Most goods are protected from competition and are guaranteed markets in the Soviet Union or elsewhere in Eastern Europe. State of the art technology and the best scientists are allocated to military rather than industrial service. The economic metamorphosis of the New Frontier will be a long and difficult process and will occur at different rates in different countries, according to how closely each country has followed Communist orthodoxy. Poland and Hungary have made some significant moves towards democratization and experimentation with free market principles, but they are saddled with debt, declining economic growth, and high inflation rates. Czechoslovakia, with its new government, is in better shape.
Economic growth is slow, but the economy has little debt.
East Germany, though closely tied to Moscow and heavily debt laden, also has a primary link with the West. Its industry is the most technologically advanced of the group. Romania and Bulgaria are still dominated by hard line Communist governments, known for oppression rather than reform. The Soviet economy has the biggest hurdles to overcome. The sheer mass of its conservative bureaucracy, its ethnically fragmented population, and military commitment to the Warsaw Pact will make economic reform difficult.