Philip Hanson, author of "The Rise and Fall of the Soviet economy: an Economic History of the USSR from 1945", claims that the label stagnation is not "entirely unfair". Brezhnev, according to Hanson, did preside over a period of slowdown in economic growth, but claims that the era started with good growth that was at a higher rate than during the end of Khrushchev's rule. Economic slowdown began in 1973 "when even the official estimates began to show Soviet per capita production no longer closing the gap with the US." Before 1973, there was a reform period launched by Alexei Kosygin, which many believed would become as radical as those in the Socialist Republic of Czechoslovakia and the previous reform attempts in Hungary. According to Hanson, many assumed that growth during the Brezhnev era did not stop but started to stagnate. Not everything stagnated, however, as per capita consumption grew by 1.9% during the 1970s, which is a "highly respectable rate" of growth. Another point that Hanson makes is that, in contrast to the repressive policies of Joseph Stalin and instability-inducing policies of Khrushchev, the Brezhnev era was stable and a "period of (comparative) plenty".