How to swiftly debunk the "muh price signals are necessary for civilization" argument? I mean is it even possible? Are there grains of truth in it? I never took it seriously when it came from reactionaries, but I've been reading more market socialism and c4ss memers lately and doubts are growing in me.
How to swiftly debunk the "muh price signals are necessary for civilization" argument? I mean is it even possible...
Juan Kelly
Jaxson Wright
hit me with some c4ss links about price signals being necessary. last i heard from that place they were saying lenin ordered all whores to be ritually slaughtered liveleak style
Elijah Carter
This book, chapter 3, subchapter "The problem of scale" onwards in particular.
Colton Sanders
Oh and here is what the calculation problem boils down to in terms of actual arguments.
That argument of course does the age old fallacy of "if you commies cannot make a perfect solution that is 100% perfect you have to give up and accept our flawed barely functional solution". We do not need a perfect model of the economy, we just need a better approximation than we currently have, which is not that difficult to achieve.
Things that aren't valid arguments often cited in the same breath:
Not an argument because market economies dont do that either
You dont need to, just like market economies dont know it. As explained in the book, you can ration it using quasi-money in the form of labour vouchers, make the price free floating and then look at the difference between the cost and the price, and correct production so that they match, striving towards pareto efficiency of labour time.
counterpoint already included in mocking quotation
Then neither can markets. If value was subjective nobody would know what to sell stuff for, because exchanges dont happen in isolation, but in the context of society.
Any questions?
Brandon Lewis
Oldish post I've made about this:
the argument has a certain weight to it, it's undeniable that information gathering is problematic, but this is not exclusively a socialist or even a capitalist planned economy problem, a free market suffers from this as well. It's no surprise that the collection of data online is so profitable, it enables much more in depth analysis than what can be simply understood from price fluctuation alone.
That said I would argue that it's not true that price determines production, it has a certain influence of course, but it is not the main factor. In 1936 an Austrian school group started studying price formation, but the businessmen interviewed by them did not agree with their theories: "All of the members of the Group […] were confirmed marginalists and accepted the imperfect competition/monopolistic approaches to prices. On the other hand, the information they received from the businessmen clearly indicated that the latter thought of prices in terms of some relationship to average total costs and totally ignored the marginalist approach to pricing. In fact, businessmen paid no attention to marginal revenue or costs in the sense defined by economic theory…. The Oxford economists were shocked, to say the least. But what caught their attention even more was the relative stability of prices over the trade cycle."
[From "Post Keynesian Price Theory" by Frederic S. Lee]
In a capitalist economy companies are interested in growing sales, entering new markets around the world, producing new products, and investing in future production. Therefore, prices are considered strategic decisions designed to meet these goals, the vast majority of prices are set by an objective analysis that this is not some theoretical guess as to how prices work: in order to determine the price, each company employs a method of its choice but it usually takes into account direct cost of the unit, the overhead costs such as Human Resource and advertising, rents, and a mark-up price. The mark-up or surplus is the price over and above the price of the total cost of the commodity. The mark-up is used for future investments, expansion of production, and allows companies to take up market share.
Instead of changing prices according to supply and demand, companies make inventory adjustments. If there is a lack demand for a particular product, companies don’t lower prices. Instead, companies decrease their inventory. If their products are flying off the shelf, again, they don’t change prices but increase inventories. Supply and demand are not necessarily reflected in the price of a commodity, so more often than not it is not a realistic representation of the effective production capability of the commodity in question.
To conclude the problem of gathering information from the market is not tied to pricing in the strict sense, an economy where prices did not exists is perfectly possible and able to supply enough information to production to avoid shortages and surpluses. If you want a great example of what happens if you allow price signaling to entirely determine your business policies see the downfall of Sears (salon.com
Also this of course.
Kevin Jones
The issue in the end is that mainstream economics mathematically demonstrated that a planned economy cannot be efficient in its resource allocation and to some extent they are right.
What this does not imply however is that market allocation is indeed efficient. To demonstrate this they would inevitably abandon the nebulous conception of price and value typical of burgeoise economics.
In other words as far as we know a market economy might be as much if not more wasteful than a planned economy. The argument in favor of it, is purely based on faith, not science.
