Define communism for dum 'ol Lancer

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Ned
Rail and Utilities? These are so-called natural monopolies anyway. The problem you have, Spiff, is that you called for a lot more than that. You want all big companies to be owned by the State, IIRC.

I supported this idea several years ago, but I think I've stopped supporting it before I joined 'Poly

I admit that I'm quite liberal on the definition of "utilities": it encompasses the energy sector, it can encompass most of the finance and telecommunication sector, along with the usual ones (public transportation, education etc.). Besides, I think the State should be able to nationalize an activity that is instrumental to the overall economic well being (telecommunications are a good example) if the market fails at providing a fair access to all economic actors.

However, a computer game company is definitely not the matter of the State, no matter how big.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Ned
Spiff, as I said, your system suffers greatly to the extent you do not allow for competition in producing goods and services.

Err, I do.

Think of my system as basically the Swedish system, with the twist that the companies' bosses are utlimately reesponsible to their employees, instead of being ultimately responsible to their shareholders.

In Sweden, there is competition. Heck, they even have furniture stores that are not Ikea

[Lawrence of Arabia]

how does it feel? how does it feel? to be on your own. with no direction home. a complete unknown. like a rolling stone.

[Ned]

Originally posted by Spiffor

Err, I do.

Think of my system as basically the Swedish system, with the twist that the companies' bosses are utlimately reesponsible to their employees, instead of being ultimately responsible to their shareholders.

In Sweden, there is competition. Heck, they even have furniture stores that are not Ikea

All companies are "responsible" in some fashion to their employees. But, if you cannot promote or pay differently based on performance, or fire or hire as needed, your company is doomed.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Ned
All companies are "responsible" in some fashion to their employees. But, if you cannot promote or pay differently based on performance, or fire or hire as needed, your company is doomed.

A co-op doesn't prevent that (firing employees would probably be a last-resort thing however). Just like a democracy doesn't prevent the existence of a political hierarchy.

The hierarchy, however, will be aco****able to the employees, instead of being accountable to the owners. As such, the company won't strive to squeeze the maximal financial rentability it can, but it will focus at providing its employees (managers included) with a good pay, and with good working conditions. If the manager is unable to reach the aims of the company (as expressed by the employees at the board of directors), then he becomes replaced. Nothing amazing with it, really.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by Kidicious
Lazy ****ers should get paid less.

"If you have a really difficult job to do, give it to someone lazy. He'll inevitably find an easier way to do it" - I read that somewhere, attributed to its author, but I can't remember the book I saw it in or the author.

[Kuciwalker]

Re: Re: Define communism for dum 'ol Lancer

Originally posted by Spiffor
This is not the definition. Communism allows for property, in its ideal marxist form as well as in the form it took in 20th century "communist" regimes. In East Germany, people owned their clothes, TV/radio sets, washing machines, and their car if they were lucky.
What communism bans, however, is the private property of the means of production, e.g. factories.

I can't own a computer or typewriter under communism?

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by MichaeltheGreat


"If you have a really difficult job to do, give it to someone lazy. He'll inevitably find an easier way to do it" - I read that somewhere, attributed to its author, but I can't remember the book I saw it in or the author.

Lazyness for Dummies?

[Spiffor]

Re: Re: Re: Define communism for dum 'ol Lancer

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
I can't own a computer or typewriter under communism?

You can, as long as you're not using them to produce value. Different Socialist/Communist systems may tackle the issue differently, once you decide to use your computer to produce value. In some cases, you might be left completely alone (in the situation of a socialist system that allows the private property of small means of production, like Soviet Russia), in some other cases, your computer will have a different administrative status (a Spifforist country could work just like that), in some other societies, producing value with your own computer might be entirely banned.

Just like capitalist systems are very diverse, so are socialist/communist systems.

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by Ned
Also, a communist system that must "progress" to a stateless society must either do so by operation of some "invisible hand," or do so by coercion.

That doesn't make sense. The theory is that there is overabundance and people only have to work as much as they want to. Stop making stuff up.

[Velociryx]

Spiffor...I realize that your utopic vision does allow for more freedoms than all the others I've read about here, so this post only partially applies to your proposal...just so you know...

quote:
Originally posted by Kuciwalker
I can't own a computer or typewriter under communism?

