5 ms·
Sounds like the problems of acrappy economic theory
by drekipus 2y ago
Sounds like the problems of acrappy economic theory
- jojobas 2y agoThe theory might or might not have worked if the leadership wasn't hell-bent on converting the entire world into their ideology by military force. Which it kind of had to do lest their citizens noticed they live in abject poverty compared to other countries.
- lolinder 2y agoSo in other words the crappy economic theory drove the militarism, lest the population recognize the fallout of the theory for what it was?
- jojobas 2y agoIt's not obvious that the militarism wasn't primary to the theory. World revolution won't make itself.
- Koshkin 2y agoWell, to be fair, the idea was abandoned back in the 1930s.
- broken-kebab 2y agoThe idea that was abandoned in 30s, was of the world revolution happening so soon that it should be prioritized over trade, and diplomacy with capitalist countries. It was replaced with flexible strategy of long-term struggle for world domination which USSR faithfully followed until its demise
- Koshkin 2y agoThe USSR was not the only country vying for domination.
- bigbacaloa 2y ago[dead]
- psalminen 2y agoSounds like most economic theories that are implemented around the globe today to me.
- throwuxiytayq 2y agoThe article presents a beautiful, self-contained, anecdotal but representative example of why communism never worked, doesn’t work, won’t work, and wouldn’t work in your imaginary parallel spider-man universe scenario.
- mordae 2y agoIt's not really about communism, though. You'd have to be blind not to see parallels under capitalism. Employees cannot profit from inventions and improvements, so they don't engage in them. Improving efficiency means budget cuts and animosity from under performers. This might not be true for smallest companies, but those don't really drive the economy.
- jojobas 2y agoExcept employees do in fact benefit from innovations and improvements, and most inventions and innovations of the past 100 years come from capitalist, not socialist, countries. To the contrary, soviet orgs paid set awards for "rationalizing suggestions", and without the market value control 99% of them were of course bullshit.
- yetihehe 2y ago> To the contrary, soviet orgs paid set awards for "rationalizing suggestions" Yes, but very often someone did that rationalizing suggestion and the manager got the reward. Most people suggesting improvements stopped after one small improvement when treated like that, so whole idea was doomed to fail by poor execution.
- broken-kebab 2y agoBad manager problem does not explain persistent technological lagging of USSR. There were good managers too, after all. The central reason is that any significant innovation implementation is a sort of travel to terra incognita. It's hard, and risky. So it requires someone who expects to get a reward big enough to pay for all the pain. Socialist/communist approach is not compatible with it on fundamental level as big rewards means inequality. Plenty of Soviet engineers proposed ineteresting ideas, and many of them were socialistically rewarded for them (e.g. "gramota" with Lenin's face, and maybe a small bonus), but very few people wanted to risk implementing those ideas. It was always better to rely on a low-risk approach: blueprints stolen from the West.
- lupusreal 2y agoNot the theory, a crappy economic reality. If the economy were sound the computer researchers should have been able to fund their own research by commercializing it, instead of expecting handouts funded by the working class's hard labor.
- rapidaneurism 2y agoMy understanding of planned economies is that credit, investment, and profits are controlled by the state. In any way starting a commercial enterprise would surely mark them as capitalist class traitors, wouldn't it?
- defrost 2y agoNot in the case of the planned economies of China nor the USSR (post Stalin, IIRC) nor Russia (if, indeed, there's still a plan there).
- jojobas 2y agoThere was no starting any private enterprise in USSR until Perestroika (1988ish). Best you could do is to suggest doing something to the government and if you knew the right people you could be allowed to, given some resources etc. Think starting a project within a large company, except you can't quit and start on your own.
- broken-kebab 2y agoTo be more precise, private enterprise was a crime in USSR until perestroika with punishments ranging up to death. But some people still risked