[adrian_b]

During the years after WW2, the USSR has stolen huge amounts from East Germany and from the other East European countries, in various forms, from factories moved tool by tool from Germany to Russia, to huge bogus war reparations paid by other countries, to mixed companies owned by USSR and the local states, supposedly for cooperation in agricultural production, mining operations or forest exploitation, where the Soviets contributed nothing, except some general manager to oversee the local workers, but they took most or all of the production, exactly like it was done in the past in the colonies of the "imperialists" that the Soviets loved to criticize.

So there is no wonder that "Material conditions in the USSR improved dramatically after WW2".

However, after 1960 the flow of stolen valuables from the occupied countries has progressively dried and eventually the internal corruption made impossible to maintain the previous material conditions of USSR, much less improve them.

[fennecfoxy]

Yup, they took a lot. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eisenacher_Motorenwerk including a whole BMW factory!

They kept making cars with the BMW logo until BMW sued them, so they renamed it "Eisenacher Motorenwerk".

[thriftwy]

Do you claim that Soviets has actually moved that factory someplace else; or are you blaming that factory for continuing to be where it was built, producing stuff it was built to produce, likely paying wages to the same people who worked there from the start?

I know that Soviet Union has took e.g. Opel manufacturing line as reparations to form Moskvitch plant, but that's a different story.