State Socialism is Inevitable
- Thread starter sufi
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sufi
lala
squeak squeak
sus
Moderator
I agree that public subsidy appears to ratchet with wealth and increasing democratization. (In part because violence against citizens, as a means of suppressing or discouraging uprising, becomes increasingly distasteful politically when citizens are fully enfranchised with the vote.) As the productive classes get richer, it will no doubt become increasingly appealing to buy social stability by providing for the unproductive class.
The devil, of course, lies in timing.
I am unfortunately a bit pessimistic about whether we can pay down unrest by subsidizing living costs. The reason for this pessimism being the possibility that absolute impoverishment matters much less than relative impoverishment, in driving unrest.
The devil, of course, lies in timing.
I am unfortunately a bit pessimistic about whether we can pay down unrest by subsidizing living costs. The reason for this pessimism being the possibility that absolute impoverishment matters much less than relative impoverishment, in driving unrest.
sus
Moderator
Whether or not markets will be replaced by centralized planning is a separate story. But it seems like improvements in artificial intelligence will help solve the primary problem with centralization, which is that markets are more "intelligent" and efficient insofar as they enlist the distributed, skin-in-the-game intelligence of individual participants. State-run economies, on the other hand, not only operate with an extreme information deficit—they also run smack-dab into deep, intractable bureaucratic/managerial issues (perverse and misaligned incentives, surrogation and reportage lossiness, everyday corruption).
Having a computer (or more realistically, many computers) run an economy comes with its own slough of difficult design problems, not least of which is a hard alignment problem. Moreover, these computers would have to handle their own data collection and tagging—otherwise all the aforementioned reporting/management issues rear their head again. This is not possible given current AI paradigms—there would have to be a serious shift in how we build and train the technology. Not impossible, but not happening til the next century I'd bet. At this point, centralized economies could become tenable.
Having a computer (or more realistically, many computers) run an economy comes with its own slough of difficult design problems, not least of which is a hard alignment problem. Moreover, these computers would have to handle their own data collection and tagging—otherwise all the aforementioned reporting/management issues rear their head again. This is not possible given current AI paradigms—there would have to be a serious shift in how we build and train the technology. Not impossible, but not happening til the next century I'd bet. At this point, centralized economies could become tenable.
sus
Moderator
I agree that COVID may have sped certain processes up, but I also think the Op tweets are myopic—historically in the States, we've had several periods of increased state support/subsidy, and they are typically followed by reactionary budget cuts and privatization. History may have a general, long-run trend, but at the timescale of individual lives, it looks more like a rollercoaster. It's totally plausible that the 2020s or 2030s look more like the Reagan-Thatcher years, economically, than they look like the Nordic nations.
sufi
lala
while the rich squirrel away their assets in their dens, and politicans and the markets wrestle over a smaller and smaller measure of control
technocracy doesnt necessarily mean centralising or computerising, states will need to socialise in order to survive
were you like the girl who broke down in my class due to being so scared of a needle? man, the right have really gone downhill.
hmg
Victory lap
I regularly give blood so I'm not bothered by needles, or any other type of inconsequential prick.
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Murphy
cat malogen
Do you think the NHS can be improved? If it’s yes but the political will isn’t there due to competing vested interest groups, we could put an answer forward such as
Mr. Tea
Let's Talk About Ceps
He's right, you know. I should have listened to him, but I went and got the clot-shot! Now my legs have just fallen off. Again!
sufi
lala
Maybe maybe not but the standard is set and the hyperconnected humans have reasonable expectations that healthcare should be decent quality and affordable or free of charge one way or another
Good. at least we can rely on you to not have turned into a 4channer.
vimothy
yurp
having said that, I read an interesting interview the other day https://themarket.ch/interview/russ...boom-ld.7606?mktcid=smsh&mktcval=Twitter&s=09
Clinamenic
Binary & Tweed
I’m starting to flirt with Georgism myself.
vimothy
yurp
Napier is saying that debt levels are so out of control that they require some kind of quasi socialism - "financial repression" - in order to get them in check, that govts will actively manage credit extension and allocation in order to mitigate crisis effects, causing inflation, which will dial back debt levels. which is certainly plausible.