They would've if they took the Chinese approach to gradually improve the standard of living organically through productivity improvements and education. Saudi Arabia instead immediately skyrocketed their standard of living far past what the population can do productively without oil. Populations don't take well to huge standard of living decreases that are inevitable when oil $ runs out to subsidize everything in the state enormously.
> They would've if they took the Chinese approach to gradually improve the standard of living organically through productivity improvements and education.
Well, since the topic is authoritarianism, note that the Chinese approach resulted in a few tens of millions dead, which is worse than what the Saudis have managed so far: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Leap_Forward
