[Mikeb85]

Everyone thinks it's a good idea and on paper it seems fine, however any time you centralize economic decision making you're basically inviting corruption. And even if you somehow avoid that, what's good for the majority often tramples the rights of minorities.

Capitalism has its downsides but "capitalism" is also basically just economic freedom, and 10/10 times I'll choose freedom over some bureaucrat making decisions that affect me.

[sharemywin]

but alot of markets end up just monopolies or oligopolies. It's hard to look at most market and call those free markets. So, doesn't really matter if there's no choice for the consumer whether its run by the government or a private company bent of extracting as much as possible from the market.

[bpt3]

Ignoring that this can be addressed through regulation, would you rather have limited choice between private companies or a single entity that mandates what you'll choose whether you like it or not and also can use force to enforce their mandates?

[kaba0]

Socialism is not a dictatorship, those are fundamentally different axes. A democratic society can vote to elect a socialist party and mandate them to create multiple competing companies in a given small market segment, for example.

But the fundamental incentives of a company under this ideal socialism are much better. Like a very crude example, other than the reason to avoid very strict regulations, why wouldn’t a food company put cocaine into their product? They have the incentive to make their buyers addicted - while a government run company can be given different goals to optimize for - e.g. the health of a population measured in some way.

[bpt3]

> Socialism is not a dictatorship, those are fundamentally different axes. A democratic society can vote to elect a socialist party and mandate them to create multiple competing companies in a given small market segment, for example.

Has anything like this ever happened in practice?

> But the fundamental incentives of a company under this ideal socialism are much better.

Socialism in a theoretical, ideal world would be great. We don't live in one currently, which is probably one reason why every single attempt at socialism/communism has failed.

> Like a very crude example, other than the reason to avoid very strict regulations, why wouldn’t a food company put cocaine into their product? They have the incentive to make their buyers addicted - while a government run company can be given different goals to optimize for - e.g. the health of a population measured in some way.

For one, people wouldn't choose the food with an addictive substance once it was known what the company was doing, plus most companies (and the individuals that run them) actually have morals and values that don't involve poisoning their customers.

[aledue]

> Ignoring that this can be addressed through regulation

That's just

> basically inviting corruption

with extra steps ;)

[bpt3]

As opposed to inviting it without the extra steps under socialism?

[logicalmonster]

Pointing out the corruption inherent when power is available is always a valuable thing, but socialism arguably would be suboptimal even if you make the impossible assumption that all humans are saints who are genuinely seeking the best possible outcome for their fellow man.

The Austrian economist Ludwig Von Mises wrote an essay in 1920 called "Economic Calculation in the Socialist Commonwealth" which made the argument that without market pricing, rational economic calculation is impossible. To give an example: say that you had a plot of land to develop in a hypothetical city and wanted to do the best possible thing for the people with zero corruption. How can you know if building a hospital, a school, a factory, a mine, a shopping mall, new housing, a public park, a museum, or a farm is the best possible thing for the people? Those are all things that some people might see a need for. Without market pricing, you have no way of truly knowing what is valued more and what's the best use of a limited resource. Even if you democratically tried to decide in a genuinely fair way with informed citizens, there's no way to actually determine what is more valuable under a socialist system.

To give the other point of view, this is somewhat of a debate and this idea has been challenged in various ways, see the following: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialist_calculation_debate

Personally I think the best argument against the calculation problem is that you can say that socialism merely tends to be inefficient compared to capitalism. However, I'd make the followup point that the system we have now is arguably not capitalism, but state corporatism. Winners/Losers in the marketplace tend to be determined more by lobbyists, lawyers, and corrupt politicians rather than through genuine open competition.

