> With this new framing, we unlock a new obviously-correct-but-rarely-if-ever-examined truth: All markets are zero sum. Because the universe is zero sum. There is a fixed amount of energy in the universe. Matter cannot be created nor destroyed. All so called “positive sum” games are just zero sum ones where the loser doesn’t matter.
No. Markets are not zero sum. Human action is not zero sum. Human interaction is not zero sum.
And not even the fucking universe is zero sum. There is not a fixed amount of energy in the universe (I know it doesn't matter, but for completeness).
Average people will support the market that makes them a Customer, which they can win, and call markets where they would have bad chances “unfair”. This is why the wretched and inferior support socialism (and increasingly build bioleninist coalitions), socially awkward people with an autistic skill that can earn them a lot of money support libertarianism, and psychopaths support democracy. This is why merchants who realised that money can’t buy everything and that could not win the aristocratic status market without assimilating into the aristocracy which can take many generations supported the French Revolution and created the virus of modernity.
The monarchical-aristocratic market is the most natural one, it developed organically and its currency is virtue, the relationship between “customers” and “product” is a paternal one. It can be protected by limiting social mobility. 18th century nobles failed to find a way to do this during the Industrial Revolution because the technological and social changes were too overwhelming. This doesn’t mean that there isn’t one and that we can’t learn from history to rebuild a traditional estate society.
>Which is why government influence over the economy is so highly correlated with negative outcomes. And further why 20th century communism, despite being more explicitly knowledgeable (as opposed to implicitly wise) than all its competitors, turned into hell and killed 100 million people.
How widgets were produced and distributed had nothing to do with the killings of Communism. Hebrew hatred did.
Furthermore, Most of the dead accrued during the pre-Communism phase when the USSR went full lolbert under Lenin and Trotsky called NEP. They repeated this experiment in the 90s with similar effects. In contrast, the state-controlled era was stable and led to some modest degree of recovery and stability. So much so that ppl who lived through it are nostalgic for that period. Lived experience > western internet folk wisdom
State control of economic production is nothing more or less than the “war economy” and it led to success everywhere it was implemented and even more so when implemented in peacetime. From the USSR to s. Korea and Japan and w. Germany, etc.
Id recommend you reevaluate your lolbert priors by actually comparing theory to experienced reality. Also I like your blog, sorry to get off on the wrong foot with a disagreement. But nothing frustrates me more than Westerners who think that Communism is about sharing widgets.
> With this new framing, we unlock a new obviously-correct-but-rarely-if-ever-examined truth: All markets are zero sum. Because the universe is zero sum. There is a fixed amount of energy in the universe. Matter cannot be created nor destroyed. All so called “positive sum” games are just zero sum ones where the loser doesn’t matter.
No. Markets are not zero sum. Human action is not zero sum. Human interaction is not zero sum.
And not even the fucking universe is zero sum. There is not a fixed amount of energy in the universe (I know it doesn't matter, but for completeness).
Average people will support the market that makes them a Customer, which they can win, and call markets where they would have bad chances “unfair”. This is why the wretched and inferior support socialism (and increasingly build bioleninist coalitions), socially awkward people with an autistic skill that can earn them a lot of money support libertarianism, and psychopaths support democracy. This is why merchants who realised that money can’t buy everything and that could not win the aristocratic status market without assimilating into the aristocracy which can take many generations supported the French Revolution and created the virus of modernity.
The monarchical-aristocratic market is the most natural one, it developed organically and its currency is virtue, the relationship between “customers” and “product” is a paternal one. It can be protected by limiting social mobility. 18th century nobles failed to find a way to do this during the Industrial Revolution because the technological and social changes were too overwhelming. This doesn’t mean that there isn’t one and that we can’t learn from history to rebuild a traditional estate society.
>Which is why government influence over the economy is so highly correlated with negative outcomes. And further why 20th century communism, despite being more explicitly knowledgeable (as opposed to implicitly wise) than all its competitors, turned into hell and killed 100 million people.
How widgets were produced and distributed had nothing to do with the killings of Communism. Hebrew hatred did.
Furthermore, Most of the dead accrued during the pre-Communism phase when the USSR went full lolbert under Lenin and Trotsky called NEP. They repeated this experiment in the 90s with similar effects. In contrast, the state-controlled era was stable and led to some modest degree of recovery and stability. So much so that ppl who lived through it are nostalgic for that period. Lived experience > western internet folk wisdom
State control of economic production is nothing more or less than the “war economy” and it led to success everywhere it was implemented and even more so when implemented in peacetime. From the USSR to s. Korea and Japan and w. Germany, etc.
Id recommend you reevaluate your lolbert priors by actually comparing theory to experienced reality. Also I like your blog, sorry to get off on the wrong foot with a disagreement. But nothing frustrates me more than Westerners who think that Communism is about sharing widgets.