You can, as long as you're not using them to produce value.

This is one of the things I find most absurd about the proposed system (Communism), by the way.

It's rediculous enough that the concept of "ownership" must be so artifically broken down and segmented

You may own the shirt, but not the loom that made it (even if you make one yourself--I'm guessing if this happened you'd be locked up, and your loom co-opted by the state as a heinous machine capable of enslaving another).

You may own the computer, but only if you PROMISE not to use it to make a profit.

You may enter into a business to make money, but ONLY if you don't hire another person to help you (ie, a contract worker, with no stake in the business) -- EVEN IF they are a 10,000% willing participant in the arrangement.

All these layers of artificial constructs and constraints seem both supurfulous and silly to me.

If it's okay to own the shirt, then it's okay to own the loom. Same mechanism. Same principle.

There's nothing inherently immoral about the loom, just as there's nothing inherently immoral about the shirt.

To ascribe it with such characteristics is pure....silliness.

To pretend to be shocked at its evil nature is equally silly.

To pretend that "the market" does not exist is an equal folly. You may drive it underground, but it WILL exist so long as human beings exist, which I"m hoping is a right long time yet.

Also to pretend that the market is somehow bad or immoral is rediculous.

It's no more bad or immoral than electricity.

As a mechanism, it lacks the capacity to be bad or immoral....it simply "is."

As a means of establishing the value of any particular good or service, there's nothing better. You can pretend otherwise till the cows come home, but there's yet to be a demonstrably better price setter. Until someone can show me one, I'll stand by my conviction.

Individuals don't OWE society anything. Society exists BECAUSE of individuals, not the other way around. Society is/was our first construct. The Market was a close second, even if we didn't realize its full power for scores of centuries. Society is, and should be, a pay to play proposition, and it is, for the most part. Pay your taxes, reap some benefits.

It should NOT be about restricting individual choice and freedom unless the restricted actions impede the choices and freedoms of another, and for the most part in Western nations, this is the way it is.

To dream up a "utopia" in which there are tons of restraints and restrictions on who can own what, and for what specific purposes implies a mind-boggling beureaucracy that sticks its nose CONSTANTLY into the private lives of its citizens....supposedly for their own good.

This "Watcher Society" is a must-have element in every communist paradise I've seen so far, as it is the ONLY way one can make sure that nobody is "exploiting" their fellow man, and it, more than anything else, is the REASON that the society will invariably become one where those in power rule from a base of fear, rather than the rule of law.

And of course, there's "no need" for anyone to watch the Watchers, because they will be above temptation and corruption. No matter the vast power they wield to destroy the lives of those they lord over, they will be beyond reproach, and their actions always guided with the purest of motivations.

Has such purity EVER existed in any human society?

I think not, and yet....we are expected to believe that "this time" it surely will! (after the revolution, of course, when all the malcontents are dealt with in the kindest way possible).

You (communists in general) tell me that I'm being shamelessly exploited by the guy who owns the company I work for....that I'm being bled dry at the altar of capitalism.

I say, I HOPE TO GOD that man keeps right on exploiting me for YEARS to come! Not only do I enjoy the work I do there, but I believe that I am compensated fairly for my time and work. I am an utterly willing participant in my so-called "exploitation" and think the term is offensive when used to describe my work environment.

You tell me that I can labor privately and make a living, but if I hire someone to help (no matter how willing they may be), I'll be exploiting them and this is amoral and wrong.

I tell you that the person I hire will have a brain, and be capable of making informed decisions, and IF I am not offering a sufficient incentive to come to work for me, then surely he will not! It would make no sense for him to.

And that is the beautiful mechanism of the market. Simple. Pure. Beyond debate.

What I take issue with most of all is the fact that the Communist folks feel this urgent, insatiable NEED to control the lives of others.

Somehow, they feel that the poor, defenseless average man is incapable of defining his own wants and desires, and that these must be mandated by the benevolent and all-knowing state.

