Thursday, May 22, 2014

The Capitalism, Socialism, Communism Spectrum

A good lesson all junior, aspiring, deputy, official or otherwise economists can learn from:


4 comments:

Karl said...

Nice job. Shared at Ushanka.

Get well!

Peregrine John said...

Dang it. I was asked this very question (additionally, what the heck fascism is) just 2 days ago. I'll have to revisit the questioner to make things more clear.

Kristophr said...

U 2?

Nasty damned flu going about. Viral, so all you can do is walk it off.

SkarnkaiLW said...

Fascism is the supposed 3rd way between Capitalism and Socialism/Communism. Instead of the State taking over firms, it merges with them to a certain extent. Firms remain in private hands, but put to State ends (War Planning, Social Welfare, and other ends).

The ideology behind it emerged from socialist thinkers, and that's why they hate it so, as it is Statism with traditionalist/nationalist trappings, vs egalitarian/universalist ones as in Communism/Socialism. This makes it a direct competitor.

Italian fascism was basically this way, with the State co-opting big businesses, who went along to gain monopoly/cartel-like privileges and escape market competition.

For the US flavor of this, there was the National Recovery Act (designed to limit competition between firms -> higher prices -> more profits -> higher wages/lower unemployment, in the wonky econ of the times) and the NLRB which was designed to co-opt Big Labor/Unions into the power structure of the State.

For the Nazi's, however, ownership of firms basically became a fig leaf, as the ruling party dictated nearly all aspects of how firms would be run. So, basically totalitarian socialism. Mises called it socialism of the Hindenburg Pattern.

Hope it helps? A bit of an academic, but I prefer clear terms, vs obfuscation.