How come Socialism/Communism always fails? (Page 3 of 5)
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Originally Posted By DevilsEggAdvocate: If China's economy one day surpasses the US then it will have demonstrated that there can be a successful system that is not based on democracy and free markets. The fact that they've made as much progress as they've had in areas we think only advanced economies can (e.g. cars, AI, solar energy, nuclear energy, weapons, etc.) already suggests it's a successful alternative system. I mean they embraced many free market policies decades ago. Authoritarian leadership has made sticking to an overall economic goal easier than the partisan infighting that we see paralyze our progress. BUT two things, leadership picked the right free market goals to go after and two they have been skating off of the world’s addiction to cheap labor that has shielded them from the typical bubbles with the constant spigot of income. |
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Everyone has nailed it really well thus far, but another avenue that I've always thought about is where Socialism as a concept generally does actually work. That's within a close (idealized) family. Children, parents, and elderly parents being a close unit. Some people work "harder" for the sake of the family, and some people reap outsized benefits from that labor. The very young children are quite literally taken care of, their every need tended to, the Mother usually works all day to keep the home and the Father goes out to earn. Quite often the Father doesn't have to kick in on the home work very much, and the Mother doesn't have to work outside very much. The elderly parents live functionally in an upper tier level of respect, ease, and authority. All of this probably a perfect representation of the classic Socialist phrase "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs." The parents will literally work themselves to the bone for the good of the group, giving food from their plates to ensure the others eat. The idealized older children will take up slack where they can, getting their own small jobs to kick into the pot of the group, or helping with the house or other localized work. The elder parents will often perform surrogate parent roles, to free up the parents for other tasks, or much like the children, kick in financially or through home labor as well. Why does this example (at least in ideal theory) work? Quite simply because of caring and love, and a true give a shit in not only the group but also of each person within the group. Which of course is precisely why it cannot work outside of that example (and often doesn't even really work WITH that example). I'm willing to literally eat less so that my child or my elderly Mother can have enough. I'm willing to work 2 jobs in order to take care of the people in MY group. Now expand that group to my neighbors. I'm NOT willing to do any of that for them. Sure, if they're decent people, I'll help to a lesser degree. Things like chasing down a trash can that blows away, or helping clear storm debris or lending my spare generator for example. But they don't get remotely the consideration my group gets, nor do I get that from them. In fact, I can honestly state that while my examples TO them are accurate, I haven't gotten back anything but a thank you FROM them. Now extrapolate that out further into people I don't know at all. People that are lazy, manipulative, or even just plain bad. Socialism doesn't work because nobody cares for each other to the degree that they HAVE to in order for it to work. |
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Originally Posted By Emeoba69: I mean they embraced many free market policies decades ago. Authoritarian leadership has made sticking to an overall economic goal easier than the partisan infighting that we see paralyze our progress. BUT two things, leadership picked the right free market goals to go after and two they have been skating off of the world’s addiction to cheap labor that has shielded them from the typical bubbles with the constant spigot of income. Originally Posted By Emeoba69: Originally Posted By DevilsEggAdvocate: If China's economy one day surpasses the US then it will have demonstrated that there can be a successful system that is not based on democracy and free markets. The fact that they've made as much progress as they've had in areas we think only advanced economies can (e.g. cars, AI, solar energy, nuclear energy, weapons, etc.) already suggests it's a successful alternative system. I mean they embraced many free market policies decades ago. Authoritarian leadership has made sticking to an overall economic goal easier than the partisan infighting that we see paralyze our progress. BUT two things, leadership picked the right free market goals to go after and two they have been skating off of the world’s addiction to cheap labor that has shielded them from the typical bubbles with the constant spigot of income. It's a command economy, not a free market economy. Somehow their leadership keeps picking the right market goals over and over again. I agree, being authoritarian does make it easier for them compared to our paralysis. |
