5 ms·

This must have been what it was like in the late Roman Empire, when successive emperors tried to stave off decline by decreeing how the economy would work.

eesmith 9y ago
Many countries have "tried to stave off decline by decreeing how the economy would work." Including the US. Eg, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incomes_policy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incomes_policy . In the US, Truman placed the railroad under US military control in 1950, and I recall at least threats of having military take over coal mines both in the US and UK, because of worker strikes.
- jessriedel 9y ago
  >Many countries have "tried to stave off decline by decreeing how the economy would work." Including the US...In the US, Truman placed the railroad under US military control in 1950 You're using this as an example of fending off economic decline? > GDP Growth Rate in the United States...[reached] an all time high of 16.90 percent in the first quarter of 1950... https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/gdp-growth https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/gdp-growth
  - eesmith 9y ago
    No. The link I gave lists examples of countries which tried to impose nation-wide economic controls, including revolutionary France, Nixon's price controls in the 1970s, and Zimbabwe's price freeze in 2007. The referenced article concerns oil mining placed under military control, so I thought it was relevant to point out that the US has also placed privately owned critical infrastructure under military control. If there's any meaning to my comment, it's the suggestion to look to more recent history for compelling analogies, rather than ancient Rome.
    - jessriedel 9y ago
      You explicitly quoted the part about economic decline, and indeed this was critical to the sort of scenario Montrose was referring to. His comment isn't suggesting that Rome be taken as the best historical case study for understanding Venezuela today, but rather that Venezuala might give us a sense of the on-the-ground human element during the decline of Rome.
      - eesmith 9y ago
        We can look to the troubles of almost any country to look for something which "might give us a sense of the on-the-ground human element during the decline of Rome." Where is there notable about Venezuela which makes this comparison insightful? Wouldn't it be more insightful to compare it to, say, the decline of the British Empire? Has Venezuela, like Rome, had a long series of costly wars (including civil wars) which took money out of the government coffers? Has Venezuela, like Rome, lost a revenue source by no longer being able to expand into new territory? Does Venezuela have anything like the Vandal pirates which disrupted Roman trade? Has it undergone a partition like that of the Eastern and Western Roman Empires, where the money diverted into strengthening Constantinople meant that Rome was less defended against invasion? Is the Venezuelan military increasingly peopled by foreign soldiers of fortune who have little loyalty to the country and might instead attack it? Because all I get from the comparison is that there's hyperinflation going on caused by poor government and a loss of income. Which has been true of a lot of countries.
        jessriedel 9y ago
        The thing that is notable about the decline of Venezuela is that it's happening now, when we can make direct observations rather than reconstructing things from the historical records. If I am betrayed by a friend and say "this is what Caesar must have felt like", I am not saying that my friend's betrayal is the most like that of Caesar's, nor that Caesar's betrayal is the most similar historical betrayal to my mine. It just means "oh, now I know more about what that feels like".
        9y ago
  - indemnity 9y ago
    Hey, never let the facts get in the way of a good bit of whataboutism...
    - coldtea 9y ago
      Never get looking at all the facts and having a perspective go in the way of complaining against whataboutism...
- montrose 9y ago
  What Venezuela has in common with the late Empire is that economic controls are pervasive, without the sort of punitive completeness you'd find in the USSR, or China under Mao. While few controls works, and being a police state sort of works (if there are free-market economies whose products you can copy), this middle strategy doesn't work well at all.