Charles Brown
tell me where exactly did they prove it "mathematically", if you talking memeyek or von misses then i take morning shits that are more mathematical than that
Austin Rogers
pretty much
youtube.com
Christian Price
No they didn't and no they aren't..
Zachary Fisher
You can’t. Thanks to price signals, it’s much easier to convey consumer preferences under a market economy than under a command economy. Stop being economically illiterate and embrace market socialism.
Michael Powell
Now those are some words that should never have been put in that order.
Matthew Thomas
How would consumer preferences be conveyed under a command economy?
Anthony Moore
...
Ryder Clark
You’ve just described Oskar Lange’s model of market socialism.
Ryder Ortiz
I've just described a model for a planned economy really simply.
Some stuff are in every model. You don't get to say stupid shit in the real of "if you breath oxygen you have capitalism".
Of course Lange's model isnt actually what i described, since it involves a simulated market, changing prices and reactions on the changing prices, not reaction on the over or under supply of goods.
Isaiah Harris
The Lange model absolutely does involve the change of prices based on the over or under supply of goods, what are you talking about?
Julian Morales
I mean honestly
is really fucking vague and doesn't tell you shit about how the system actually works. Its just that litterally every economic model does this BECAUSE THAT IS THE JOB OF AN ECONOMIC SYSTEM, TO RATION GOODS AND PRODUCE ACCORDING TO NEED.
And you have the guts to call me economically illiterate.
I was talking about the "see what stuff is left over and make less of it". Market socialism doesn't do this, it first changes the price, then reacts to the price change, like any market system. A planned economy can react immediately to a shortage if it so wishes, without changing the price.
Dylan White
THIS
BASED MARKET SOCIALISTS UNITE
Jonathan Howard
Alright lads good night, stop masturbating over muh market socialism god knows I used to do it and read this book. It will blow yo motherfucking mind and make you stop falling for unscientific capitalist propaganda of "communism can't work, you need markets and commodity production".
Mason Collins
Imagine unironically wanting to live in a society where the state owns and controls virtually everything.
Sebastian Richardson
Imagine unironically wanting to live in a society where the corporations owns and controls virtually everything and constantly try to fuck each other and society over to make more profit.
Imagine thinking that "da state" is going to exist in any form resembling its current form in socialism
Imagine thinking that any form of organisation is a state, except for corporations, which are even less democratic and do the same things except they arent states for some reason
Imagine falling for the "big state" boogeyman pushed by the larger-than-most-states multinationals
Dominic Cooper
Oh shit dawg, quads of truth!
Parker Allen
libertarians get the bullet too
Ryder Peterson
Imagine thinking that the only alternative to command economy is capitalism
Robert Ortiz
Okay
Jonathan Davis
That poster was clearly opposed to socialism in general, as the OP was not specific to one ideology or another. And lolberts are notorious for crying over states.
Bentley Allen
No they weren't, 'The state is evil and needs to die' is basic anarchism.
Strong government is even worse than free market capitalism. Its the difference between monarchy/oligarchy and aristocracy. At least in the latter the people with authority individually have less of it instead of one institution having as much power as every aristocrat/porky.
Large, powerful, central governments cannot actually be democratic, and if it could be, that would still be evil, because nothing legitmizes a big crowd stepping on other people any more than a king, a career politician, or a rich fuck doing it.
not being an anarchist because smashies are retards is like not being a socialist because sjws are retards.
Angel Lee
I’m that poster and I’m not opposed to socialism. I’m just opposed to state socialism and central planning.
Xavier Gutierrez
In that case, OP never mentioned a state, so I don't know why you blurted about states in the first place.
Colton Kelly
Calculating the socially necessary labour times stopped being a problem since like, the late 80's. Labour modeling is possible. youtu.be
Camden Morgan
A).I'm not that poster
B.)People were talking about a 'command economy', and central planning, implying a strong central authority. He was responding to the current discussion, not to the OP.
Eli Davis
I also responed to
Fair enough then.