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Originally Posted By DevilsEggAdvocate: If China's economy one day surpasses the US then it will have demonstrated that there can be a successful system that is not based on democracy and free markets. The fact that they've made as much progress as they've had in areas we think only advanced economies can (e.g. cars, AI, solar energy, nuclear energy, weapons, etc.) already suggests it's a successful alternative system. A) china doesn't "create" anything they steal the production knowledge and designs from devolped countries. B)They exploit their cheap Communist labor from the country sides C) the level of poverty in china is nuts. Great depression type levels anywhere outside of the main cities. - I have spent many years there in the factories . The money is going straight to the top. The guy on the assembly line isn't going down to a car dealer and buying a car like one can doing that labor in western countries. |
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Originally Posted By PCUT: A) china doesn't "create" anything they steal the production knowledge and designs from devolped countries. B)They exploit their cheap Communist labor from the country sides C) the level of poverty in china is nuts. Great depression type levels anywhere outside of the main cities. - I have spent many years there in the factories . The money is going straight to the top. The guy on the assembly line isn't going down to a car dealer and buying a car like one can doing that labor in western countries. Originally Posted By PCUT: Originally Posted By DevilsEggAdvocate: If China's economy one day surpasses the US then it will have demonstrated that there can be a successful system that is not based on democracy and free markets. The fact that they've made as much progress as they've had in areas we think only advanced economies can (e.g. cars, AI, solar energy, nuclear energy, weapons, etc.) already suggests it's a successful alternative system. A) china doesn't "create" anything they steal the production knowledge and designs from devolped countries. B)They exploit their cheap Communist labor from the country sides C) the level of poverty in china is nuts. Great depression type levels anywhere outside of the main cities. - I have spent many years there in the factories . The money is going straight to the top. The guy on the assembly line isn't going down to a car dealer and buying a car like one can doing that labor in western countries. Indeed. China is "Communist" in how it justifies top-down control. But not in any way that obligates the government to provide for its citizens. They've also been quite in how in how they facilitate genuine competition between what are essentially state-run enterprises. Entire regional companies are allowed to fail and get absorbed by others. There is no real private industry, but it's a very competitive environment nonetheless. I doubt it's wholly different from how things were in pre-revolution China, albeit with different branding and large-scale industrialization. |
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There is examples of socialism and communism all over the world. The people that think Socialism and Communism is a failed system always point towards Venezuela, Cuba, and North Korea. The people that think Socialism and Communism is not a failed system always point to Denmark, Sweden, and Finland. |
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Originally Posted By Rigley: There is examples of socialism and communism all over the world. The people that think Socialism and Communism is a failed system always point towards Venezuela, Cuba, and North Korea. The people that think Socialism and Communism is not a failed system always point to Denmark, Sweden, and Finland. Denmark and Sweden also still have kings. |
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Originally Posted By TontoGoldstein: It's only workable if 1. people are unselfish, 2. there is always a supply of money, and 3. you have unlimited natural resources. Originally Posted By TontoGoldstein: Originally Posted By TresOsos: Because of the nature of man. It's only workable if 1. people are unselfish, 2. there is always a supply of money, and 3. you have unlimited natural resources. Even then, you probably still couldn't overcome the distribution problem. |
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Originally Posted By 1cheapshot: 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. Originally Posted By 1cheapshot: 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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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 means some group of people who don't own a thing (usually, the means of production - and that would be *human beings*) or have a right to take ownership of that thing - take over that thing. This means they have to control it enough to be able to make it do what they want. The kibbutz in modern israel failed because in order for the kibbutz to functionally own the people, it had to be able to control them, and one of the main ways they did this was by effectively taking people's kids (community raises the