You've got to be kidding !!

The command economy in the old USSR couldn't even predict the demand for toothbrushes, let alone more critical items. If Toiletries Factory No.17 had produced its quota, that was that. A system doomed to fail ...

 

You're constraining your thinking by not looking to what near future holds.

Only 59% of working age Americans are in employment; this percentage will increase dramatically as automation and technology has a grater effect upon the possible working roles available to people. And this scenario is not limited to blue-collar jobs, as the so-called professionals are increasingly being affected too. Thankfully sectors which hitherto have escaped the inexorable march of technological 'progress' in the workplace are now significantly affected, specifically lawyers and accountants. This situation will be a factor of all economies, mature or developing.

With less people working and the wealth disparity between them and those who are working increasing massively, something has to give. If one can't get what one wants (as distinct from one what needs) by working for reward, and if there's little hope of ever being able to do so, then one option is to take it, by whatever means. The other option is to have it provided.

If you're uncomfortable with centrally planned production because of its historical association, then perhaps you'd be happier with centrally planned consumption. With many economists postulating the previously unthinkable concept of zero-cost marginal production, those in the minority who are employed will be increasingly required, and be able, to provide for those who are not.

With market forces becoming irrelevant in such a scenario, planned production/consumption will be an inevitability.

 

It's funny how similar the whole debate of capitalism etc.. is to the world of F1.

A set of artificial boundaries are imposed intended to provide equality, a group finds a way of gaming those rules and eeking an advantage. The masses cry foul, revolutionary rules ensue intended to provide equality, one group finds a way to game them and rinse and repeat.

People aren't meant to be equal it's what drives us. I've worked job in teams with equal pay and joint team goals for bonuses and what happens is once you find a balance of work in the team, you have no motivation to work harder. Working in a job with individual goals and bonus structure and it's a far greater motivator for achievement.

 

Unfortunately, until we eliminate busybody zombies like economists, legislators, et al, there will always be an opportunity for people to get rich whilst subjugating others.

Since the command-economy system has been empirically proven to fail (and even those living in a socialist fantasy have come to realise it) they are now trying this revolving-door arrangement between Gov't & Big Business. i.e., fascism in lieu of communism. Fail in one, move to the other & back again.

We can only afford to pay people not to work & to funnel the asset value upwards as long as the current credit system continues to expand (the present currencies are all overdue for replacement, as their predecessors were!) and at some point, it has to collapse. Only then will the 'new system' emerge & most people return to doing something useful & productive. Probably via the internet, or something. Maybe pedalling generator-bikes to power it all? Who knows.

 

We'll be on to the Hegelian Dialectic next (thesis, antithesis, synthesis) ....

 

You can't have rich without poor - otherwise you lose the reference point

 

Bingo

Relatively speaking I drive a sports car, don't live in much fear of crime or persecution, have a decent amount of leisure time, disposable income for luxuries, eat exceptionally well from a nutritional stand point, health care which in an emergency can typically be counted on, and even none essential procedures are available providing you accept the waiting times. I've access to the same education as any one else.

Granted a lot of that would be completely different were I to throw kids into the mix but you show my life style to a working class person from a couple of hundred years or more ago, and they wouldn't care if the gulf between me and the Ecclestones of the world was larger than it's ever been they'd bite my arm off for it.

We live in an era where no one willing to work can really claim to be poor in this country. If people can't make ends meet it's because they are living beyond them and if they want that extra level of luxury in life it's down to them to earn it.

I know the ruling classes capitalise more from my efforts than I do, but like that scene in the Matrix with Cypher, I'm happy as long as I can still taste a steak.