A socialist alternative to a vcommand economy

[Blake]

To get right back to the start of this topic, comparisons with the KSR world to the modern one are difficult and possibly meangingless. On Mars, I believe the economy was based on volunteerism of some description, I don't recall mention of Martian currency, credits, money, whatever, in any case chasing around little slips of paper didn't play a major role in the motivations of the martians.

Meanwhile (**SPOILER**), Earth got royally screwed by rising seas, imagine the economic damage from having the coastlines of the world suddenly submerged... the billions of hungry and homeless, the existing economy would simply collapse like the house of cards it is and be replaced by something new. In KSR I believe the megacorporates took the economy into their own hands, "buying" the labor of people with the longlivity treatment (rather than with any national currencies, which no doubt became worthless due to the economic collapse)...
In any case, the enormity of the natural disaster that befell earth would be sufficient to induce a more "caring and sharing" mindset among the population. I actually think that a global natural disastor is the most likely trigger for a shift in society towards something more like communism, it was a good plot device by K.S.R.

[Imran Siddiqui]

for something to be efficient it must achieve DESIRED goals. Dictatorship doesn't do that.

Are you really this dense? Of course dictatorship achieves desired goals! The goals which are desired by the dictator! What is it with you and thinking the only desired goals of government are of those people under it?

The corporation on the other hand, acting in it's own interest, makes decisions to achieve only it's goal. Left alone it makes all kinds of decisions to go against societies desired goals.

But like I said, that is more than balanced out by the societies desired goals for prosperity and technological booms.

Secondly society's desired goals are NOT accomplished efficiently by a republic government. There are all sorts of compromises and struggles in trying to get people to vote to do something. The desired goals may or may not be accomplished (and they may or may not be realistic) because of the nature of the governance.

Yes, this doesn't apply to a corporation because the desired goal is for the corporation itself, and it does that efficiently. Most people in society realize this is a good thing and like to have corporations do well because it benefits everyone else (Sony's success gives us bigger and better TVs for example).

If everyone acted in their own self interest universally the market could not function. After all, it is in my self interest to try and defraud and rip others off as long as there is little chance of being caught.

I think someone has, once again, confused self interest with selfishness. A self interested individual is not one who would want a society where you could rip people off and get away with it easily, because that can easily impact him as well.

[Dinner]

Yugoslavia tried using government owned but worker run companies during the 1960s through to the 1980s. The Yugoslav economy did out proform the rest of the eastern block through that period but they suffered from sever undercapitalization and as a result their economy underperformed the west.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Blake
In any case, the enormity of the natural disaster that befell earth would be sufficient to induce a more "caring and sharing" mindset among the population. I actually think that a global natural disastor is the most likely trigger for a shift in society towards something more like communism, it was a good plot device by K.S.R.

It wasn't merely a plot device by KSR. Most revolutions have been preceded by disasters, both natural and man-made. Revolution occurs when a government is presented with a crisis with which it is incapable of coping and there is some alternative ready to take charge. Not every revolution starts this way (various wars of national liberation -- Americans, Dutch -- come to mind), but since the French Revolution this has pretty much been the case.

As for the notion that dictatorships are more efficient than democracies, I suggest one take a good look at various third world dictatorships, as well as the Nazis and Fascists. By and large, the economies of dictatorships do not do well (the Asian tigers and Chile--somewhat--being exceptions). Generally dictatorships are made inefficient by graft and bloated bureaucracies. (The South American dictatorships probably would have done better, however, had it not been for the rise of OPEC, which really clobbered their ablity to develop and pay off their loans.) Personal dicatorships (like those of the Duvaliers and Somozas) are even more inefficient as the dictators tends to steal everything in sight. At the end, the exceeding wealthy country of Zaire wasn't even able to pay the soldiers who propped up Mobutu.

Back on topic, if the market is capable of producing a stable and productive society, then there is absolutely no point in opposing capitalism. Instead you should be working for the regulation of capitalism, unless you believe in that free market ****.

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by Albert Speer
i dont get this... can't it be assumed that the workers do not have business administration and management skills? i mean, chances are, we're dealing with workers without even basic college educations. these people wouldn't know how to run a company.