kids) and threatening people with complete and total loss of all social ties in the community if they tried to not have the kibbutz control them. The fact that individual human beings are the means of production and that socialism - to BE socialism - must control the means of production means that any actually socialist society, to the extent it is socialist, must be able to force people to do stuff they don't want to do. That means ever more control and thus dictatorship and the society MUST ignore what the people (the means of production) in it want. This is on top of socialist societies always having to steal not just people, but their posessions. Socialism always results in a ruling oligarchy, usually with a tyrant at the top that uses the oligarchy and struggles against them too. Of course it's always going to fail. It's society scale control of the means of production (and that's always people). |
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Originally Posted By mikNtx: https://i.redd.it/jaswt1hsq7m41.gif Spirit Airlines? |
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In the 1970s an article in Reader's Digest explained why everything in Soviet Russia was all to hell. Farmers owned nothing. The farmer took directives from the local "Agriculture Tsar." The Tsar told the farmer exactly when to plow, disc, fertilize, plant, spray, and harvest his crop. After every step was taken, the Tsar would ride out to see that the farmer completed his recent task. The Tsar then paid the farmer. What the Tsar didn't know was the newly plowed field wasn't as it seemed. Land close to the road was plowed 14-16" deep as instructed. But land away from the road was only plowed 4-6" deep. The Tsar didn't know this because he probably didn't get out of his car. Everyone in Soviet Russia was corrupt and lazy. If the farmer was told to harvest his crop the first week in Sept, that's when he harvested his crop. The maturity of the crop and inclement weather didn't matter. The farmer took his grain down to the communist co-op and put his grain in the silo like everyone else. In a good year there'd be a bumper crop and the silos were full. The farmers did as they were told and dumped their grain out on the ground and left it to rot. During the entire year the farmer made no decision about the state's land, buildings, or equipment. There was no point, he made the same amount of money as everyone else. |
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Originally Posted By CTM1: And this why man should be kept on earth and not be allowed to spread beyond. Originally Posted By CTM1: Originally Posted By TresOsos: Because of the nature of man. And this why man should be kept on earth and not be allowed to spread beyond. incorrect, but the general advancement in tech that will eventualy give us the stars will give the monkeys and us a universal IQ vaccine long before we leave our podunk backwater star system. |
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Originally Posted By TresOsos: Because of the nature of man. |
A people that values its privileges above its principles soon loses both. - Dwight D. Eisenhower
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Socialism is not an alternative to capitalism; it is an alternative to any system under which men can live as human beings. Ludwig Von Mises What pushes the masses into the camp of socialism is, even more than the illusion that socialism will make them richer, the expectation that it will curb all those who are better than they themselves are. Ludwig von Mises The Welfare State is merely a method for transforming the market economy step by step into socialism. Ludwig von Mises Tyranny is the political corollary of socialism, as representative government is the political corollary of the market economy. Ludwig von Mises |
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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Originally Posted By ZF-1: If we had StarTrek replicators and unlimited power for everyone, we would finally solve it. I think the movie Elysium was more realistic in that regard. |
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Originally Posted By silverstate55: Government has NO incentive to innovate; only to grow itself and try to control everything. Decide which goods to produce. i mean it works pretty well in a situation like WW2 |
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When words lose their meaning, a people can move neither hand nor foot. Confucius
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Originally Posted By Rigley: There is examples of socialism and communism all over the world. The people that think Socialism and Communism is a failed system always point towards Venezuela, Cuba, and North Korea. The people that think Socialism and Communism is not a failed system always point to Denmark, Sweden, and Finland. IOW a certain level of charitable subsistence will work in high trust homogenous cultures. In Iceland they're all cousins anyway. |
Live your life as you would wish to have lived, when you come to die. Confucius
When words lose their meaning, a people can move neither hand nor foot. Confucius
