Just finished reading Nelson Demille's book, Up Country. It paints Vietnam as a two-speed state, divided between the pro-communist north and anti-communist south.

Anyway, Vietnam is yet another nominally communist country that is rapidly liberalising it's economy.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam

Throughout the history of Vietnam, its economy has been based largely on agriculture—primarily wet rice cultivation.[254] Bauxite, an important material in the production of aluminium, is mined in central Vietnam.[255] Since reunification, the country's economy is shaped primarily by the CPV through Five Year Plans decided upon at the plenary sessions of the Central Committee and national congresses.[256] The collectivisation of farms, factories, and capital goods was carried out as part of the establishment of central planning, with millions of people working for state enterprises. Under strict state control, Vietnam's economy continued to be plagued by inefficiency, corruption in state-owned enterprises, poor quality and underproduction.[257][258][259] With the decline in economic aid from its main trading partner, the Soviet Union, following the erosion of the Eastern bloc in the late 1980s, and the subsequent collapse of the Soviet Union, as well as the negative impacts of the post-war trade embargo imposed by the United States,[260][261] Vietnam began to liberalise its trade by devaluing its exchange rate to increase exports and embarked on a policy of economic development.[262]

In 1986, the Sixth National Congress of the CPV introduced socialist-oriented market economic reforms as part of the Đổi Mới reform program. Private ownership began to be encouraged in industry, commerce and agriculture and state enterprises were restructured to operate under market constraints.[263][264] This led to the five-year economic plans being replaced by the socialist-oriented market mechanism.[265] As a result of these reforms, Vietnam achieved approximately 8% annual gross domestic product (GDP) growth between 1990 and 1997.[266][267] The United States ended its economic embargo against Vietnam in early 1994.[268] Despite the 1997 Asian financial crisis affecting Vietnam by causing an economic slowdown to 4–5% growth per annum, its economy began to recover in 1999,[263] with growth at an annual rate of around 7% from 2000 to 2005 making it one of the world's fastest growing economies.[269][270] According to the General Statistics Office of Vietnam (GSO), growth remained strong even in the face of the late-2000s global recession, holding at 6.8% in 2010, although Vietnam's year-on-year inflation rate hit 11.8% in December 2010 with the country's currency, the Vietnamese đồng being devalued three times.[271][272]

Deep poverty, defined as the percentage of the population living on less than $1 per day, has declined significantly in Vietnam and the relative poverty rate is now less than that of China, India and the Philippines.[273] This decline can be attributed to equitable economic policies aimed at improving living standards and preventing the rise of inequality.[274] These policies have included egalitarian land distribution during the initial stages of the Đổi Mới program, investment in poorer remote areas, and subsidising of education and healthcare.[275][276] Since the early 2000s, Vietnam has applied sequenced trade liberalisation, a two-track approach opening some sectors of the economy to international markets.[274][277] Manufacturing, information technology and high-tech industries now form a large and fast-growing part of the national economy. Though Vietnam is a relative newcomer to the oil industry, it is currently the third-largest oil producer in Southeast Asia with a total 2011 output of 318,000 barrels per day (50,600 m3/d).[278] In 2010, Vietnam was ranked as the eighth-largest crude petroleum producer in the Asia and Pacific region.[279] The United States purchased the highest amount of Vietnam's exports,[280] while goods from China were the most popular Vietnamese import.[281]

According to a December 2005 forecast by Goldman Sachs, the Vietnamese economy will become the world's 21st-largest by 2025,[282] with an estimated nominal GDP of $436 billion and a nominal GDP per capita of $4,357.[283] Based on findings by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in 2012, the unemployment rate in Vietnam stood at 4.46%.[6] That same year, Vietnam's nominal GDP reached US$138 billion, with a nominal GDP per capita of $1,527.[6] The HSBC also predicted that Vietnam's total GDP would surpass those of Norway, Singapore and Portugal by 2050.[283][284] Another forecast by PricewaterhouseCoopers in 2008 stated Vietnam could be the fastest-growing of the world's emerging economies by 2025, with a potential growth rate of almost 10% per annum in real dollar terms.[285] Apart from the primary sector economy, tourism has contributed significantly to Vietnam's economic growth with 7.94 million foreign visitors recorded in 2015.[286]

I didn't mean to imply that they weren't great amps anymore.

They're still excellent.

I just meant that now the bulk of them are made in Vietnam, not the UK.

Vietnam makes a lot of music industry related stuff now.

Guitars, amps, microphones, speaker cabinets, etc.

I've had a number of friends and aquaintences holiday in Vietnam. All saying it was great. Tourism in Vietnam has boomed and the Government has been supporting it.

greggerypeccary wrote on Jan 9^th, 2021 at 5:01pm:




tsk tsk   fd   we have one or two members to do that! ...jas at least is a decent human bean   well most of the time....sorry jas but not all the time....

and suddenly you have become a target...maybe fd has joined the WOKE community   where everyone must agree with him or be shot down


shame fd shame.

greggerypeccary wrote on Jan 9^th, 2021 at 7:36pm:



you wish

What the hell happened there? 

Rhetorical... You never saw this post. Does Jedi hand wave.