4 ms·

The two major problems right now are price controls and seizure of private property by the government. Price controls cause shortages, and if anyone does manage

The two major problems right now are price controls and seizure of private property by the government. Price controls cause shortages, and if anyone does manage to bring good to market, the government seizes them. It doesn't matter if Ghengis Khan becomes the leader of Venezuela.....if he fixes those two things, the economy will rebound quickly.

seanmcdirmid 10y ago
Cause and effect. Cause: corruption, populist uneducated leader, need to satisfy constituents without making any hard choices. Effect: price controls, private property seizure. When it comes down to it, the same thing isn't happening in Sweden or Norway.
- mc32 10y ago
  But Sweden isn't nationalizing/socializing all aspects of the economy nor controlling monetary exchange rates nor demonizing businesspeople as tools of the gringos, etc.
  - PhasmaFelis 10y ago
    None of those things define socialism any more than forcing the poor to work 16-hour days in deadly factories defines capitalism.
    - nickik 10y ago
      Socialsit have been using this excuse forever. Its never "real" socialism. Nationalising everything is socialism. It has been a major aspect of socialist thought for a very long time. True, there are other strands of socialsit thought but usually all countries that become socialist try to do command and control and not anarcho syndicalism or something like that. So maybe go back and inform yourself about the history of socialist tought. Also stop trying to sell Sweden as Socialist. Those countries are normal capitalist wellfare states, just like France, Germany or any other western state.
      - seanmcdirmid 10y ago
        Wait...what is your list of socialist countries? You don't include the Nordic model countries of Sweden, Norway, Denmark? Or governments with socialist aspects (Japan, Australia, etc...too many count). Thankfully, Wikipedia maintains a list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_socialist_states https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_socialist_states Venezuela doesn't even make the list since they aren't "officially" socialist (only four countries are, Laos, Vietnam, Cuba, China). So what is your criteria then? What is a socialist state? Is it just anything that nickik declares as socialist? Zimbabwe had price controls and they practiced land redistribution as well as nationalization. Would you try to spin them as socialist? Or just really corrupt?
        ktRolster 10y ago
        It's better to just not use the word 'socialism' because it's too poorly defined.
        nickik 10y ago
        First of all, anybody can edit wikipedia and on issues like what definitions of words to use its extremely difficult to coordinate. So using wikipedia as a source of authority is actually no very useful. Their are to many definitions and often people with a particular opinion edit, then other people who disagree edit it again. One of the main issues is that their is the divide between countries that call them selfs socialist, and countries who are attempting a socialist model. Just as we understand that the "Democratic People's Republic of Korea" of North Korea is not actually a democratic or a Republic. I define purely by economics system. So that means that North Korea actually has a socialist system but they no longer claim to be communist. China in turn calls itself socialist but their economic system has moved pretty far in the last 20 years (China is somewhat special because their are huge internal divides between special economic zones and some of other parts). So I think that truly socialist in terms of economic policy, you basically only have North Korea and Cuba (Cuba could be different now, Im not very up to date). Venezuela never really went to the end but they certainly when pretty far. I don't know enough about Lao or Vietnam to make an educated comment about their economic policy. For me a socialist government is one that is actively trying to get full control over the means of production. The more a government tries to attempted this, the more socialist they are. Lenin and co in 1917-1921 probably had the 'best' run. Within a very short time they nationalist banks, all major industry, all export, transportation and many others. The only thing they really failed to nationalise is the farmland because it was to difficult. It took Stalin to do that in 1928. The definition of socialism as 'worker owned means of production' has been interpreted as 'means of production owned by a worker lead party' from a very early time. The follower of this definition have been by far the most successful socialist. The other interpretations had far less success. As for Zimbabwe, yes the ZANU is a socialist party and the began to nationalise under the banner of socialism.
    - deleted 10y ago
      [deleted]
    - tiktiktok 10y ago
      nickik, thanks for erasing the libertarian socialism wing of socialism and focusing solely on authoritarian socialism. Maybe the problem isn't socialism but authoritarianism?
  - seanmcdirmid 10y ago
    > But Sweden isn't nationalizing/socializing all aspects of the economy nor controlling monetary exchange rates nor demonizing businesspeople as tools of the gringos, etc. Exactly, so you get what I'm saying?
    - mc32 10y ago
      Yup, they're not that kind of socialists. They're "socialists". Which is to say capitalists with Nordic values.
      - seanmcdirmid 10y ago
        Ya, the word is kind of arbitrary and meaningless. Does 67% state owned Statoil make Norway socialist? Does universal health care make a country socialist? Do high taxes on the rich make a country socialist? Venezuela isn't even a self proclaimed socialist country, let alone one without capitalism. All of its dysfunctions are fairly basic...it looks a lot like what happened in Zimbabwe.
        mc32 10y ago
        I'm sorry, did Norway just yank the oil company from its owners and just take it without compensation? Do they continuously assign any bad news the doings of Americans and the traitors among them who sympathize with Americans? Zimbabwe has a tortured history with lots of corruption, colonialism, despotism, nepotism, racism, ethnicism etc. The economic system is the least of its problems. PS who di Venezuela associate with if not Cuba, Bolivia, Ecuador, etc? That should tell you their implicit leanings (if not their explicit rhetoric).
        seanmcdirmid 10y ago
        Even if a socialist country yanked a private company away from its owner, it would be "theft", nationalization without compensation is not a core socialist tenant. > Do they continuously assign any bad news the doings of Americans and the traitors among them who sympathize with Americans? Again, not something defining or unique to socialism. > Zimbabwe has a tortured history with lots of corruption, colonialism, despotism, nepotism, racism, ethnicism etc. The economic system is the least of its problems. Zimbabwe is far from Somalia. Yes, economic system issues were one of their primary problems, arising from problems like corruption, colonialism, etc...: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperinflation_in_Zimbabwe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperinflation_in_Zimbabwe

seanmcdirmid 10y ago

Cause and effect. Cause: corruption, populist uneducated leader, need to satisfy constituents without making any hard choices. Effect: price controls, private property seizure. When it comes down to it, the same thing isn't happening in Sweden or Norway.