When words lose their meaning, a people can move neither hand nor foot. Confucius
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Originally Posted By tnwalker10: In the 1970s an article in Reader's Digest explained why everything in Soviet Russia was all to hell. Farmers owned nothing. The farmer took directives from the local "Agriculture Tsar." The Tsar told the farmer exactly when to plow, disc, fertilize, plant, spray, and harvest his crop. After every step was taken, the Tsar would ride out to see that the farmer completed his recent task. The Tsar then paid the farmer. What the Tsar didn't know was the newly plowed field wasn't as it seemed. Land close to the road was plowed 14-16" deep as instructed. But land away from the road was only plowed 4-6" deep. The Tsar didn't know this because he probably didn't get out of his car. Everyone in Soviet Russia was corrupt and lazy. If the farmer was told to harvest his crop the first week in Sept, that's when he harvested his crop. The maturity of the crop and inclement weather didn't matter. The farmer took his grain down to the communist co-op and put his grain in the silo like everyone else. In a good year there'd be a bumper crop and the silos were full. The farmers did as they were told and dumped their grain out on the ground and left it to rot. During the entire year the farmer made no decision about the state's land, buildings, or equipment. There was no point, he made the same amount of money as everyone else. |
Live your life as you would wish to have lived, when you come to die. Confucius
When words lose their meaning, a people can move neither hand nor foot. Confucius
When words lose their meaning, a people can move neither hand nor foot. Confucius
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Originally Posted By PCUT: A) china doesn't "create" anything they steal the production knowledge and designs from devolped countries. B)They exploit their cheap Communist labor from the country sides C) the level of poverty in china is nuts. Great depression type levels anywhere outside of the main cities. - I have spent many years there in the factories . The money is going straight to the top. The guy on the assembly line isn't going down to a car dealer and buying a car like one can doing that labor in western countries. None of that changes the fact that it's an alternative system to our democracy and free market capitalism that is not failing and is competitive and surpassing us in areas that we consider important. The original question was "how come socialism/communism always fails?" and this is an example where it's not true. Another example is Vietnam which is a socialist country that is governed by the Communist Party of Vietnam. Not failing and thriving. |
| In Bernie Sanders' (etc) world, the problem isn't that eventually you run out of other people's money, it's that you eliminate other people's ability to make money you can take from them. This is why it always fails- not just no incentive, you aren't ALLOWED to produce/prosper/thrive... eventually the gas runs out and the lights flicker off (see: every collectivist society, ever) |
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Originally Posted By DevilsEggAdvocate: None of that changes the fact that it's an alternative system to our democracy and free market capitalism that is not failing and is competitive and surpassing us in areas that we consider important. The original question was "how come socialism/communism always fails?" and this is an example where it's not true. Another example is Vietnam which is a socialist country that is governed by the Communist Party of Vietnam. Not failing and thriving. Originally Posted By DevilsEggAdvocate: Originally Posted By PCUT: A) china doesn't "create" anything they steal the production knowledge and designs from devolped countries. B)They exploit their cheap Communist labor from the country sides C) the level of poverty in china is nuts. Great depression type levels anywhere outside of the main cities. - I have spent many years there in the factories . The money is going straight to the top. The guy on the assembly line isn't going down to a car dealer and buying a car like one can doing that labor in western countries. None of that changes the fact that it's an alternative system to our democracy and free market capitalism that is not failing and is competitive and surpassing us in areas that we consider important. The original question was "how come socialism/communism always fails?" and this is an example where it's not true. Another example is Vietnam which is a socialist country that is governed by the Communist Party of Vietnam. Not failing and thriving. China has a lot of fundamental issues combined with a lack of transparency that should make anyone hedge their claims about how much "surpassing" is going on, Vietnam was nothing close to thriving until the Doi Moi reforms in the late 1980s. More than half of its GDP is now private sector, and that's where all of the innovation is. If the only way for socialism not to fail is to allow enough "not socialism" in order to keep the economy alive, is it really socialism? |
History has stopped. Nothing exists except an endless present in which Trump is always right.
