"That is, I'm sorry, a tremendous load of hooey. If, when you're talking about 'Socialist economy', you're talking about what occurred in the Soviet Union, then my friend you're in for a rude awakening, because it was a mixture of markets and planning. Perhaps a bit more planning, and a little less market, but pretty much a mixture just like every country. No country is purely market based, and no country has ever been purely planning based either. Whatever 'inefficiency' exists in the system of planning is due primarily because of the bureaucracy that, without oversight, tends toward corruption."





Actually I'm not talking about what happened in the USSR. What happened in the USSR was piss poor attempt at socialism that only lasted as long as it did because of access to Capitalist Free Markets and Supply and Demand Pricing Systems. If they really tried to attempt true Socialism and divorce themselves from the influence of international markets the whole thing would have crumbled in a few short years. I'm talking about the society the Socialist wish to see which is one without private ownership of the means of production. This even assumes we have our perfect altruistic Socialist person and in the end they won't be able to function very efficiently if at all because there is no private ownership in any capacity. No private ownership means no competition and exchange, which means no prices to determine value and without knowing the value there is no way to determine the best utilization of resources.





"Also keep in mind that both markets and planning are systems of DISTRIBUTION, and have nothing inherently Capitalistic or Socialistic about them. Markets existed long before Capitalism. Capitaism just happens to have assimilated it because it loves markets so much."





Capitalism has always been around in some capacity somewhere. It is only with the rise of free markets and free peoples has Capitalism flourished. Have we ever had an unfettered 100% Capitalist society. No, but we have for the last 200 years in the developed world largely Free Market Capitalism and since the end of the Cold War Capitalism has been increasingly embraced by more countries the standard of living has dramatically gone up for most peoples around the world.





"See this is the horseshit right there xD. Private ownership of the means of production needs to be abolished because it's the primary source of exploitation. You must know very little, or nothing, about the labour theory of value. What, pray tell, allows a board of directors, a CEO or a pure and simple *owner* from somehow "effectively utilizing resources"? Are these people born with some innate, magical knowledge of how to acquire resources?"





So I just say that Socialist universally call for the end of the Private Ownership of the means of production, you call it horseshit and then explain why all Socialist call for the end of the private ownership of the means of production. I would also like to add that Labor Theory of Value(LTV) is horseshit, Marx himself had a hard time defending LTV when he was alive. The problem is that LTV often ignores the other resources involved and the end product involved. I could work my ass off canning food and selling it, or find an uncut daimond in the ground and sell it. Which one required more work and which one is probably going to make me wealthier. We also have to contend with changing consumer preferences. An Iphone made two years ago still in the box isn't nearly as valuable as an updated one made last month. Both use the same amount of labor and more importantly the older Iphone has depreciated in value and cost, it's not like the labor that went into it all of a sudden disappeared. Supply and Demand is the best if not the only way to determine the value of goods and services.





Also your argument against the Owners of the means of production is falling for the false Wage Slavery argument. First of the person who invest in and/or starts a business venture had to accumulate wealth to begin with in order to even invest/start the endeavor. Likely they got into a habit of saving capital while they were just workers themselves. Next the reason why this labor exploitation is nonsense is first the worker voluntarily chooses to work for the business owner, but also the business owner provides benefits to the workers. The first one is the owner is assuming all the risk and putting his own capital on the line. If the business starts running on a loss the workers are still payed and receive the agreed compensation for work the owner on the other hand loses money. If it's a startup the owner must expend a lot of capital with no return for sometime, but the workers are paid still. If the workers were the ones who owned the business and responsible for startups they'd be putting their own capital on the line. Another benefit is time. Most workers are on a time crunch. They don't have the Capital available to start a business especially if they're young new workers. They either have to start completely from scratch and I mean living in the woods scratch, or they work for someone to have a higher standard of living much more immediately. It's not much different from money lending. You need the money much more now and are willing to pay interest later for it. The employer gets the profit and the worker doesn't assume the risk and saves time. it's not exploitation it's free exchange.





"No we fucking don't. The market system doesn't supply the demand, it supplies whatever's profitable. Don't believe me? Fine. Here's an example to fit through your skull. We need a cure for aids. Why don't we have one? Well all the means of producing a cure, the laboratories, the equipment and the intellectual patents, are owned by large pharmaceutical companies. They don't supply a cure because there's no money in it. Cure a disease? Are you nuts? You cure it and it's gone. It's a one shot deal. No, you see what's more profitable is *treating* the disease. That's right if you keep people paying, and paying, and paying, for a drug cocktail without which they couldn't live, now that's profitable."





Whatever is profitable is what is being demanded the problem is the cost of creating and distributing supply. This argument doesn't take into consideration that a market place has multiple competing firms and the ability for new firms to enter the marketplace. One company may see it's profits in treating a disease, but another firm/individual will ultimately see the money potential in supplying a cure if said cure could be supplied economically. Technically their are surgeries that can eliminate HIV in ones body, but these are extremely limited and expensive procedures supply can only meet the demand of a very few. The fact that such surgeries even exist means the search for more economical cures is underway.





