Huey Prashker
28th October 2013, 17:28
I really can't think of any.
The weirdness of capitalism is evident to me in the problem of unemployment. High rates of unemployment under capitalism are evidence of a struggling economy / population, because, since a portion of the population has not found a method of being productive to the overall system, their needs are need ignored. Properly viewed in an idealistic counterfactual simulation of human history without the advent of property, unemployment would be evidence of productive success – the production capacity exceeds the need not yet met, so all need will eventually be met.
By decentralized planning, I mean roughly the ideas on this wikipedia page:
WIKIPEDIA/wiki/Decentralized_planning_(economics)
It seems to be the ideal way to implement from each according to their ability, to each according to their need. Under an easy to imagine as but not necessarily electronic system, anybody could create an account and by a simple commitment to a work requirement proportionate to their ability, the would gain the ability to submit need to some sort of website. These need demonstrations could be as complex as education or infrastructure. The larger the need, the more work hours are created in the system. The work requirement is roughly the amount of work hours evenly distributed across a population after a certain age with reductions granted in the case of permanent or temporary disability, the elderly, or those pregnant and with young children.
This balance where work and need are directly compared gives the society an incentive not to overproduce or over-consume; each addition of need forces each member of society to work more, so a natural comfortable balance should arise. In needy times of famine or natural disaster, all must work more than is likely comfortable. But, in times of plenty, the labour commitment of the collective population would decrease.
This system would also be able to easily manage long-term needs that require long-term production such as education as well. If it were determined that education was needed in a broad range of disciplines, a portion of the population could seek a temporary reduction or voiding of their work requirement for a period where they would be a student.
I do not rule out the possibility of a second tier economy based on decentralized currency that handles non-need demand, but the existence of the possibility is interesting but not troubling. If this second tier economy not only existed but flourished, it would mean that not yet met need was so low that the population had enough time, energy, and resources for heavily developed leisure or culture. However, it is likely that it would not develop too much because there would be no property, so the only thing said currency could be exchange for are leisure services (plays, movies, vacation transportation, recreational drugs).
Furthermore, this system would be better able to handle the problem of mismatch, where, due to changing needs, the production capacity of individuals is not able to meet the needs of the population. In this situation, new need is simply created: the need to change the production force (i.e. education, transportation to jobs, construction of factories).
Please, attack.
The weirdness of capitalism is evident to me in the problem of unemployment. High rates of unemployment under capitalism are evidence of a struggling economy / population, because, since a portion of the population has not found a method of being productive to the overall system, their needs are need ignored. Properly viewed in an idealistic counterfactual simulation of human history without the advent of property, unemployment would be evidence of productive success – the production capacity exceeds the need not yet met, so all need will eventually be met.
By decentralized planning, I mean roughly the ideas on this wikipedia page:
WIKIPEDIA/wiki/Decentralized_planning_(economics)
It seems to be the ideal way to implement from each according to their ability, to each according to their need. Under an easy to imagine as but not necessarily electronic system, anybody could create an account and by a simple commitment to a work requirement proportionate to their ability, the would gain the ability to submit need to some sort of website. These need demonstrations could be as complex as education or infrastructure. The larger the need, the more work hours are created in the system. The work requirement is roughly the amount of work hours evenly distributed across a population after a certain age with reductions granted in the case of permanent or temporary disability, the elderly, or those pregnant and with young children.
This balance where work and need are directly compared gives the society an incentive not to overproduce or over-consume; each addition of need forces each member of society to work more, so a natural comfortable balance should arise. In needy times of famine or natural disaster, all must work more than is likely comfortable. But, in times of plenty, the labour commitment of the collective population would decrease.
This system would also be able to easily manage long-term needs that require long-term production such as education as well. If it were determined that education was needed in a broad range of disciplines, a portion of the population could seek a temporary reduction or voiding of their work requirement for a period where they would be a student.
I do not rule out the possibility of a second tier economy based on decentralized currency that handles non-need demand, but the existence of the possibility is interesting but not troubling. If this second tier economy not only existed but flourished, it would mean that not yet met need was so low that the population had enough time, energy, and resources for heavily developed leisure or culture. However, it is likely that it would not develop too much because there would be no property, so the only thing said currency could be exchange for are leisure services (plays, movies, vacation transportation, recreational drugs).
Furthermore, this system would be better able to handle the problem of mismatch, where, due to changing needs, the production capacity of individuals is not able to meet the needs of the population. In this situation, new need is simply created: the need to change the production force (i.e. education, transportation to jobs, construction of factories).
Please, attack.