JohnG@lt wrote:
Diesel_dyk wrote:
Shahter wrote:
he also says that there were "communist countries" that supposedly failed because of their planned economy, when those weren't communist in the first place and that type of economy was the only one that could work in those countries. the dude has no idea what he's talking about.
Yah yah, those weren't true communist countries... because we all know that a true communist country is a eutopian dream that has existed for precisely zero seconds in the history of the earth. What, I'm talking about are the countries that were referred to with affection as the communist block countries from the cold war... in case you didn't know that already.
Sorry but those countries did fail because they had planned economies. Planned economies are ineffcient and inflexible and when they couldn't keep up with the pace of change, black markets sprung up and eventually market systems took over. China learned from these mistakes and began to open up markets shortly after the fall of the Soviet Union.
Anyway, dude you explain to me why these countries shrugged off their planned economies, like I said its organic. These planned economies failed to provide a benefit to those societies so those socties shrugged off those structures. Even with all the authoritarian might that the Soviet Union had, it couldn't keep that structure in place.
And I guess that's my point, if you try to replace the redistribution of wealth that exists in our society with some other system like a police state, or high tech survellience or some other type of authoritarian measures, eventually society will over throw it and return to a more efficient system of resources allocation and that system will balance efficiency with stability just like our society does now.
We have what we have because it works, if it didn't work we would have something else.
May be in the future high tech will bring us a more efficient system of resource allocation and when that day arrives, I do believe that we will see a change because that is what an organic society will gravitate towards. My only fear is that high tech will be used to make authoriariansm more cost effective and be used to over throw society in which case we will look more like the Soviet Union than Athens.
You seem to be a true believer. I have a few questions for you...
Say I want a new cell phone under your system. I understand that since there is no money and no private property I need to put in a request to the correct committee in order to receive one. My need is then debated and if I qualify as needy they will provide one for me. Who's making the cell phones? If we're living in the utopia that you suggest without centralized government directing the economy and we've done away with money and greed, hasn't everyone devolved down to subsistence communities where they are isolated from one another and live in harmony? Everyone is working, yes? They're all out in the fields working or they've invented machines to do it for them and they're all sitting there playing their fifty year old xbox games, yes?
There are just so many millions of holes in Marx's theories that I could sit here all night driving semi-trucks through them. A long long time ago people realized that Marxist economies just don't work, that there is no such thing as democratic socialism where everyone ends up equal and everyone ends up with the same amount of money etc. It's not because capitalism is evil and at fault for the failures of communism, it's because the system itself is a fairy tale and frankly, pure idiocy. If I could invent a time machine and go back and change one event in history I wouldn't end the Crusades, or see if Jesus was real, or kill Hitler or any other such thing. I would go back to shortly after Karl Marx was born and smother him with a pillow so that I wouldn't have to listen to otherwise intelligent people prattle on with his stupidity coming out of their mouths.
Edit - I picked the last thing you wrote to quote. After reading what you actually wrote in your paragraphs here what you are describing with people deciding organically what they want is capitalism. It's the free market. There's nothing socialist in there. There's also been no organic manifestations of desire for a socialist system among the 'proles' that you are so fearful of. Every single program has been implemented top down by 'progressives' so even there you fail. No one rose up and said they wanted Social Security, it was a wealthy man with a bleeding heart who implemented it. Same with all the other crap. Face it, you really have no fucking idea what a poor person needs, you just think you do.
I not sure if you not reading what I wrote, or its just outside of your simplistic or perhaps eutopian view view of capitalism and the invisible hand.
But here are my points in a nutshell.
We have the welfare state/ redistribution of wealth because capitalism has certain inherent flaws. There is a balance between the beneficial efficiencies that the market brings to benefit society, and the stability that the welfare state brings. These are necessary because but the flaws make capitalism unstable and prone to self destructive behaviors. Just like the latest financial crisis brought to by deregulation. One solution for those problems are the welfare state/ redistribution of wealth. Frankly I'm not the one with eutopian rose colored glasses, you are, if you think that society will tolerate conditions created by a market that left all on its own. Like I said there is a balance between efficiency and stability the marking line as to the degree of redistribution necessary to achieve that stability is something that is constantly debated and adjusted and that is what I refer to as being organic. I doubt that we will ever be without some form of welfare state unless we have some sort of uber authoritarian govt like a soviet union in which case we will be without property at all which is IMO a form of slavery.
And on the Marx comment... I said that he highlighted certain problems with the destructive nature of capitalism. His economic analysis provided insights that influenced the development social programs and the welfare state which stabilized democracies that utilize market systems. Its his insights not his prophecies on a communist eutopia that I was referring to as having helped save capitalism. And in fact there are large corporations that use "marxian" economic analysis to aid in forecasting... its got nothing to do with communism. But if you've never read anything but john locke or adam smith or taken no more than an econ class in a business school then I guess you wouldn't know any better.
You are right that some of the first programs like unemployment insurance were instituted by an authoritarian.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_von_BismarckThose programs came into existance to head off the rise of socialism and communism... hence the statement that that Marx saved capitalism.
Anyway, Bismarck was attempting to stabilize his society, and today those type of programs perform the same function. To say that we an do without them is really naive.
In a nutshell, no amount of rational thought will ever trump a full belly when it comes to pacifying the poor. And that full belly provides all of us with some stability.
