From: gary@ke4zv.uucp (Gary Coffman)
Newsgroups: alt.activism,talk.politics.misc,misc.headlines
Subject: Re: Socialism, again (was Re: Derailing the Reagan...)
Date: 25 Aug 92 23:42:11 GMT
Reply-To: gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman)
Organization: Gannett Technologies Group

In article <1992Aug25.003220.25787@meteor.wisc.edu> stvjas@meteor.wisc.edu (Stephen Jascourt) writes:
>In article <1992Aug24.200445.16384@hsv3.lsil.com> mvp@hsv3.lsil.com (Mike Van Pelt) writes:
>>In article <1992Aug20.124634.27340@cs.ruu.nl> rkunenbo@cs.ruu.nl (Ronald Kunenborg) writes:
>>>I don't think you quite understood what he meant. "From each according to
>>>ability, to each according to need". And not decided by little committees,
>>>but by the people themselves.
>>
>>Socialists and Marxists of various kinds seem to think of this little
>>formula as some kind of ideal.  The more I think about it, though, the
>>more pernicious it seems.  What you've got is a formula for slavery.
>>"From each according to his ability..."  Extract the maximum work out
>>of the slaves that they're capable of putting out.  "... to each
>>according to his need."  And only feed, clothe, and house them at the
>>subsistance level.  "Needs" aren't "wants", and obviously nobody
>>"needs" more than subsistance, right?

This struck me as sounding very much like the old draftee army. They
worked you like a dog, clothed, housed, and fed you in an abominable way,
and all you had to look forward to was leave. That seems to describe
socialist paradises to a T. All their populations want is to leave too.

>In contrast, capitalism establishes an enslaved class out of whom the maximum
>work is extracted without even enough compensation for the needs of food
>clothing, and housing. This is happening in the U.S. Unions are being busted
>and forced to make concessions, the working person has no place to turn.

Yeah right. The reason unions are losing sway is that people have quit
joining. Union membership is at a post-WWII low, organizing efforts are
failing everywhere as workers vote to avoid union servitude. I'm a card
carrying IBEW and Teamster member, but I'm not proud of it. I had to
join to work. Union leadership seems bent on pushing social and political
causes that are overwhelmingly rejected by the rank and file with dues
money coerced from that same rank and file. Union leaders have pushed
excessive work rules and wage rates on companies until those companies 
have been forced to pick up and leave because they can no longer compete.  
There was a time when unions were necessary to protect workers from 
exploitation, but now it's the unions that workers, and companies, need 
protection against.

That enslaved "class" you talk about has a guaranteed minimum wage
if they want to work and public housing and food stamps and welfare
if they don't. The latter pays better than the former after taxes so 
there's little wonder many don't want to work. If they've got any 
gumption at all they can do much better than minimum wage, though they 
won't get to keep most of it after all the various levels of government 
steal their share, and the unions check off their share.

>A large percentage (I don't have figures-- somebody could post them if they
>do) are unable to earn enough for rent and food and transportation to work--
>it they live in the city, where the jobs are, the rent is high, if not, the
>commute adds up. Many of the homeless have jobs of 20+ hours per week, some

The jobs are in the city? Not the last time I looked. Companies are 
fleeing the high tax cities nearly as rapidly as their workers. The 
jobs are in the suburbs. There aren't a lot of tenements in the suburbs, 
but then few companies need unskilled workers at minimum wage anymore.
Those that did fled overseas or to the rural areas. Those that remain
lap at the government trough picking up tax money for job training and 
make work programs to fill out their quotas. They run private shuttle 
buses into the inner city to pickup and return these back markers. The 
inner city is mostly government bureaucratic paper shufflers and their 
hangers on by day, and the chronically unemployable lounging about public 
housing projects pushing dope by night. Meanwhile "guest workers" and 
illegal immigrants are imported to do the work these people refuse. The 
so called homeless are the people we used to call bums and winos twenty 
years ago augmented by the refuse of the mental institutions who were 
turned out into the streets in a misguided plan to "mainstream" them. 
We used to have county work farms to deal with the winos and bums, 
and the insane were housed in institutions.  No more. Now they are "the
homeless" and get featured on TV.

>full time. At least with a decentralized socialism (not a state-planned and
>state-mandated economy of the eastern block countries), a minimum standard
>of living is established so everyone has the dignity of having a home and
>being able to eat a nutritious meal and having their medical needs met.

Yes and that "minimum" standard also becomes the defacto *ceiling* for
everyone since anyone who tries to get ahead is taxed back down into
the pack to pay for the slackers and losers.

>>Under this formula, what possible motive would anyone have for learning
>>a useful skill?  It only would add to his workload, and for absolutely
>>no benefit to himself.  Learning a skill doesn't increase your "need".
>
>Motivation is the one primary positive contribution of capitalism, but also
>its most negative feature. One can be motivitated to excel, inventing new
>ideas and technologies, improving the human condition. But ultimately, one is
>motivated to accumulate wealth regardless of what affect that has on the
>society-- including accumulating wealth at the expense of other people rather
>than in a way in which they benefit too. Capitalism by its very nature breeds
>greed, brings latent greed out like nothing else can. That is not to say that
>the opposite is a cure for it. Rather, we have to understand what the vices of
>all different kinds of systems are so we can come up with ways of getting 
>around them, to having something that does have positive motivating power but
>directs that motivation toward the betterment of the society. An ideal system
>does not exist, but we can try to work toward one.

Capitalism doesn't breed greed. It recognizes that it exists as a basic
human motivation and harnesses it to drive the "invisible hand" of the
market. Socialism tries to deny that it exists and tries to suppress it
with draconian taxation. Not surprisingly, that doesn't work. It merely 
breeds resentment and discontent. Socialism tries to tap into altruism 
as it's driving force, but altruism is a weak emotion at best and quickly 
disappears when times turn tough. In economic good times, feel good
altruism flourishes and the system seems to work. But when the business
cycle turns down, as it does periodically when debt loads rise, then
people are willing to throw the weakest to the wolves to save themselves.
Capitalism holds no such illusions. Good times or bad, it's root hog
or die, a classless society that belongs to the strong from whatever
level they clawed their way up. 

A mixed economy is the worst of both worlds. It holds out the illusion
of the possibilty of success. But it slaps down those who claw their
way partway out of the pit with oppressive taxation and government
interference in the free market. Those who start on the bottom are
truly class bound with nowhere to go and no way to get there.

Gary
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