mc32 10y ago
But Sweden isn't nationalizing/socializing all aspects of the economy nor controlling monetary exchange rates nor demonizing businesspeople as tools of the gringos, etc.
- PhasmaFelis 10y ago
  None of those things define socialism any more than forcing the poor to work 16-hour days in deadly factories defines capitalism.
  - nickik 10y ago
    Socialsit have been using this excuse forever. Its never "real" socialism. Nationalising everything is socialism. It has been a major aspect of socialist thought for a very long time. True, there are other strands of socialsit thought but usually all countries that become socialist try to do command and control and not anarcho syndicalism or something like that. So maybe go back and inform yourself about the history of socialist tought. Also stop trying to sell Sweden as Socialist. Those countries are normal capitalist wellfare states, just like France, Germany or any other western state.
    - seanmcdirmid 10y ago
      Wait...what is your list of socialist countries? You don't include the Nordic model countries of Sweden, Norway, Denmark? Or governments with socialist aspects (Japan, Australia, etc...too many count). Thankfully, Wikipedia maintains a list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_socialist_states https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_socialist_states Venezuela doesn't even make the list since they aren't "officially" socialist (only four countries are, Laos, Vietnam, Cuba, China). So what is your criteria then? What is a socialist state? Is it just anything that nickik declares as socialist? Zimbabwe had price controls and they practiced land redistribution as well as nationalization. Would you try to spin them as socialist? Or just really corrupt?
      - ktRolster 10y ago
        It's better to just not use the word 'socialism' because it's too poorly defined.
      - nickik 10y ago
        First of all, anybody can edit wikipedia and on issues like what definitions of words to use its extremely difficult to coordinate. So using wikipedia as a source of authority is actually no very useful. Their are to many definitions and often people with a particular opinion edit, then other people who disagree edit it again. One of the main issues is that their is the divide between countries that call them selfs socialist, and countries who are attempting a socialist model. Just as we understand that the "Democratic People's Republic of Korea" of North Korea is not actually a democratic or a Republic. I define purely by economics system. So that means that North Korea actually has a socialist system but they no longer claim to be communist. China in turn calls itself socialist but their economic system has moved pretty far in the last 20 years (China is somewhat special because their are huge internal divides between special economic zones and some of other parts). So I think that truly socialist in terms of economic policy, you basically only have North Korea and Cuba (Cuba could be different now, Im not very up to date). Venezuela never really went to the end but they certainly when pretty far. I don't know enough about Lao or Vietnam to make an educated comment about their economic policy. For me a socialist government is one that is actively trying to get full control over the means of production. The more a government tries to attempted this, the more socialist they are. Lenin and co in 1917-1921 probably had the 'best' run. Within a very short time they nationalist banks, all major industry, all export, transportation and many others. The only thing they really failed to nationalise is the farmland because it was to difficult. It took Stalin to do that in 1928. The definition of socialism as 'worker owned means of production' has been interpreted as 'means of production owned by a worker lead party' from a very early time. The follower of this definition have been by far the most successful socialist. The other interpretations had far less success. As for Zimbabwe, yes the ZANU is a socialist party and the began to nationalise under the banner of socialism.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - tiktiktok 10y ago
    nickik, thanks for erasing the libertarian socialism wing of socialism and focusing solely on authoritarian socialism. Maybe the problem isn't socialism but authoritarianism?
- seanmcdirmid 10y ago
  > But Sweden isn't nationalizing/socializing all aspects of the economy nor controlling monetary exchange rates nor demonizing businesspeople as tools of the gringos, etc. Exactly, so you get what I'm saying?
  - mc32 10y ago
    Yup, they're not that kind of socialists. They're "socialists". Which is to say capitalists with Nordic values.
    - seanmcdirmid 10y ago
      Ya, the word is kind of arbitrary and meaningless. Does 67% state owned Statoil make Norway socialist? Does universal health care make a country socialist? Do high taxes on the rich make a country socialist? Venezuela isn't even a self proclaimed socialist country, let alone one without capitalism. All of its dysfunctions are fairly basic...it looks a lot like what happened in Zimbabwe.
      - mc32 10y ago
        I'm sorry, did Norway just yank the oil company from its owners and just take it without compensation? Do they continuously assign any bad news the doings of Americans and the traitors among them who sympathize with Americans? Zimbabwe has a tortured history with lots of corruption, colonialism, despotism, nepotism, racism, ethnicism etc. The economic system is the least of its problems. PS who di Venezuela associate with if not Cuba, Bolivia, Ecuador, etc? That should tell you their implicit leanings (if not their explicit rhetoric).
        seanmcdirmid 10y ago
        Even if a socialist country yanked a private company away from its owner, it would be "theft", nationalization without compensation is not a core socialist tenant. > Do they continuously assign any bad news the doings of Americans and the traitors among them who sympathize with Americans? Again, not something defining or unique to socialism. > Zimbabwe has a tortured history with lots of corruption, colonialism, despotism, nepotism, racism, ethnicism etc. The economic system is the least of its problems. Zimbabwe is far from Somalia. Yes, economic system issues were one of their primary problems, arising from problems like corruption, colonialism, etc...: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperinflation_in_Zimbabwe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperinflation_in_Zimbabwe