Cold - WAR - LIES:
The Cold WAR of the last century, as with every WAR, required villianization of the enemy. As with the villianization of our enemies in any Hot WAR, lies are told to generate hate of the enemy, to make it easy for our children to kill theirs, and to create acceptance for spending lots of money to kill the enemy combatants and civilians. For this Cold WAR, the lies were about 'opposing' economic systems.In this Cold WAR, the lies included the condemnation of the USSR's "planned economy" of socialism and the unquestioned praising of the "market economy" of capitalism. According to the lies, the two systems had nothing in common. The USSR socialist system was evil and the USA capitalist system was perfect.
All Economic Systems - Mixture of Planning and Markets:
The reality, however, is that both 20th-century socialism and capitalism are just different combinations of planning and markets. Both include markets where goods are exchanged for money. Both market economies include planning but by different small minorities.
The USSR market-planning minority were the leaders of the Communist Party, who also controlled the government until the collapse of the USSR in 1989. In the USA, the market-planning minority were the leaders of large corporations, who, starting in 1971, have been seeking both to end our democratic government and to protect their growing greed into perpetuity.
What is also common between the two economic systems is the money created by the governments to grease the planned market place. The difference between USSR and USA was the minority who controlled the supply of money. The Communist Party manage the money in the USSR. In the USA it is The Fed, but corporate bankers have had excessive, and sometimes direct, influence over the Fed.
In summary, the USSR put a minority of Communist Party leaders in charge of their economy and it totally collapsed in less than 100 years. On the other hand, USA left the economy mostly in the hands of a minority of corporate leaders and their elected lackeys. But the USA system still fails every seven years on average. In addition, few USA government leaders, since FDR, have done much to manage the economy through fiscal, government, planning - legislation. Government planning, with the help of bankers, was mostly shifted to monetary planning through interest rates and monetary easing for corporations and billionaires.
A Third Planned Market Economy:
In addition to the authoritarian economic systems of the USSR and USA, there is a third authoritarian system being used in China. Its 21st-century economy has been the fastest growing for decades. It is also a combination of minority control by both Communist Party and corporate leadership. But recently, even the Chinese economy is starting to slow some from authoritarian market planning and globally integrated economies.
Corporate Oligarch Abusive Pricing Power:
Included in two of these three national minority-controlled authoritarian planned market economic systems, are today's few international consolidated industries. This minority of corporatists, who manage these authoritarian oligopolies, have nurtured a significant planning tool - pricing power. With this power tool, they decided to make up for profits lost during the recent recession and from the economic impacts of a pandemic. They have driven inflation for workers through the roof. (Note: Most of the free money the Fed pumped into the USA economy has been used by the corporate leaders to inflate the stock market through stock buybacks.)
This market planning and pricing power by a minority of either communists or corporatists is abusive to the workers living within these and other nations. This is especially true when these authoritarian economic systems crash due to greedy authoritarian leadership decisions. These minority-controlled systems have steadily increased economic inequality, which accelerates during market crashes.
Stopping Economic Abuse:
There is another, more democratic economic system, that would both disempower the minority corporatists and minimize the need for governmental (democratic or communist) intervention.
My thanks to Professor Richard Wolff of Democracy at Work. Watch his video for more details on how planning and markets are used by different authoritarian minorities and replacing them with a democratic economic system:
Economic Update: Capitalism vs Socialism is NOT Markets vs Planning
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