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>Centrally planning a whole society clearly does not work (demonstrated, bloodily, several times). I really, really hate this argument. If it's true, why does

>Centrally planning a whole society clearly does not work (demonstrated, bloodily, several times). I really, really hate this argument. If it's true, why does the CIA feel the need to destabilize countries with centrally planned markets? Why has China been so successful despite what is widely believed to be a failed premise? Central planning works as well as unplanned markets work: That is, sometimes they work, sometimes they don't, and it mostly comes down to external factors.

zeroxfe 5y ago
These arguments are not helpful because their metrics and criteria for what constitutes "works vs. does not work" are different from yours. > Why has China been so successful despite what is widely believed to be a failed premise? They're successful as an economy, not as a society (obv, using my metrics.)
- endisneigh 5y ago
  By which criteria are they not successful as a society?
  - xbar 5y ago
    The ones that measure the success of a society. WEF's Global Competitiveness Report and Amnesty International, for example.
- cblconfederate 5y ago
  > successful as an economy, not as a society You 're going to have to give a definition of that. Subjective measures of success don't matter, that's why people have different morals. Maybe the west has produced the most "culturally dominant society" but it has also been boosted by a few centuries of economic dominance, while china has just come out of poverty. I'm not even going to ask why china is considered unsuccessful as a society since afaik the chinese neither commit suicide in droves nor are they running to exit as fast as possible.
dsign 5y ago
> Central planning works as well as unplanned markets work: That is, sometimes they work, sometimes they don't, and it mostly comes down to external factors. I have first-hand, extended experience with a hard-core centrally planned economy. It most definitely doesn't come down to external factors. Everything I saw and experienced was self-inflicted. And things keep getting worse.
whakim 5y ago
The author is mostly talking about Soviet Communism, China pre-1976, etc. in which the government owns everything there is to own. The China of today isn't "centrally planning a whole society". It's a society in which the government owns a much larger amount of assets, than, say, the United States (as measured as a percentage of the country's national income). On that metric, it's just further along the scale compared to Northern European social democracies (where the government also owns many more assets than in the United States). I think it's a great mistake to assume that just because the government owning everything doesn't work, the government owning anything is also bad.
Aunche 5y ago
I wouldn't say China is any more centrally planned than the US. The economy is highly controlled in some aspects, but in others it's a lot less regulated, which is how you get plastic in baby formula. On a government level, every one is centrally planned. That's kind of the purpose of it. Democracies just happen to elect their centrally planned government.
pdabbadabba 5y ago
I partially agree with the basic point here, but China's not a great example as its economy is not, in fact, centrally planned. It is more of a hybrid of private enterprise/capitalism and strong state influence. Back when Chinese central planning was more aggressive and comprehensive, you had worse outcomes like the mass starvation of the Great Leap Forward. The obvious issue is that centrally planning an economy to achieve our desired outcomes is very difficult--perhaps beyond our capabilities. Of course, an easy way of addressing this is to do what China has done and effectively concede that you can't centrally plan everything, but you can find an equilibrium where the necessary parts are controlled and the rest left to market forces, with a system of regulations to address distortions created where the two meet. Of course, you might also say that it's not exactly trivial to create a market-oriented system that achieves the outcomes we want. I think history demonstrates that societies have had greater success with market-oriented economies than with centrally planned ones. But you may be right that we shouldn't be so quick to completely rule out the possibility of a centrally planned economy based on a small number of examples, each of which was actively sabotaged by other major powers--much less should we rule out the viability of hybrid systems. (In fact, basically all modern economies are some sort of hybrid between planned and unplanned systems, including that of the U.S.)

zeroxfe 5y ago

These arguments are not helpful because their metrics and criteria for what constitutes "works vs. does not work" are different from yours. > Why has China been so successful despite what is widely believed to be a failed premise? They're successful as an economy, not as a society (obv, using my metrics.)

endisneigh 5y ago
By which criteria are they not successful as a society?
- xbar 5y ago
  The ones that measure the success of a society. WEF's Global Competitiveness Report and Amnesty International, for example.
cblconfederate 5y ago
> successful as an economy, not as a society You 're going to have to give a definition of that. Subjective measures of success don't matter, that's why people have different morals. Maybe the west has produced the most "culturally dominant society" but it has also been boosted by a few centuries of economic dominance, while china has just come out of poverty. I'm not even going to ask why china is considered unsuccessful as a society since afaik the chinese neither commit suicide in droves nor are they running to exit as fast as possible.

dsign 5y ago

> Central planning works as well as unplanned markets work: That is, sometimes they work, sometimes they don't, and it mostly comes down to external factors. I have first-hand, extended experience with a hard-core centrally planned economy. It most definitely doesn't come down to external factors. Everything I saw and experienced was self-inflicted. And things keep getting worse.

whakim 5y ago

The author is mostly talking about Soviet Communism, China pre-1976, etc. in which the government owns everything there is to own. The China of today isn't "centrally planning a whole society". It's a society in which the government owns a much larger amount of assets, than, say, the United States (as measured as a percentage of the country's national income). On that metric, it's just further along the scale compared to Northern European social democracies (where the government also owns many more assets than in the United States). I think it's a great mistake to assume that just because the government owning everything doesn't work, the government owning anything is also bad.

Aunche 5y ago

I wouldn't say China is any more centrally planned than the US. The economy is highly controlled in some aspects, but in others it's a lot less regulated, which is how you get plastic in baby formula. On a government level, every one is centrally planned. That's kind of the purpose of it. Democracies just happen to elect their centrally planned government.

pdabbadabba 5y ago

I partially agree with the basic point here, but China's not a great example as its economy is not, in fact, centrally planned. It is more of a hybrid of private enterprise/capitalism and strong state influence. Back when Chinese central planning was more aggressive and comprehensive, you had worse outcomes like the mass starvation of the Great Leap Forward. The obvious issue is that centrally planning an economy to achieve our desired outcomes is very difficult--perhaps beyond our capabilities. Of course, an easy way of addressing this is to do what China has done and effectively concede that you can't centrally plan everything, but you can find an equilibrium where the necessary parts are controlled and the rest left to market forces, with a system of regulations to address distortions created where the two meet. Of course, you might also say that it's not exactly trivial to create a market-oriented system that achieves the outcomes we want. I think history demonstrates that societies have had greater success with market-oriented economies than with centrally planned ones. But you may be right that we shouldn't be so quick to completely rule out the possibility of a centrally planned economy based on a small number of examples, each of which was actively sabotaged by other major powers--much less should we rule out the viability of hybrid systems. (In fact, basically all modern economies are some sort of hybrid between planned and unplanned systems, including that of the U.S.)