Those 66% were not among the 25 million or so to be brutally murdered under the system. For those given ration cards and told where to live and work for whatever the government chose to pay them, life was simple and secure. As long as you didn’t complain about the working conditions, or God forbid go on strike, you knew you’d have your daily loaf of bread and ration of vodka.
I had Hungarian friends who told me about Hungarian friends of theirs who had left the free world and gone back to communist Hungary.
There was very little freedom there, but neither was there much freedom to fail. They were terrified living in the West with the possibility of being out of work or having medical problems that sucked up all their money.
If you were raised never knowing any better, capitalism and self-reliance could be a real crap shoot.
Or skip work, or be late to work, or complain about the local party leader picking your kid up off the street to use as a sex toy, etc.