| To clarify, not just any socialism, non-market socialism; the kind that always fails given sufficient time (none longer than 50 years). Markets require adversarial decisionmaking, and when few participants exist they always coordinate, even opposite profit because they receive profit from bailouts and monopoly distortions. Coordinated moves regardless of cost, cannot perform economic calculation, which is why shifting inventory around at any level doesn't solve core problems under socialism. Mises covers this quite well. Runaway money printing inevitably runs afoul of the two participants requirements to continue the economic cycle, and those requirements are in purchasing power. The producers will cease production when they can no longer make a profit, and that happens when the stable store of value of their assets is undermined (chaotically). The factor markets will cease having children when they can no longer afford to support a wife and three kids (sufficient to get one to the age where they have children). Our birthrate is at 1.44 at last check, significantly below replacement. The state apparatus who receives money directly from a money printer can continue production, but not efficiently, and certainly not indefinitely, and they typically engage in constraining the supply artificially to raise price level, which distorts the economies chaotically with a whipsaw effect as well. All in all, it runs into the socialist calculation problem, and that chaos destroys the distribution network. Without that network, it all fails, including food getting to your local grocery store. Been to the store lately? Seen all those empty shelves? See the price of eggs up at the same price as meat. Its all going to come crashing down in the next few years. The former producer side is fairly immediate in their leaving the market (sieving through merger, acquisition, bankruptcy etc), the latter consumer side may take up to 40 years. We are in year 35 of having dipped underneath the required compensation to raise children, in purchasing power. Take your pick. |