  - HenryBemis 9y ago
    > this middle strategy doesn't work well at all I will translate your suggestion like this: -Either be a full-on dictatorship OR -Be a modern democratic state
    - ekianjo 9y ago
      And thats basically what we have in the world in terms of relatively stable regimes. Nothing in between.
      - deleted 9y ago
        [deleted]
      - coldtea 9y ago
        If "stable" merely means "persisting over time", then all kinds of between regimes have been very stable...
        ekianjo 9y ago
        Such as what kind of regimes?
        infinite8s 9y ago
        China is in the middle.
        ekianjo 9y ago
- bmelton 9y ago
  > Many countries have "tried to stave off decline by decreeing how the economy would work." Including the US. > Truman placed the railroad under US military control in 1950 These seem like non-sequiturs to me. The economy in the 50s was booming. Truman took control of the trains to mitigate the effects of a worker strike during wartime, when it was important that the trains be running efficiently.
  - eesmith 9y ago
    I found the original comment to be a non-sequitur. I gave examples of other historical cases which fit that description to suggest that there wasn't enough detail for it to be useful or insightful.
zeth___ 9y ago
And managed to do it for 1000 years until religious extremists destroyed Constantinople in a terrorist attack.
- oblio 9y ago
  While the Ottomans were far from perfect (and I learned a lot about the bad things they did back in school in Romania), you might want to crack open a history book. Here, let me get you started: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mehmed_the_Conqueror#Administration_and_culture https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mehmed_the_Conqueror#Administr...
  - zeth___ 9y ago
    I'm talking about the 4th Crusade: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Constantinople_(1204) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Constantinople_(1204)
    - oblio 9y ago
      Look back at your comment and tell me with a straight face that it was reasonable for anyone to figure that out on his own :)
crdoconnor 9y ago
>decreeing how the economy would work Every country decrees how their economy should work. That's what central banks, laws, regulatory bodies and fiscal spending are all about. Venezuela's economy is tanking because it was so heavily dependent upon oil revenue and because oil prices collapsed. That really is it. This isn't about socialism or capitalism or central planning or markets. This is all about oil, dutch disease caused by oil and political and economic instability caused by the fight over those resources. The same thing happened in the 90s when Venezuela could hardly be called socialist and the resulting economic and political turmoil propelled Chavez in to power. Back then it was all "capitalism's fault". Of the countries 'blessed' with massive natural resources - relative to the size of the economy, I can think of precisely one that hasn't been fucked up by it. Edit: -2 points and 0 counter-arguments. Apparently the idea that Venezuela (along with African and Middle Eastern countries), with vast natural resources get screwed up politically and economically by them is not a popular one, but nobody really wants to say why they think that...
- rjsw 9y ago
  >Of the countries 'blessed' with massive natural resources - relative to the size of the economy, I can think of precisely one that hasn't been fucked up by it. Norway ?
  - crdoconnor 9y ago
    Yes, Norway.
  - danieltillett 9y ago
    What about Australia, although as an Australian we do manage to mess us quite a lot of the natural bounty we inherited.
    - crdoconnor 9y ago
      Australia's economy is not even close to being dominated by natural resources. Your mining boom also isn't that old (only about 10 years). Nonetheless, it doesn't appear to be having a positive effect on your politics. Imagine if people like Gina Rinehart started to dominate.
coldtea 9y ago
>tried to stave off decline by decreeing how the economy would work. So, a tried and tested way (from the ancient Greek loan relief [1], to laws to suppress the Great Depression, to all kinds of monetary policies used worldwide), except in periods of cultural and political decline. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seisachtheia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seisachtheia

