Arguments for central planning
Central planning works for military operations, so why not use the same techniques for meeting the basic needs of citizens like food, shelter, and healthcare?
A liberal would answer that central planning is usually grossly inefficient, and prone to misallocation of resources that ultimately does citizens more harm than good. If a society tries to implement central planning without allowance for external corrections, the result will be a giant mess.
So why is this true at the level of goods and services, but not for the military?
A liberal would answer that central planning is usually grossly inefficient, and prone to misallocation of resources that ultimately does citizens more harm than good. If a society tries to implement central planning without allowance for external corrections, the result will be a giant mess.
So why is this true at the level of goods and services, but not for the military?
Comments (32)
The military is grossly inefficient and prone it misallocation of resources. It works, yes, but we throw colossal shit tons of money at it for the return that we get. But here's the deal: It provides jobs. So the better question is, why can't those jobs be created building basics needs? Or better yet, why are those jobs which currently exist to provide basic needs considered part of the welfare state and a waste, instead of being counted like the guy building bombs?
I hate ugly central planning. But I think Europe has some cool shit. It's not an either/or. It's priorities.
There really aren't any good practical arguments, are there?
Only if it works.
Quoting frank
If it works, it's practical.
I just think that if we threw as much money at central planning as we do the military, we could have gold-plated food, shelter, and healthcare, instead of gold-plated toilet seats in a new super-sonic jet that can't get off the ground.
Instead of ugly-ass projects and tenement buildings, we could have some really cool stuff. And think of all the jobs created to do this, from Landscape Architects, to nail-benders to etc. Doctors and nurses getting paid without the insurance sucking sound between them and the patient, and healthy food that tastes good.
And guess what? I think the U.S. could afford to do that AND still have the baddest-ass military on the planet, by far. But I don't make policy. Shrug.
Because that would be socialism! We can't have that!! People must fight for their daily bread, or perish.
You can give bread and circuses to the people without central planning of the economy. That's what we call progressive in the US.
But I think a liberal who adheres to Hayek's views would say that central planning is fine as long as it emerged naturally, like in a mir?
Hayek would point to his Local Knowledge Problem, which suggests that the vast majority of the knowledge required for rational planning exists outside the grasp of any central authority. The knowledge is dispersed among all people, decentralized.
https://www.econlib.org/library/Essays/hykKnw.html
Sounds like an argument for trickle-up economics. Take from the hoarders and give to those who know best, and who will actually spend it in the community. If the hoarders want to get in on the action, they actually have to work for it. But if they don't want to work, it's not a problem: They are wealth creators and they'll just bootstrap some more money out of thin air. It's a win-win.
There is supply-side and demand-side economics. So-called “trickle” kinds of economics are pejoratives, and not actual theories.
Right. This is the argument that central planning can't work. All we need is one example of it functioning successfully, and that argument falls.
He also argues that central planning does violence to what nature has wrought, endangering the population in the process. Again, we only need one example of it working to show that isn't true.
Liberalism contains a few gems. Arguments against central planning aren't among them in my view. The thing is, there really isn't a good argument for it (that I can see so far).
They aren't pejoratives. Well, trickle-down may be, now that it has been exposed. But trickle-up still needs a 40 year shot at it. The theory is as I stated.
Supply and demand side are both increasing growth models.
:100: :up: I agree and only rolled with a tangent of my own, assuming his military reference was being used as an example of central planning, with the opposite being free-markets. But yes, we are lacking in any substantive criteria/definitions. That never stopped me :lol:
I guess I don’t understand the question.
I was responding to the question: “Hayek's views would say that central planning is fine as long as it emerged naturally, like in a mir?” That contradicts his view that central planning cannot work.
Military is not an incidence of central-planning because military planning has nothing to do with markets and economy, and is limited in activity and scope.
Oh, I see what you're saying. Let me rephrase: if I showed Hayek a case of central planning that emerged spontaneously, he'd be have to approve due his devotion to whatever appears naturally.
Quoting NOS4A2
I'm probably not going to wrangle with you over cases of functional central planning.
Oh, ok. Well, he differentiates between spontaneous and designed order. I can’t see how a centrally-planned economy can come from the former without first coming from the latter.
