Anti-Capitalist Sentiment (with some morality)

[wufwugy]

Wuf, you gave a critique of communism in the last dozen posts or so. I felt it was lacking, in that communism, on a large scale, has not been achieved to any greater extent than a modern free market system has. All communist states have been rigid economies with assigned work. Of course productivity incentive will be lower when jobs are assigned, and mobility (both physical and social) is limited. I'm not really arguing for communism here, but just trying to illustrate that a argument, similar to one favored by Libertarians, can be made for communism: it hasn't ever really successfully been implemented.

Why don't you think it has been implemented? Everything I've learned about Russia shows that it was super implemented in the USSR. The foundation of communism is an economy based on communal need, and everything in the USSR was based on this. Factories were put in the worst possible places just because they were "needed" there. Products were manufactured at costs that exceeded their value because it was "needed". Everybody worked because everybody needed to work, and everybody reaped the benefits of the work. I bet if you asked any Soviet Russians about it, they'd tell you they did what they were supposed to and they tried hard. For decades, the USSR went gangbusters on growing their economy, but they eventually realized it was a house of cards. Supply and demand had not been adhered to. Gorbachev tried to save it by gradually reverting to a more market oriented model, but the damage had already been done. The foundation of the Russian economy was communal need, and it had starved them of innovation for half a century. The country is now suffering incredibly.

China was similar, but it was able to drop its communism for state capitalism, and since then upward mobility has been increasing at a phenomenal pace

[boost]

Why don't you think it has been implemented? Everything I've learned about Russia shows that it was super implemented in the USSR. The foundation of communism is an economy based on communal need, and everything in the USSR was based on this. Factories were put in the worst possible places just because they were "needed" there. Products were manufactured at costs that exceeded their value because it was "needed". Everybody worked because everybody needed to work, and everybody reaped the benefits of the work. I bet if you asked any Soviet Russians about it, they'd tell you they did what they were supposed to and they tried hard. For decades, the USSR went gangbusters on growing their economy, but they eventually realized it was a house of cards. Supply and demand had not been adhered to. Gorbachev tried to save it by gradually reverting to a more market oriented model, but the damage had already been done. The foundation of the Russian economy was communal need, and it had starved them of innovation for half a century. The country is now suffering incredibly.

China was similar, but it was able to drop its communism for state capitalism, and since then upward mobility has been increasing at a phenomenal pace

This is all patently wrong. Millions of Russians died due to an avoidable famine caused by Stalin's enthusiasm for a misguided botanist who couldn't have reversed his position if he realized his error, because it wouldn't only mean his fall from the grace of the inner party, but likely his death. This was repeated over and over. Innovation was not stymied because of communism, it was squashed because there were megalomaniacs running the show, there was a culture of suspicion, and disagreeing with the states opinion on nearly anything meant a vacation in the gulag, if not death.

It was indeed doomed to failure at the time, you're 100% right. But that's because there was no possible way to transition from a system which dependent on vast bureaucracies and a powerful inner party.

For a further rebuttal, see #72

[wufwugy]

This is all patently wrong. Millions of Russians died due to an avoidable famine caused by Stalin's enthusiasm for a misguided botanist who couldn't have reversed his position if he realized his error, because it wouldn't only mean his fall from the grace of the inner party, but likely his death. This was repeated over and over. Innovation was not stymied because of communism, it was squashed because there were megalomaniacs running the show, there was a culture of suspicion, and disagreeing with the states opinion on nearly anything meant a vacation in the gulag, if not death.

It was indeed doomed to failure at the time, you're 100% right. But that's because there was no possible way to transition from a system which dependent on vast bureaucracies and a powerful inner party.

For a further rebuttal, see #72

The famines were certainly tragic, but I'm not sure what the relevance is. Sovkhoz made up to 45% of USSR farming, and they did not do well. Stalin was a terrible guy, but he implemented some srsbsns communist reforms. But none of them worked well