They only don't have those skills because they don't need them in this system. That's what training is for.

[Imran Siddiqui]

As for the notion that dictatorships are more efficient than democracies, I suggest one take a good look at various third world dictatorships, as well as the Nazis and Fascists. By and large, the economies of dictatorships do not do well

We are discussing efficiency in terms of achieving desired goals, ie policy. In dictatorships, achieving the goals of the ruler is very efficient compared to democracy achieving the goals of the ruler (supposedly the people).

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui

As for the notion that dictatorships are more efficient than democracies, I suggest one take a good look at various third world dictatorships, as well as the Nazis and Fascists. By and large, the economies of dictatorships do not do well

We are discussing efficiency in terms of achieving desired goals, ie policy. In dictatorships, achieving the goals of the ruler is very efficient compared to democracy achieving the goals of the ruler (supposedly the people).

No. We aren't talking about achieving the goals of rulers (or corporations). We're talking about achieving the goals of society.

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara
Back on topic, if the market is capable of producing a stable and productive society, then there is absolutely no point in opposing capitalism. Instead you should be working for the regulation of capitalism, unless you believe in that free market ****.

Hmmmm... Unless regulation doesn't work. You have to have a true democracy, and if you did I don't think capitalism wouldn't last long.

[chequita guevara]

The goals of most non-personal dictatorships is the growth of the economy. The juntas in Brazil and Argentina, for example, thought themselves patriots saving their countries from chaos and economic crisis. They were largely spectacular failures.

AS, many workers have the capacity to manage. While it is a specialized skill, it can be taught and learned. It depends on the sophistication and level of consciousness of the workers. In the Russian Revolution, workers managed their factories and work places quite effectively at first (things changed during the Civil War for various reasons). After the leftist military coup in Peru in 1968 (?), however, when a sugar factory was turned over to the workers, they ended up going out of business because they stopped working hard (what a crime!!!) and started taking more pay and perks (the criminals!!! ). Because it was still a market economy, however, they were unable to compete with sugar factories in other countries.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Kidicious
Hmmmm... Unless regulation doesn't work.

If I believed that, I'd be a libertarian. I strongly believe in regulation, for both market and command economies (a non-regulated command economy seems oxymoronic, though).

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara
In the Russian Revolution, workers managed their factories and work places quite effectively at first (things changed during the Civil War for various reasons).

There is a conflict between societies needs and the needs of the workers of the individual units. You can't just leave the workers to decide how much work they will do or to discipline themselves when there are urgent concerns of the overall society. You have to strike a balance. Unfortunately, in Russia the communists went from the extreme of allowing workers complete control to taking just about all control from them.

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara
If I believed that, I'd be a libertarian. I strongly believe in regulation, for both market and command economies (a non-regulated command economy seems oxymoronic, though).

Regulation works better for the rulers than free market sillyness, but can only work for the people in special cases and only temporarily.

[Imran Siddiqui]

No. We aren't talking about achieving the goals of rulers (or corporations). We're talking about achieving the goals of society.

No we aren't, we are talking about efficiency of government systems. The desires of 'society' have nothing to do with that unless we talk about a democratic government.

The goals of most non-personal dictatorships is the growth of the economy.

How do you have a non-personal dictatorship? Even the junta in Argentina had a personal component. Being supported by an elite in your position of power doesn't make it non-personal.

In the Russian Revolution, workers managed their factories and work places quite effectively at first

Unfortunetly Stalin got to run the economy soon after the Civil War.

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui

No. We aren't talking about achieving the goals of rulers (or corporations). We're talking about achieving the goals of society.

No we aren't, we are talking about efficiency of government systems. The desires of 'society' have nothing to do with that unless we talk about a democratic government.

We are talking about democratic govt. You keep talking about dictatorships though.

[Imran Siddiqui]

We are talking about democratic govt.

No, we are talking the efficiency of a democratic government system as a governmental system. Look back on Page 1, before you came into the picture. Dictatorship is also a governmental system.