eesmith 9y ago

Many countries have "tried to stave off decline by decreeing how the economy would work." Including the US. Eg, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incomes_policy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incomes_policy . In the US, Truman placed the railroad under US military control in 1950, and I recall at least threats of having military take over coal mines both in the US and UK, because of worker strikes.

jessriedel 9y ago
>Many countries have "tried to stave off decline by decreeing how the economy would work." Including the US...In the US, Truman placed the railroad under US military control in 1950 You're using this as an example of fending off economic decline? > GDP Growth Rate in the United States...[reached] an all time high of 16.90 percent in the first quarter of 1950... https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/gdp-growth https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/gdp-growth
- eesmith 9y ago
  No. The link I gave lists examples of countries which tried to impose nation-wide economic controls, including revolutionary France, Nixon's price controls in the 1970s, and Zimbabwe's price freeze in 2007. The referenced article concerns oil mining placed under military control, so I thought it was relevant to point out that the US has also placed privately owned critical infrastructure under military control. If there's any meaning to my comment, it's the suggestion to look to more recent history for compelling analogies, rather than ancient Rome.
  - jessriedel 9y ago
    You explicitly quoted the part about economic decline, and indeed this was critical to the sort of scenario Montrose was referring to. His comment isn't suggesting that Rome be taken as the best historical case study for understanding Venezuela today, but rather that Venezuala might give us a sense of the on-the-ground human element during the decline of Rome.
    - eesmith 9y ago
      We can look to the troubles of almost any country to look for something which "might give us a sense of the on-the-ground human element during the decline of Rome." Where is there notable about Venezuela which makes this comparison insightful? Wouldn't it be more insightful to compare it to, say, the decline of the British Empire? Has Venezuela, like Rome, had a long series of costly wars (including civil wars) which took money out of the government coffers? Has Venezuela, like Rome, lost a revenue source by no longer being able to expand into new territory? Does Venezuela have anything like the Vandal pirates which disrupted Roman trade? Has it undergone a partition like that of the Eastern and Western Roman Empires, where the money diverted into strengthening Constantinople meant that Rome was less defended against invasion? Is the Venezuelan military increasingly peopled by foreign soldiers of fortune who have little loyalty to the country and might instead attack it? Because all I get from the comparison is that there's hyperinflation going on caused by poor government and a loss of income. Which has been true of a lot of countries.
      - jessriedel 9y ago
        The thing that is notable about the decline of Venezuela is that it's happening now, when we can make direct observations rather than reconstructing things from the historical records. If I am betrayed by a friend and say "this is what Caesar must have felt like", I am not saying that my friend's betrayal is the most like that of Caesar's, nor that Caesar's betrayal is the most similar historical betrayal to my mine. It just means "oh, now I know more about what that feels like".
        9y ago
- indemnity 9y ago
  Hey, never let the facts get in the way of a good bit of whataboutism...
  - coldtea 9y ago
    Never get looking at all the facts and having a perspective go in the way of complaining against whataboutism...
montrose 9y ago
What Venezuela has in common with the late Empire is that economic controls are pervasive, without the sort of punitive completeness you'd find in the USSR, or China under Mao. While few controls works, and being a police state sort of works (if there are free-market economies whose products you can copy), this middle strategy doesn't work well at all.
- HenryBemis 9y ago
  > this middle strategy doesn't work well at all I will translate your suggestion like this: -Either be a full-on dictatorship OR -Be a modern democratic state
  - ekianjo 9y ago
    And thats basically what we have in the world in terms of relatively stable regimes. Nothing in between.
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
    - coldtea 9y ago
      If "stable" merely means "persisting over time", then all kinds of between regimes have been very stable...
      - ekianjo 9y ago
        Such as what kind of regimes?
        infinite8s 9y ago
        China is in the middle.
        ekianjo 9y ago
bmelton 9y ago
> Many countries have "tried to stave off decline by decreeing how the economy would work." Including the US. > Truman placed the railroad under US military control in 1950 These seem like non-sequiturs to me. The economy in the 50s was booming. Truman took control of the trains to mitigate the effects of a worker strike during wartime, when it was important that the trains be running efficiently.
- eesmith 9y ago
  I found the original comment to be a non-sequitur. I gave examples of other historical cases which fit that description to suggest that there wasn't enough detail for it to be useful or insightful.

zeth___ 9y ago

And managed to do it for 1000 years until religious extremists destroyed Constantinople in a terrorist attack.

oblio 9y ago
While the Ottomans were far from perfect (and I learned a lot about the bad things they did back in school in Romania), you might want to crack open a history book. Here, let me get you started: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mehmed_the_Conqueror#Administration_and_culture https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mehmed_the_Conqueror#Administr...
- zeth___ 9y ago
  I'm talking about the 4th Crusade: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Constantinople_(1204) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Constantinople_(1204)
  - oblio 9y ago
    Look back at your comment and tell me with a straight face that it was reasonable for anyone to figure that out on his own :)

crdoconnor 9y ago

>decreeing how the economy would work Every country decrees how their economy should work. That's what central banks, laws, regulatory bodies and fiscal spending are all about. Venezuela's economy is tanking because it was so heavily dependent upon oil revenue and because oil prices collapsed. That really is it. This isn't about socialism or capitalism or central planning or markets. This is all about oil, dutch disease caused by oil and political and economic instability caused by the fight over those resources. The same thing happened in the 90s when Venezuela could hardly be called socialist and the resulting economic and political turmoil propelled Chavez in to power. Back then it was all "capitalism's fault". Of the countries 'blessed' with massive natural resources - relative to the size of the economy, I can think of precisely one that hasn't been fucked up by it. Edit: -2 points and 0 counter-arguments. Apparently the idea that Venezuela (along with African and Middle Eastern countries), with vast natural resources get screwed up politically and economically by them is not a popular one, but nobody really wants to say why they think that...

rjsw 9y ago
>Of the countries 'blessed' with massive natural resources - relative to the size of the economy, I can think of precisely one that hasn't been fucked up by it. Norway ?
- crdoconnor 9y ago
  Yes, Norway.
- danieltillett 9y ago
  What about Australia, although as an Australian we do manage to mess us quite a lot of the natural bounty we inherited.
  - crdoconnor 9y ago
    Australia's economy is not even close to being dominated by natural resources. Your mining boom also isn't that old (only about 10 years). Nonetheless, it doesn't appear to be having a positive effect on your politics. Imagine if people like Gina Rinehart started to dominate.

coldtea 9y ago

>tried to stave off decline by decreeing how the economy would work. So, a tried and tested way (from the ancient Greek loan relief [1], to laws to suppress the Great Depression, to all kinds of monetary policies used worldwide), except in periods of cultural and political decline. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seisachtheia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seisachtheia