Somehow, the poor, downtrodden average man is incapable of negotiating a good deal for himself, based on his own wants and desires (things that the state seems to believe they know better than the individual himself, which is a beautiful trick of mind-reading, I must say!).

I say this is nonsense spouted by people who have the desire to control the lives of others, and will say whatever is necessary to sway people to their position, and then to chain them to the alter of an all powerful state machine, and using history as a guide, my perception of communism falls pretty closely in line with the historic realities.

So when the big red horse is trotted out for the umpteenth time, I can't help but wonder what's changed. And then Kid shows up, and I realize the answer is:

Not much.

Not much at all...

-=Vel=-

PS: For the record, of all the proposals I've ever read, Spiffor's seems far and away the most palatable. The only big thing I take issue with is the fact that I can bust my arse for ten years writing a book, but the moment I hire my first full time employee (who wasn't around for ANY of that other stuff during the past ten years), he gets an automatic 50% stake in my company).

I'm doubting that the same thing would apply if we were talking straight capital investments. That is to say, if I invest a quarter of a million dollars to start a business and my partner invests eighty-five cents, I doubt you'd give him an equal say in the business, so why should my labor, over and above the new guy's not count?

But that's another story...

-V.

[MrFun]

I think you used the term "amoral" incorrectly.


To be amoral means that it is neither good or bad -- it just is.


I think you mean the word "immoral."

[Kidlicious]

OMG the longer Vels posts get the more deluded he gets.

[Velociryx]

Mr. Fun...that's what I get for typing on darvocet....thanks for the point-out!

And Kid....not delusional...hell, you've said yourself on NUMEROUS occassions that you want to force people to work. You've mentioned forcibly relocating families, telling people WHERE they'll work, and on what project, and a host of other things.

Aside from that, can YOU tell me how one might keep tabs on who's exploiting whom WITHOUT a "Watcher Society"?

Further, can you explain how such a (Watcher Based) society could be based on anything BUT fear? With neighbors seeking to turn each other in for some meager gain and to gain favor with those who watch over them?

Didn't think so.



-=Vel=-

[Spiffor]

Somehow, they feel that the poor, defenseless average man is incapable of defining his own wants and desires, and that these must be mandated by the benevolent and all-knowing state.

The poor man is actually much, much weaker in a negociation than the one who has options.

I'll be using an extreme example to show what poverty can do to your bargaining power:
Tell me Vel, if you were poor to the point that you couldn't guarantee food and shelter to your children (ie, all your money-worthy stuff has already been sold long ago, and the banks won't lease you a penny). Let's assume that the only job opportunity in your area is to work under the orders of an utter ***** (outrageously low pay, way too much work, dangerous working conditions). What would you do? Would you accept being exploited by the bastard, or will you let your kids starve to death?

Sadly, this situation is not an hypothetical in most countries in the world.

Let's hit closer to home with another example. Let's say you have been working for 30 years at an office job, as an oridnary clerk. You're not exceptionally skilled, and your "general" skills (skills that can be used at other workplaces) have dulled with time: you are good with your company's firmware, and with your company's working methods. But it would be very difficult to adapt to a new job (especially considering that when you're 50-60 years old, your learning abilities are weak)
Now, the company decides to lower its human costs. There will be a slew of people who'll get fired, and a slew of people who'll get their wages cut. For the company, you're typically among the expandables. You, OTOH, have grown dependent of the company to offer you and your family the standard of living you're used to.
The HR guy calls you in his office to negociate how you will contribute to the downsizing effort. Do you really think you're strong enough to rboker a good deal for yourself?

In developed countries, there is an increasing trend of having two kind of workers: indispensable (skilled) ones, and expandable ones. The companies heavily invest in their "indispensable" workforce, because these employees are a strong asset, and they don't want to lose such an asset (especially to the hands of the competition). Many skilled jobs are like that.
The pendant is the "expandable" workforce: cashiers, masons, low-level clerks, dish-washers, assembly line workers, MacJobs etc. Who cares if such a person is disgruntled? Who cares if she wants to leave? She'd be very easy to replace, and she has much more to lose by leaving the job than the company has to lose. As a result, this "expandable" person is extremely weak in negociations.


Edit: is "pr*ck" such a bad smear word that it gets censored