[MrHamburger]

You just described what was happening in 1950s in Eastern Europe when communism came to town and started purging every "evil capitalist pig". It has turned out that loyalty can't be exchanged for merit and all the countries slowly declined until 1990s when communism just imploded.

But instead of paying ransoms, result would be concentration camp. We were calling them "Labor camps" because communism is not Nazism. However sign "Work to Freedom" was used on the entrance of such camps.