RE: The New Panglossianism: Profit Motive Leads to the "Best of All Poss

Randy Groves wrote:

 

"Markets are quite good at pricing goods. If one central authority has
to price all the goods to be sold they will find themselves overwhelmed by the
task. The same goes for production decisions. How in the world do we decide how
many size 10, brown wing-tip shoes to produce and then how much do we charge for
them? Ok, now how many size 9's? And now keep going until you cover all the
goods sold."

 

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Am I the only one on WSN that thinks this is a little bit oversimplified? What about the overcapacity of auto production in the world, thanks to "free competition" which will result in destabilizing layoffs throughout the industrial world in the future?  

...cut...

 

 Alan Spector

No, you're not alone Alan.  Free market anarchy is the horror of capitalism allowing commodities (including labor-power) to dominate and structure social relations, in particular, workers who compete in world labor markets. 

 

And we don't necessarily need "central planners."    Minimum wages that are humanely set, organized/unionized workers who raise wages to levels approaching that of the "owners," rights to democratic decision making in the work place, and global price and pollution controls, etc. could allow people rather than commodities and capitalists to control market relations, but only if done on a world-systemic scale.   Call this what you will:  it simply boils down to extending democracy to the economy and globally.