How come Socialism/Communism always fails? (Page 1 of 5)
Posted: 9/4/2026 7:33:50 PM EDT
| How come they nearly always start with millions dying? If communism and socialism are so great how come they have to be lied about to come to fruition, how come they have to be enforced through violence and often with millions dying? |
Liberty is meaningless where the right to utter one's thoughts and opinions has ceased to exist. That, of all rights, is the dread of tyrants. It is the right which they first of all strike down. They know its power. F. Douglass
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Everyone always talks about human nature or power and corruption, but all socialist countries will always fail even if run by perfect human beings. Why? 1. Centrally planned economies can't determine what things should cost. It's literally impossible. For example, without markets, negotiations, choice in consumer goods, competition, etc., how much do you pay a farmer? You can try to calculate a cost through studies and years of bureaucracy, but it will always be a guess that is too high or too low and shortages/overages will constantly occur. Meanwhile, in free market economies, determining how much things cost happens via supply/demand completely organically, quickly, and none of us even realize it's happening. Free markets are simply more accurate and way more efficient at this unique thing that is impossible for socialist economies. 2. The only way to ensure no one owns private property (the foundational idea of all socialist philosophies) is to have an all-powerful government that represses anyone who tries. It's the only way to make it "work". Purges, secret police, etc. are all inherent features of socialism, not unfortunate byproducts of power and human nature. |
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Originally Posted By TresOsos: Because of the nature of man. First post. Now the argument we'll that we create AGI, then the AGI will be able to benevolently rule us, basically under communism with a UBI. 
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Originally Posted By bigfatOTMs: Everyone always talks about human nature or power and corruption, but all socialist countries will always fail even if run by perfect human beings. Why? 1. Centrally planned economies can't determine what things should cost. It's literally impossible. For example, without markets, negotiations, choice in consumer goods, competition, etc., how much do you pay a farmer? You can try to calculate a cost through studies and years of bureaucracy, but it will always be a guess that is too high or too low and shortages/overages will constantly occur. Meanwhile, in free market economies, determining how much things cost happens via supply/demand completely organically, quickly, and none of us even realize it's happening. Free markets are simply more accurate and way more efficient at this unique thing that is impossible for socialist economies. 2. The only way to ensure no one owns private property (the foundational idea of all socialist philosophies) is to have an all-powerful government that represses anyone who tries. It's the only way to make it "work". Purges, secret police, etc. are all inherent features of socialism, not unfortunate byproducts of power and human nature. Yup. Hayek won a Noble prize in economics with point 1 being a significant part of his work. Socialism can’t calculate, can’t adapt, can’t incentivize, and can’t go broke gently via profit / loss accounting and resource re-allocation through market liquidation. |
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Originally Posted By AlvinYork: How come they nearly always start with millions dying? If communism and socialism are so great how come they have to be lied about to come to fruition, how come they have to be enforced through violence and often with millions dying? Because eventually they run out of other people's money |
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Originally Posted By AlvinYork: How come they nearly always start with millions dying? If communism and socialism are so great how come they have to be lied about to come to fruition, how come they have to be enforced through violence and often with millions dying? Evil fails ultimately and always. Lots of pain along the way tho. |
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Originally Posted By TresOsos: Because of the nature of man. Because it’s against the nature of man. Man tries to improve his lot. Acquire things. Marxism is there to take from those who like to acquire things. After awhile nobody wants to acquire things for those that are to lazy to do it themselves. Then draconian measures have to be put in place. It’s also the Antichrist. As it makes man God or the highest beast. Based entirely on a gospel of envy. Someone has more and therefore they are evil. Unless you’re the party boss of course. |
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Its a poorly thought out, lazy solution. In practice it can't work because it relies on adherence. Humans aren't evolved to the point where we adhere to things that conflict with our innate fight or flight reaction to stimuli. Most people have an intrinsic bias toward justice. There is no justice in communism. Quite the opposite. It requires the suspension of justice in order for it to work. It reminds me of the psychology require to make a cult function. |
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The fundamental reason why Socialism/Communism always fails is that it no answer for one simple question: "How much should everything cost?" Everything reason given in this thread is rooted in that fundamental defect. Economies run on the concept of scarcity and Socialism / Communism has no answer for how you price scarcity. |
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Because it puts the foxes in charge of the henhouse, even more fully than capitalism. Socialism/Communism, by nature, demand that the government have even *more* authority and control over people, their lives, their property, and their decisions. Which lets government stooges get away with even more selfishness and evil than they can get away with under capitalism. |
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1) Because it does not solve the problem of concentration of wealth and power. It just redistributes that to the party insiders. 2) It incentivizes every person to take as much from the system and put as little in it as possible. 3) centralized planning of everything is impossible in practice. |
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Socialism is incompatible with human nature. In "Of Plymouth Plantation", the pilgrims tried socialism. They had a communal garden system where everyone was supposed to put in equal work in return for the food being divided equally. Guess what? A few people put in most of the work, some people did some work, and a few free loaders did almost nothing and still expected an equal share of the food. They decided that each family would work its own plot and get whatever they could produce. A society can strive for one of two systems, in general. One approach is to strive for equal opportunity with the understanding that it will produce unequal results. The other approach strives for equal results with the understanding that it will require unequal opportunity. Only one approach is compatible with human nature. |
It's as if a big chunk of our adult population has lost the ability to tell the difference between what is possible, and what is probable.
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Originally Posted By TresOsos: Because of the nature of man. but, I'll expand just a bit. there is no incentive to do better. In fact, there is an incentive to do less, because if you do less than your neighbor, but receive the same handouts, you actually "earned" more than they they did per unit of labor. |
Always blame autocorrect.
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Originally Posted By LnWlf: If it’s so great, why does it take a bloody revolution to start it? Followed by killing millions more and then building a fence to keep the ones you cant kill inline. And most democrates think they want this now... no matter their income level. |
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Originally Posted By AlvinYork: How come they nearly always start with millions dying? If communism and socialism are so great how come they have to be lied about to come to fruition, how come they have to be enforced through violence and often with millions dying? Socialism is fiction. It doesn't exist. Utopian fantasy. Empty speeches and brutal authoritarianism. The authoritarianism is real but the utopia cannot exist. |
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Originally Posted By macro: Another organic thought....its laughable when the people who own nothing start making decisions about how the people who own a lot ought to do things. I earned what I have. No. You can't have any. You mean renters? 
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If you can’t dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bullshit.
