state-controlled capitalism

Good video, WV. Thanks.

Will take a look at the second one later. But from what I’ve read, the percentage of private sector listed (70%) for Venezuela is too low. It’s the vast majority of it, and they “nationalized” the oil sector back in the 1960s, if memory serves. It happened long before Chavez and Maduro.

Here’s an excellent essay by Emma Goldman, explaining the difference between nationalizing and socializing. The former isn’t what actual socialists want. It doesn’t make an economy “socialist” to nationalize industry. That’s actually state capitalism — in its right or left-wing forms.

There is no Communism in Russia

https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/emma-goldman-there-is-no-communism-in-russia

Bottom line for me, in these discussions? There has never, ever been a “socialist” nation in the modern world. It’s only existed in small enclaves, like in Republican Spain in the 1930s, or the Paris Commune of 1871, or even smaller scales like co-ops, WSDEs and Kibbutzes. No “socialist” nation-state has ever existed.

wv wrote:

i can think of lots of different kinds of societies that would be a lot better than a biosphere-destroying-poor-people-destroying Corporotacracy. I know you can too, BT.

How would you feel about allowing small-capitalist-businesses and nationalizing the big stuff, like health care, energy, transportation, internet, etc.

I think a nation of small businesses would be ok with me. Even though they are ‘for profit’ etc.

Its just when they start the process of eating each other and the small businesses become Walmarts, and the Walmarts can then buy the politicians, that things become Murderous.

Do you think it would be possible for humans to regulate a system so that small businesses would not become murerous-mega-businesses that destroy the poor, democracy,
and eventually the biosphere? 🙂

This is what i’m readin this week, btw:https://www.amazon.com/Psychologies-Liberation-Critical-Practice-Psychology/dp/0230537693/ref=asc_df_0230537693/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=312142103956&hvpos=1o1&hvnetw=g&hvrand=13754754053655343360&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9009441&hvtargid=pla-491634720637&psc=1

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WV,

I’d prefer a nation of nothing but “small businesses.” Small farms, artisans (a la William Morris’s vision), small producers of all stripes, etc. But, if it were up to me, I’d make it illegal to profit from another person’s labor. I think that’s the fundamental immorality of capitalism, and it leads to all the other immoralities, big and small, IMO. It can’t help but create classes, which can’t help but lead to class divisions and conflicts.

“Ownership” is the key to me. Who owns the means of production? Who decides what is produced, where, why, how, when, etc.? Is there an employer and an employee dynamic? Or are we all co-owners? Is the economy and the workplace “democratic” in real terms?

I think the best society is the one that starts with the fundamental notion that you can not profit off someone else’s work. You can’t own them for twelve or ten or eight hours a day. You can’t own anyone but yourself.

For me, it’s the difference between these two scenarios:

1. You build custom chairs with your own two hands. You don’t have any employees. It’s just you, from start to finish, including hauling your work to your clients, or getting them to visit you in your shop.

(You’re not a capitalist.)

2. You hire other people to build those chairs for you. They don’t own anything they make, legally. You own it all, even though you didn’t build a single chair. You get to determine the “value” of their labor. They have no say in the matter. You appropriate all the surplus value they generate as if you did all the work.

(You’re a capitalist.)

I prefer the first scenario, and this can scale up and remain “non-capitalist” simply by making everyone who works there co-owners. Democratize the process and you have “socialism.”

WV,

Would appreciate any feedback about my analogy, etc. Does it make sense to you . . . my argument against capitalism itself?

Again, I’m not at all against commerce and trade. We obviously need that. I’m just against a particular mode of production that makes it legally possible for one human being to own all the work of hundreds, thousands, hundreds of thousands of other human beings.

They (workers) own nothing they produce under our current mode. And in order for it to add up for the capitalist, they will never be compensated fairly for their production. Basic math prevents that. There’s simply no money left over for the capitalist to make his or her fortune if workers are paid fairly, value for value. He or she has to underpay them. The more they want for themselves, the worse that underpayment gets.