Mao decreed that efforts to multiply grain yields and bring industry to the countryside should be increased. Local officials were fearful of Anti-Rightist Campaigns and they competed to fulfill or over-fulfill quotas which were based on Mao’s exaggerated claims, collecting non-existent “surpluses” and leaving farmers to starve to death. Higher officials did not dare to report the economic disaster which was being caused by these policies, and national officials, blaming bad weather for the decline in food output, took little or no action.
The government took what food there was from the farmers because they were trying to swing their dicks around and impress the boss. It’s like the Irish potato famine, but with rice.
Yeah i guess if you kill tens of millions with forced labour you build out a pretty good industrial sector. Also you have less people to worry about because you just killed them so i guess a win win in the eyes of some people.
That was the middle of Mao Zedong’s disastrous Great Leap Forward initiative, which due to mismanagement saw vast numbers of people starve to death.
It’s a little worse than mismanagement:
The government took what food there was from the farmers because they were trying to swing their dicks around and impress the boss. It’s like the Irish potato famine, but with rice.
But even with that disaster Mao still raised life expectancy more than the world average from 1955 to 1976(when he died).
Yeah i guess if you kill tens of millions with forced labour you build out a pretty good industrial sector. Also you have less people to worry about because you just killed them so i guess a win win in the eyes of some people.
population grew more than 60% under mao https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/population-long-run-with-projections
And there was a shorter work week than was after 1991. https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/annual-working-hours-per-worker?country=GBR~CHN
And i dont support the bad stuff that was done.