"Companies and corporations manipulate the market when it suits them as well. If they have a large supply of something there's no demand for, like those asinine snuggies, then they artificially create a demand by pumping out a fuckton of commercials and advertising. How else do they manipulate the market? Well Cartier, the largest jewlery company in the world, owns almost all the diamond mines in Africa, and they keep the price of diamonds high by not mining more diamonds than they need, to keep them purposefully rare and thus keep the prices high. Here's a third example to really drive the point home. The markets and Capitalism *stifle* innovation. Why? Well why don't we cheap, readily available solar panels and technology? Again because it's not profitable. Sunlight is free, so fuck that noise. We want the governments of the world to buy *our* oil, *our* natural gas, *our* coal, *our* uranium. So if some scientist comes up with the newest and more reliable solar panel, you know what happens? GE comes around and buys the patent, sticks it in a vault and throws away the key."





They aren't manipulating markets they're informing and/or persuading consumers of their product. In the end it is the consumer that decides whether to buy the product, or not. The exchange is free and voluntary regardless of how asinine you make think such a product and demand for it is.





Cartier is selling a very niche product and a very unnecessary one at that. If it raises the prices too high people will just stop buying their diamonds for other things made from other precious materials and this opens up Cartier to competition from other Daimond producers and potential new competition.





Capitalism has increased innovation, just not in the places you think they should be. Investors saw rising Oil prices and decided that investing in more expensive techniques for obtaining Shale Oil was more profitable than Solar Panels, or in the new Fracking Technology for getting Natrual Gas. And many inroads have been made in the development of better Solar Panels. They just aren't at a point where they are more economical than other energy sources. Hell government are throwing money at Solar energy research and it still hasn't become more economical than fossil fuels. Spain's government bankrupted itself over green energy projects and development.





Patents are constructs created and enforced by Governments, not products of the free market even with these arbitrary IP protections patents are not endless they have often have a time limit.





"Now I get it. You have absolutely no fucking clue about what Socialism is. I'll say it once so open your eyes wide: Socialism occurs when the means of production (factories, offices, businesses, farms, tractors, buses, fishing boats, software patents, etc) are controlled by the working people. So there's no "entity of some sort", it's YOU, it's ME, it's the 99% if you like to use a modern slogan. In Marxist-Leninism, which is a sect of Socialism that believes in having a State, then the democratically elected government controls the means of production *on behalf* of the working people. In Libertarian-Marxism, for instance, it would be put in the hands of the people directly. Meaning you would have a direct democracy in the workplace. No more board of directors, no more shareholders, no more bosses. The workers would be their own board of directors, their own bosses, or simply put: the worker/boss dichotomy would evaporate and you would have: you guessed it, a classless society."





Did I ever say the working people wouldn't have control of the means of production. What Socialist want is communal ownership. The community is an entity and a single one at that. The community may attempt to determine the use of resources themselves, or delegate power to a State, but this is still one entity and that is the crux of Socialism is this oneness controlling all modes of production. Without separate private ownership their is no competition and exchange that is necessary for a supply and demand price system which is the most efficient if not only way to determine the value of goods. Once again without prices we don't know the value and without the value we won't be able to efficently and effectively determine the most efficient use of resources. Whoever the planners are would be winging it. We can obviously have people pretend Capitalism, but when it is not your own resources at risk it ultimately destroys the need for economization and you never pin down the true value of goods.

Do you think that during World War II, a period where the United States had to supply bullets, bombs, tanks and airplanes to 25 allied nations, that the country allowed the market to compete and decide on what to produce? Like FDR said 'okay companies, go ahead and compete so we can see who cuts the most corners to save on resources, and sells the government tanks at the highest price so as to-" OF COURSE NOT. Roosevelt said 'Markets Shmarkets'. He went to the industries that produced cars and girders and other metalworks and *told them* you're gonna produce tanks, and you're gonna produce planes, and they're gonna have these specs, and you're going to make this many of them, and ship them here.



"He *planned* the war-time economy. Guess what else he did. He also introduced ration vouchers. That's right, you could be a rich asshole and go to the grocery store demanding to be given three roast chickens and a buttload of tomatoes, but the grocery clerks would shake their heads and say 'your money's no good here'. Vouchers were given to families based on their need, by the number of children, where they lived, and what was available to them locally. Smells a lot like 'to each according to their need, to each according to their ability'. Smells like golden rule Socialism to me.



Oh no! United States had ... *le gasp* Socialist Planning!





Seriously friend, go read a fucking history book and then come back having done your homework."





Bullets, Boms, Tanks, Warplanes. Explain to me how these improve the average condition of most people. Enormous amounts of resources were forcefully and arbitrarily committed to efforts of destruction, not to producing goods and services that improved peoples lives. The average living conditions of most Americans declined. Roosevelt didn't start telling the companies how they were to run themselves and do it all for free. The Federal Government still paid all these companies even the grocers and the companies usually worked in conjunction with the military in weapons development, but ultimately production was left to the companies. Companies that were never involved in making weapons were making weapons. You can find a WWII knife made by IBM because IBM saw the money to be made in selling knives to the army not because Roosevelt told them to. Capitalist Market functions were still very much a reality in War time America. In many respects the war helped dismantled Roosevelt's New Deal which played a major role in perpetuating the Great Depression. Roosevelt passed a lot of laws that had negative and restrictive impacts on the economy especially his attempts to Cartel major industries. A lot of these rules and regulations were lifted during the war to help increase production and after the war in the post war crash most of his New Deal was repealed by successive Congresses especially under Eisenhower.