I think I somewhat understand the principles behind communism but how would Communism work in practice?
How would laws be created? What sorts of governing bodies would there be?
How would items be valued? How would we know how many to produce? Especially with niche or innovative items.
Would I be able to start a business? Say I had designed something new and innovative, how would I go about producing that and how would I be rewarded for my innovation?
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Like the Soviet model, but corresponding to increases in Technology compared to their day.
The politburo and centralized power, splitting up out to a federal level.
How much labour was required to produce it and how socially necessary it is. We would produce how many based on intelligent estimates of peoples wants and needs, probably through a voting system, although we would aim for excess production.
No, you wouldn't. However you could submit your design and technological documents and be rewarded for them or hired at the local engineering bureau etc.
Production would be decided by the representative leaders of their respective industries in the workers congress.
Thered be a representative for the writers union, the electronics union, the cars union, the clothes union, etc…
Prices of goods would be decided by the market because as we saw in the soviet union price allocation are a waste of time, create an elite and create shortages goods.
I dont even know what the point of it was in the first place.
I mean realistically we need price signals to determine production.
Thered be no corporations, itd just be for pricing of goods is all.
No.
Ah yes because queuing in line for 10 hours is Actual Existing Socialism.
The goverment would hand all workers a card with points.
They could spend the points on whatever they want and the points would become unusable once spent thus ensuring they can not be turned into capital.
Itd solve the economic calculation problem and have no bad side effects, whats the issue?
I stand in line every day to buy a bread. Capitalism or specifically markets do not completly solve this problem, but let's look how """efficiency of markets""" is functioning against this. It's mainly two points:
Well nowadays most people buy online and distribution is done through delivery anyways.
The government could also have a website with product listings like amazon. Including foods such as "bread" solving the "breadline" problem.
Or you can build a store close to where people live, and they can use their fucking feet.
THIS
Oh whoops I dropped my book. Perhaps you should read it…
stop reading Hayek and start reading Marx
Nobody worth their salt can just dismiss the economic calculation problem.
Im not sure but i read the amazon reviews for the book you guys posted and i think the author argued for the market letting decide the price of goods.
Itd be helpful if you guys could summarize the book as not everyone is committed or patient enough to buy a $30 book.
You can still have a planned economy but if you dont have price signals itll just lead to more wasteful beaurocratic work and imperfect economic data.
my gott lurk more
wrong again
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Fuck off, we have enough left-wing capitalists already. We are communists, not market "socialist" cucks.
You guys criticize me for saying that we need markets for price signals and you guys post and article and book that say the same thing…
I'm not completely sure why either because it was indeterminate what you meant there by market. Cockshott describes a kind of market as a means to adjust the plan, but it isn't a capitalist market because nobody makes a profit. I like Cockshott, but one thing I'm confused about that I can't quite remember if he addressed was by what mechanism the store decides to raise or lower prices on a thing. A capitalist store does this because it wants a profit, and maybe it knows more people buy TVs at this time of year, or it does see that something isn't selling and puts it on clearance to make some amount back on it. The socialist store doesn't really NEED to raise or lower prices to survive, unless the state closes the store for failing to meet some target, but even then the workers can presumably just go work somewhere else since the socialist state is going to provide work. So what's the criteria for deciding to raise or lower a price? I guess they need to empty the store of a certain set of products by a certain date?
I explisitely said that the market would be only for price signals.
Coordinating an economy without price signals is like building without a ruler.
Really depends on what branch of communism you ask this.
Some sort of democratic body with more of an emphasis on bottom up local law and direct democracy.
You can start a cooperative. Investment could come from whatever investment body there is, or if the system has it, some sort of crowdfunding program.
Under Cockshott's cybernetic communism, an item would be values at the shelf clearing price, and for every item they keep track of how many hours of work went into it. If the shelf clearing price is higher than the labour value, make more of it, as there is more demand for it. If it is lower, make less of it, because there is an oversupply for it.
Very niche or innovative products would still work the same, as niche products, such as special paints or whatever, are still produced in somewhat substantial quantities. Things that are produced in extremely tiny quantities do not really blip on the radar, but as a rule should still follow the same logic. There cannot be commodities in more demand than their current supply while we have the ability to produce them.
Read this book for more info on cockshott and cybernetic communism.
That reminds me. In one thread we had a proposal to have expiring consumption vouchers for products produced in a certain period (meaning you have to obtain a thing with vouchers from the corresponding period) and the prices are fixed, and you order things online and there are virtual waiting queues and you have to bid with a distinct voucher type for a position in the buyer queue (if the queue gets too long, those at the end of it get nothing and pay nothing in either voucher type).
So, it almost doesn't matter how silly the consumption-point "prices" and quantities the bureaucracy comes up with might get, the stuff will get off the shelves sooner or later. For under-supplied stuff at a low consumption-point "price", the queuing -voucher auctions ration it. Relatively expensive over-supplied stuff people will still get after trying and failing to get other things, when the only alternative is letting their unused consumption vouchers expire.
Everybody could also get exactly the same hourly remuneration in terms of consumption points, the only difference being the queuing-voucher quantity. Consequence of such a system: If you are a highly-skilled highly demanded professional, you also have a better chance to get the time of other highly demanded professionals. But a person doing tedious tasks for you costs you as much as it costs anybody else.
sorry bro you didn't.
Nobody worth their salt has ever bought in the first place. It was disproved when Misis came out with, then disproved doublely so when computers started seeing common use. I know this is you I responded to here .
*Bought into it in
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