Hungary began its transition to a market economy as long ago as 1968 with the adoption of the New Economic Mechanism, when detailed central planning was abandoned and the economy was regulated by means of financial and economic levers. However, after a period of re-centralization in the 1970s...

Discusses the Hungarian economic system called the New Mechanism which was established post‐1960. Suggests that the planners are still thinking in terms of quantities and balances and not paying enough attention to prices and costs.

Transition from central planning to a market economy, involving large-scale institutional change and reforms at all levels, is often described as the greatest social science experiment in modern times. As more than two decades have passed since the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the...