Tim Draper reflects on how the Soviet Union's decades-long ban on private business destroyed entrepreneurial culture. He visited Russia and the Hermitage Museum, observing how generations grew up without business role models, leaving lasting damage to free-market thinking that takes time to repair.
Chapters
So we started this great fund and I went to visit Russia and I went to the Hermitage Museum, I went to St. Petersburg. Moscow is one thing, it's sort of like a big facade and everything else is poor as dirt. But St. Petersburg, Paris is a spectacular city, and it is so gorgeous. And you can imagine that in 1800, that it was so cool and so amazing. And I went into the Hermitage Museum, and they've got the greatest collection of Van Goghs and Renoirs and whatever in the world. This makes the Louvre look like podunk. But the floor is dirty, the walls are painted graffiti, the whole place is a total mess. And what happened, I asked, I said, what happened here? They said, well, 75 years ago, the Bolsheviks came in and they were mad at the wealthy Russians. And this is how happening in our country now. They came in and they made business illegal. And let this be a lesson to all of us. They made business illegal for 75 years. So imagine this, you're an entrepreneur, your father believes business is bad, your grandfather believes business is bad, and his father also believes business is bad and illegal. You have no role model. That is a horrible place to be. And if you have that entrepreneurial vibe, you don't even know how a free market works. It is a scary place to be. Anyway, so I'm hoping that if we keep at it long enough, A generation will go by where at least the father and mother will have understood the free market before these kids start businesses.
