> An “administrative economy” in which “money is no longer a driving force,” designed to “promote central control of all efforts and materials…in the interests

> An “administrative economy” in which “money is no longer a driving force,” designed to “promote central control of all efforts and materials…in the interests of the people,” was on the horizon. In this socialized economy, central planners would engage in “calculation in kind,” or the practice of directly judging the value of resources or the desirability of large-scale planning without using any standard unit of accounting. This sounds interesting, but everything I've ever read suggested that this is a bleak landscape that no sane person should want to live in. If I decide I want to dabble in oil painting, I need only stop by Michael's or Hobby Lobby on my way home from work and buy those. If I lived in the socialist paradise, assuming that any were manufactured at all, would I be put on a 3 yr waiting list, only to get three tubes of ugly colors, or would I instead find out that it is rationed out only to those who have (somehow) demonstrated talent in the past? When filmmakers in the Soviet Union were unable to get the resources they needed, it wasn't always just that the communists wanted to carefully control something they saw as propaganda. Sometimes those resources just weren't manufactured. Or allocated sanely. The examples of "total warfare mobilization proves that it is possible" are bizarre, given how awful conditions were for soldiers and civilians alike at those times. Planned economies only seem capable of making just barely enough of the most essential necessities for the groups considered the most important to those in charge. It is difficult to believe that such a system will even perform well enough to make sure one person or another doesn't go without such simple necessities as water, energy, food, and cloth. Let alone the sort of minor luxuries we're all accustomed to. I don't like my odds that I'll get any of the things I want under such a government. No thanks.