question as an observation.

I don't know if you have a reaction to this.

If you just look at Russia's history through the 20th century, Tsarism to communism to collectivization to more than 10% of your population dying from World War II.

then back to Stalin, and then more communism, and then the economy collapses again, and then Putin, and then especially if you look at the satellite states, well, they had all of this happen to them and worse, and now they're getting invaded.

Whereas you have other countries like, you know, Japan and Germany also had tragic histories, but then they recovered.

The tragedy of Russia is... Yeah, you're lucky you're not Russian.

Yeah, exactly.

I should have thought to end on a more optimistic note.

Well, you've outlined the ways in which countries can chart a better course for themselves, and that's where the optimism can come from.