[kaba0]

I am absolutely not knowledgeable enough on the problem, but other than a company calculating a crude price for e.g. a hospital — that will generally over or undervalue it by a lot (like I don’t even know how many public tenders are won by a company in Hungary, only to increase the price 10-100 folds and the promised timeframe by 3-10 times. This way legitimate companies with more correct pricing loose at the tender already, while these corrupt ones can do this indefinitely leeching on our money (and our stupidity to vote for this corrupt party yet over again))

In a very idealistic system they can may know the availability of concrete, of this specific tool, etc. And we can’t ever know whether an alternative building in its place would have been better — like that doesn’t happen under capitalism either.

[sharemywin]

but market pricing is skewed if Bill Gates decides to turn the whole city into a giant statue of him don't see how that's the best use for that plot of land.

[Mikeb85]

Hypothetically, socialism could solve the problem of allocation of resources by throwing enough smart people at the problem.

To me the corruption potential (which has been realized everytime socialism has been implemented) is the main argument against.

[logicalmonster]

> socialism could solve the problem of allocation of resources by throwing enough smart people at the problem

As I interpret the calculation problem, the unfortunate reality is that this isn't a case where you just have some complicated math problems that you could throw enough geniuses and computers at and could somehow come pretty close to solving. The problem according to this idea is that without market pricing, there's no basis for comparison even theoretically possible. In light of many competing societal needs, you have no clue if you're directing too many resources to produce orange juice or not directing enough resources to build tools. Resources are misallocated in a complex world and everything eventually grinds down.

I believe that one strategy the Soviet system tried in part to deal with the calculation problem was actually acquiring shopping catalogues from the West to try and use their market pricing as a calculation system.

One thing I think that Star Trek gets right is that socialism might work to produce a near-utopia if you have technology that produces near infinite matter and energy for close to free.

[kaba0]

> And even if you somehow avoid that, what's good for the majority often tramples the rights of minorities.

That part is not economy-related, so I really don’t see how is it different than under capitalism. It all depends on the democracy axis, and how well minorities are represented.

[thinkwithlucie]

i agree, I wonder how the world will change once we are able to reprogram human nature through CRISPR DNA editing

[WalterGR]

> Everyone thinks it's a good idea and on paper it seems fine, however any time you centralize economic decision making

That's not required for socialism, right?

[sharemywin]

the problem is the argument seems to devolve into socialism versus capitalism which is ridiculous because most economies are mixed. is a mixed economy socialist? or capitalist? capitalism could look pretty awful as well. If you can buy anything murder for hire etc. Then I would argue against that.

[Mikeb85]

It's literally the defining feature of socialism...

[WalterGR]

What is China?

My understanding is that socialism is primarily about public rather than private ownership. And that centralization of market planning varies in different regimes.

It may be a sufficient condition but it is not a necessary one.

[Mikeb85]

Public ownership = centralized ownership = centralized decision making.

If you can't own anything individually you can't make economic decisions individually.

It's like having a million business partners all with equal voting shares but in every aspect of your life.

[pwinnski]

Left unanswered is: What is China?

China seems to manage largely-decentralized decision-making in a socialist society.

There are exceptions, of course, as Jack Ma is finding out, but then, there seems to be more exceptions in the USA right now, as oligarchs are leveraging their wealth in obscene ways.

[bpt3]

> China seems to manage largely-decentralized decision-making in a socialist society.

Is this the same China where the CCP issues 5 year plans that dictate what the entire country is going to work towards, and the state owned enterprises that control most of the economy execute on those plans?

[anthony_d]

> "as oligarchs are leveraging their wealth in obscene ways."

Which US oligarchs are you talking about and what obscene things are they doing?

[Mikeb85]

China is socialism but allows a certain amount of private enterprise. They still have 5 year plans as pointed out, still have state-controlled enterprises and still maintain a large degree of control over private business.

[yucky]

>Left unanswered is: What is China?

State capitalism.

[nradov]

It would probably be more accurate to label China as a fascist or corporatist state. There are elements of socialism (as well as capitalism) but it isn't the primary policy focus. Look at their actions rather than words.