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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? AI Overview of Bastiat's views of Socialism: French economist Frédéric Bastiat viewed socialism as an unjust, coercive system of "legal plunder" that masks state control behind appealing words like fraternity and equality. Core Criticisms of Socialism - Legal Plunder: Bastiat argued in his famous 1850 work The Law that the proper function of law is to protect individual life, liberty, and property. Socialism perverts the law into "legal plunder," using government force to take property from one group to give to another. - Confusion of Government and Society: Socialists confuse society with the state. When free-market advocates oppose state-run services (like public schooling or state religion), socialists falsely claim they oppose education or religion entirely. - The "Great Mechanic" Fallacy: Bastiat criticized socialists for viewing themselves as the "Great Mechanic" who design an artificial social order and treat ordinary people as lifeless cogs to be coerced, rather than respecting the natural, harmonious order of human free choice. - The Source of Mutual Exploitation: By turning the law into a tool for privilege and redistribution, socialism encourages everyone to try to live at the expense of everyone else through political force rather than voluntary production. |
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Socialism and communism work on the premise that all humans are equal and differences between humans are social constructs. Humans are not and have never been equal. Equality is a false god that leads to destruction and death. Embrace diversity by not attempting to force everything to be equal when it can’t be. |
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Too many questions in OP with different, complex answers. All of it basically boils down to the fact that communism is completely contrary to human nature. We are not hive creatures. It works slightly better for Eastern cultures because of some complex sociological and psychological reasons, but it will always eventually fail because (1) people will always act in their self interest (2) political leadership on any macro level is always corrupt, regardless of government type (3) people want to be rewarded and compensated for their labors (4) not everyone contributes equally - there are always more people taking out than putting in, so it’s doomed from the start |
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Originally Posted By TresOsos: Because of the nature of man. Yes, but Ludwig Von Mises also pointed out the economics of this failure: Without individual deal making - meaning someone determining what something is worth trading for in time, commodities or currency - then there can never be efficient price discovery. If there is no price discovery (ie true capitalism), then one cannot plan and anticipate input costs OR actual demand, because prices reflect both. I'm paraphrasing here, but without consumers making individual choices in a free market at the local level, you cannot have efficient pricing, or efficient production - which inevitably leads to mass shortages, massive increases in inefficiency and cost, and ultimately system failure (economic collapse). The only question is how long it takes. |
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Simply put - Communism/Socialism rewards only those who do little to nothing and the leaders who control those who do little to nothing. It is a completely flawed concept at its core. It encourages/creates corruption and low productivity. But on paper it sucks folks in…. The US founding fathers even tried it initially. |
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Originally Posted By DevilsEggAdvocate: If China's economy one day surpasses the US then it will have demonstrated that there can be a successful system that is not based on democracy and free markets. The fact that they've made as much progress as they've had in areas we think only advanced economies can (e.g. cars, AI, solar energy, nuclear energy, weapons, etc.) already suggests it's a successful alternative system. The unfortunate reality of your statement is that it relies on money it makes from capitalist systems/societies. Once those are taken over the whole thing collapses. It will be the shortest reign of a Chinese empire. |
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Seems pretty simple to me. When you have someone in "power" at the very top......taking everything from the people on the bottom that actually do the physical work.....at some point, people just lose all motivation to work hard. Production goes down.....but the people in power just keep taking and taking, and handing it out to the other bums that don't do anything. Before you know it...everyone is a bum, there is no more money, and everything just crumbles to pieces. Capitalism is what keep innovation rolling.....keep people motivated to work hard, and keep what they earn. Money is a great motivator. People get creative, start businesses, make new products, etc, etc.... |
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Socialism/Communism is an obviously and extremely stupid concept, that's why it fails. All power, control and wealth From the many...almost everything. To the few...almost everything. That's why. Name attached to this criminal scheme does not matter, the dumb idea behind the scheme does matter. The fact that this scheme appeals to several different "higher education" majors, tells us about how far intellectually people in those majors are beneath normal. The socialist is Far beneath normal with respect to intellect, reason and morality. That's why. |
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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. I thought the pure communist paradise had no need for 'money', so nothing costs anything. |
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Originally Posted By DevilsEggAdvocate: None of that changes the fact that it is an alternate model to democracy and free market capitalism and is not failing. It appears to be succeeding and may overtake Western democracies that mostly operate on free market capitalism. How “diverse” is China? |
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Originally Posted By sitdwnandhngon: Socialism exists all over the place, and to varying degrees. Even in the USA, plenty of socialist systems that we all use. Communism kind of fails before it even starts, because it's end goal is a system without government, so any government attempting communism has already screwed it up. It could probably be argued that so far in human history, every system has failed. The question is "How long did it last?" followed by "What sort of corruption caused it to fail". Historically, the most consistently stable system is a monarchy with a benevolent ruler, which is unfortunate, because it means that in general humans are too stupid to govern themselves effectively. The promotion of Christianity is the promotion of self government. |