Eli5: so why is Balkan so poor compared to west europe?
In: Economics
Most of the Balkan lands are quite mountainous. Historically, this makes those regions relatively inconducive to trade due to higher transportation costs (because building roads up/down/through mountains is more expensive, and there are fewer navigable rivers upon which you can barge freight) which therefore hinders wider economic development.
Soviet economic systems through the 20th century didn’t help economic development much either. Sure, there may have been some tech/knowledge transfer between soviet allies, but not really enough to jumpstart any positive feedback loops strong enough to weather the soviet breakup (and the loss of the little planned-economy trade that went with it).
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