The Socialist Dream Crumbles in Venezuela

[JDHURF]

My position had always been that Chavez should have removed himself earlier and let the nascent social movements carry the work forwards. Chavez really hindered the movements by compelling them to rely on a single individual in one position for so much. That is now really causing sustained harm by the clearly incompetent Maduro.

Spider, you cannot with any shred of intellectual honesty pretend that the situation in Venezuela is a condemnation of planned economy. To begin with state management is not the only form of planned economy. Furthermore, there are simply far too many instances of state owned enterprises (SOE's) only succeeding because they were state managed: Singapore Airlines "is one of the most highly regarded airlines in the world...Unlike most other carriers, it has never made a financial loss in its 35-year history," as institutional development economist Ha Joon Chang observes. Singapore Airlines is an SOE. Korea's POSCO (Pohang Iron and Steel Company) began as an SOE, it is now privatized, but that only occurred after it became successful as an SOE, and became within ten years "one of the most efficient steel-producers on the planet and is now the world's third largest.(Chang)"

There are a plethora of such examples to be found not only in East Asia, Taiwan, China and so on, but within European economies like Austria, Finland, France, Norway and Italy. Here's some former SOE's that became successful because of the fact: Renault, Alcatel, St Gobain, Usinor, Thomson, Thales, Elf Aquitaine, Rhone-Poulenc, etc. Returning to Latin America one only need review Brazilian state-owned Petrobras to conclude that SOE's are not predictably disastrous.

[exploited]

LCBO in Ontario is a fine example from closer to home. As is OLG. Both are multi-billion dollar companies, both pay decent wages, both fill the tax coffers with money.

I concede it is hard not to make money given a monopoly, but both of these organizations are renowned for being run effectively.

[PoS]

[Spider]

[The Dharma Bum]

You can't just point to the way every aspect of human existence is being monetized by private interests and the finance sector and say that is the world developing it's own ideology and this development is simply "shaped by reality".

You are simply conflating your cultural expectations and beliefs with "reality" (whatever that is).

[The Dharma Bum]

[The Comrade]

privatization works so much better. that's why when china privatized all their SOEs they began developing an unstable bubble-economy that's getting ready to implode.

[Spider]

[Spider]

I think certain industries can potentially be partially manage by government, with little ill effect, so long as they are allowed to be returned to the private sector if and when they eventually become too inefficient. Proper regulation....setting boundaries for operation....are the proper role, rather than the micromanagement of an entire economy...an endeavor doomed to failure because it cannot compete with other economies that run more efficiently and flexibly.

Some industries and modes of production don't necessarily have a good enough profit motive, but do have an important utility to society that can be better profited from collectively. Not everything that is worth doing can be done profitably, and so state management can be beneficial. And some things that can be staggeringly profitable can have greater benefits if public than private, and so the state can play there, too. Look at Norway and energy.

^Also, Dharma, that is what I just posted. Rather than isolating a single phrase that completely misrepresents my stated position, (which is apparently the only way you can debate) do you want to discuss what I actually posted?

[Ben Huh]