Before free markets existed temple economies were common. Priests set exchange rates (there was no money yet). It worked, although moneyless societies were stagnant by our standards.
Ironically, planned economies came first. Free markets first appeared in the chaos of the Bronze Age collapse.
This very much happens in market societies all the time, only that there's more smoke and mirrors involved. But it's the same concept of thinking that a few people know more than the rest of the population on what they should want or have.
I think there should be loose-ish centers in which people decide what rules they want in society. One would only need as much central planning as is necessary and not more. You can't avoid large institutions, but you can temper the power they have to reflect the will of the majority.
But retain the power they have to prevent the will of the majority to exclude a minority.
If a community decided to provide housing and food for all it's members, would central planning be required?
It's not easy under any circumstance. I think minority rights could be respected in a more democratic society, but there's no guarantee.
If they don't depend on any resources from others, then they could do without certain aspects of central planning. Of course, this depends on if we are picturing an ideal-ish society or what can be done within our current system.
If we limit ourselves to the latter, we're going to have less choices to be creative about it.
I was thinking the opposite: the community would need to be mostly self sufficient for central planning. If a lot of their resources are imported, they're going to be dependent on bigger political entities and the same problem emerges: the people making decisions are too far away from the hardware of the economy.
Free markets work. They foster creativity, they allow personal expression, they're adaptable and efficient.
The moral argument for central planning just can't overcome those assets.
I'm not going to give you the "left wing" spiel you've probably heard thousands of times.
I'll only limit my comments to saying that the institutions themselves are not the problem, it's the way they're used. Free markets - if they exist - would be good for trade. It would not be a good idea for a society, to think of a society like a market.
Central planning - in so far as they can reflect the will of the majority - can be good for setting laws most people would agree to, such as having a police force of some kind, a universal justice system and so on. But it would also not be a good idea to foster the mentality of leaders in a society.
But these terms are so loaded, they impede communication just as frequently, if not more so, than they can get a message across.
A lot of my reading about Neoliberalism orbits around the Weimar Republic. I think it's supposed to be a case of catastrophic collectivism?
Because military operations, war, are the most inhumane of human activities, concerned mainly with how to kill human beings as efficiently as possible. I can accept that such practices are a necessity if one wishes to conduct war, but to voluntarily invite them into other parts of society?
I'n sure one's household could be made to run a lot more efficiently were one to apply some military principles in running it - whether that is going to lead to a happy family? I have my doubts.
Central planning requires powerful governments, and individuals to wield that power. The vast majority of individuals is completely unfit to wield any type of power over others, let alone power of such magnitude over millions of people.
That's already happened. American factories used the same Prussian organizational structure that the US military uses. They learned about it from studying Napoleon apparently.
And war is quintessentially human.
Quoting Tzeentch
Interestingly this isn't a liberal point against central planning. You'd think it would be, but it turns out they need to protect liberalism from democracy, so they approve of authoritarianism.
In my opinion, it is quintessentially inhuman; animal, degenerate.
“We the peoples of the United Nations determined to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime has brought untold sorrow to mankind.”
The opening words of the Charter of the United Nations, and one of the few things that seperates human civilization from chimpanzees.
Quoting frank
Then they do not apply their ideas consistently, and thus hold little merit.
They can also eat fibrous plant material that we can't. There's a "flaw" in our genetics that makes our jaw muscles weaker.
Quoting Tzeentch
When Hayek first started writing, the academic scene was dominated by leftists and they laughed at him (kind of in the same way people laugh about Rand as if she had nothing interesting to say).
It's a different story after his ideas take over the world. :grimace:
Curiously, they all share the same flaw. They all wish to impose their views on others through force (as does anything that is authoritarian). Apparently reason and dialogue are not well-suited for communicating their ideas.
Note that liberalism in the classical sense is the first, and perhaps the only ideology that acknowledged the issues with the use of force.
Look for the use of force anywhere, whether it's physical, intellectual, emotional, mental or otherwise, and you'll find bad ideas.
I don't think there's any way around it. We like our hierarchies and their existence requires some measure of force.