One issue is that the planning via prices and money (or via the labor-hour or via any single universal scalar) would be replaced by material planning. During the transitional period, money would still exist, but there would be increasing use of material planning.
The use of material planning (sometimes called material balances) does *not*, in itself, make an economic system socialist; it is only one aspect of a socialist system. It's the social structure of a country, such as the control by the working masses of the economy and politics of a country, that is the criterion of socialism. But the technical aspect does have its importance. It's important the social welfare and protection of the environment cannot be accomplished simply by setting better prices, using the "true value", gross domestic happiness, or any other single measure. I have written about this in several articles that you might find of interest. See "A reply to Seongjin Jeong on labor-time and 21st century socialism" (http://www.communistvoice.org/DSWV-181014.html). and A three-part article against labor money or the existence of any single natural unit of economic calculation (http://www.communistvoice.org/00LaborHour.html). The latter article includes, among other things, an overview of the development of socialist thought about the law of value and pricing, consideration of the Soviet method of material balances, and a discussion of Marx's views on communist economic planning. On 30 Nov 2020 at 7:53, Michael Marking wrote: > > (2) Almost everything I have read about post-revolutionary > economics > is vague, or qualitative, or both. Where is a place to start > for > Marxist quantitative economics, econometrics, and the like? > > Comment: I majored in mathematics and economics. Somehow, in > school, > no one ever mentioned Karl Marx. The closest we came was a > discussion about how Soviet central planners fixed prices of > vodka > and television sets. (The process basically consisted -- if my > professors got this right -- in deciding the quantity to be > produced, then reading the price from that point on the demand > curve. The difference was a kind of "profit" which supported > the > state in lieu of taxes.) We did a lot of optimization, some > portfolio theory, input-output analysis, and so on, and > Keynesian > models of national economies. But nothing about socialism except > for > vodka and TVs. > > (3) In a world where capitalists can't foist the costs of their > pollution, poisoning, exploitation, enclosure, and so on, onto > others, and the incentive of profit is gone, I would expect an > economy naturally smaller and more sustainable. On the other > hand, > maybe the Bolivians would become greedy, and happy to despoil > their land and to work long hours in return for video games > and > microwave ovens. While Hickel talks about some top-down > planning > to control, say, waste and resource usage, which might be seen > as > "supply side" management, who has talked about "demand side" > parameters affected by socialism itself? > > Comment: Maybe communism doesn't have a solution for > environmental > problems or resource limitations, but certainly the analysis > is > greatly changed. > > In short, I'm very interested in pointers to any discussions about > forms of socialist governance and socialist economics. I assume that > one > size doesn't fit all, that Europeans and Chinese and indigenous > peoples > ("first nations") might all want to do it differently, but socialism > can > be a big tent, can't it? Especially, how are conflicts resolved > between > local governments and larger (national or global) governments? > > -- This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software. https://www.avast.com/antivirus -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Groups.io Links: You receive all messages sent to this group. View/Reply Online (#4050): https://groups.io/g/marxmail/message/4050 Mute This Topic: https://groups.io/mt/78574247/21656 -=-=- POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. -=-=- Group Owner: [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://groups.io/g/marxmail/leave/8674936/1316126222/xyzzy [[email protected]] -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