Jose Cooper
models like don't even require an executive branch of a goverment, instead everything is unions, and randomly selected committes, the problem i see with anarchic distribution is that not all resources can be descentralized, like if you need a medicine that can only be obtained from the coke plant, that only grows in 5 different countries, if you need coffe good luck growing it in europe, coltan then good luck finding that shit anywhere
Ethan Ramirez
I should read it then. I might not be opposed to it.
which is a reason I sometimes call myself a social minarchist instead of an anarchist. Thats true, and one reason some kind of larger scale cooperation and organization is necesssary, which means government or something that may as well be. The question is how to arrange it so that as little is needed as is posssible, and what is is as weak, localized, and easy to disobey or topple as possible.
Xavier King
Linear modelling shows it is possible, just requires a fucktonne of computing power that was impossible for the period the USSR existed in.
Wyatt Smith
And in fact I said to some extent.
David Davis
mutualism, market "socialism", titoism etc. should be fucking canned once and for all
Christian Lopez
Imagine thinking that a market "socialist" system isn't capitalism
Imagine thinking that an anarchist state-not-state is any different from a socialist state.
Connor Bennett
huh, makes me think
Joseph Jackson
Proof?
Austin Lopez
Read
Bentley Rivera
Imagine thinking that a system where workers own and control the means of production isn’t different from capitalism
Imagine thinking that a system where workers are told how and what to produce by the state is any different than a system where workers are told how and what to produce by the bourgeoisie.
Jeremiah Mitchell
Imagine thinking that a planned economy can only mean a burocratic class and no democracy
Imagine thinking that the state cannot be owned and controlled by the workers, and as such they also own and control the means of production
Ryder Flores
Fukuyama get off the internet.
Dylan Carter
Imagine thinking that indirect control of the means of production by the workers through the state is better than direct control of the means of production.
Nathan James
Imagine thinking that workers in a workplace wouldn't control how to run their factory
Imagine thinking that having workers of a factory only controlling their factory and doing whatever the fuck they want is what communism is about
Imagine thinking that we shouldn't have all of society collectively controlling all of the means of production.
Ayden Johnson
Imagine thinking that a system in which workers are forced to produce a certain amount goods and serviced by the bureacrats who allegedly represent workers’ interests would be better than a system in which workers voluntarily convey their preferences to each other through market mechanism.
Sebastian Roberts
Imagine relying your entire worldview of defending capitalistic production and saying that communism is impossible on the boogeyman of "DA BUROCRAT", despite the dicisions being made by the workers democratically.
Read a fucking book.
Julian Edwards
Imagine thinking that an economic system which has catastrophically failed in the 20th century would work this time because of muh computers
Brody Cruz
capitalism has been failing us in the 19th century too, user
Aaron Hughes
Imagine thinking that an economic system that is catastrophically failing right now can work without any changes. (Because coops already exist and making it co-op only is just social democracy, it doesnt change any of the things that cause the problems in society, it even keeps profit seeking and competition)
Ryan Young
Again, why would you want workers to allocate resources through state apparatus instead of voluntary exchange?
Ian Thomas
Certainly not to the extent that state “socialism” has failed.
Juan Johnson
Because voluntarism doesnt work in real life user, we live in a society. Its "workers owning the means of production", not workers owning some mean of production. We have "vuluntary exchange between people" right now, and see what it leads to. The problem with capitalism is not just "some people own factories and the workers don't", capitalism inherently creates these inequalities. Even with your retarded market socialism, as soon as one factory goes under, you now have people who do own a factory and those who down, the owners and the unemployed, and the owners don't want to give them a say in their company because the entire system still runs on "fuck you i got mine, you should have worked harder". Add to this growing automation and right from the getgo your new "system" already has classes and falls apart due to its internal contradictions.
Alexander Cox
Oh and market socialism also encourages increased working weeks, working more for the sake of working, etc etc. Its the same race to the bottom, destroying the quality of life for everyone because of "muh competition". It has goon-type jobs, it pits all individuals against each other and against society, promoting backstabbing behaviour to get that competitive edge, promoting the chasing of profit, rather than the statisfaction of needs.
Ian Clark
Yes. Most communist countries have been plagued by shortages and ounderproduction for various goods.
Uncle Cockshott says that computers can do way better than politiburos and this won’t be a problem going forward.