Lots of Broken Eggs, But No Omelet

by Don Boudreaux on November 9, 2009

in Complexity & Emergence, History, Video

Here are two excellent videos for your November 9th celebration of communism’s collapse.

The first is from the always-excellent reason.tv.

The second is of Hayek discussing socialism.

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{ 8 comments }

Anonymous November 9, 2009 at 6:39 pm

Oh, there was an omelet, just not a very good one. To steal from one of my history professors when I was an undergrad, it isn’t as if the Communists produced nothing, they produced a lot. But what they produced came at a very, very steep price.

Anonymous November 9, 2009 at 6:57 pm

The Soviet Union was very good at producing lots of tanks, missiles, bombs and very bad cars.

Masterpiece of Soviet auto engineering:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zaporozhets

Like the Volkswagen Beetle or East Germany’s Trabant, Soviet Zaporozhets was destined to become a “people’s car”. It was the cheapest Soviet car and so the most affordable to common people. At the same time, it was rather sturdy and well suitable to Soviet roads.

Anonymous November 9, 2009 at 7:07 pm

The thing about the Beetle is that few were ever made under the Nazi regime; the Nazis spent gobs of resources building nice roads and very few people traveled on them.

Anonymous November 9, 2009 at 8:36 pm

Yes, the Soviets produced plenty of tanks. Half of them didn’t work, but never mind.

The Soviets could never sell finished goods and resorted to selling commodities like wheat and oil in exchange for necessary hard currency. The quality of goods produced were just always substandard. A large number of economists who have studied the Soviet economy have concluded that finished goods produced in the Soviet Union were worth less than the inputs used to make them.

We were great at producing things. It’s just that the thing we were really great at producing is wealth destruction and rivers of blood.

Now, we have American sociofascists who believe that as long as we destroy wealth without the obvious rivers of blood (opting instead for harder to detect underground streams), it is hyperbole to call them socialists or fascists.

Anonymous November 9, 2009 at 9:21 pm

But comrade, it’s the THOUGHT that counts! For the greater glory of mother Russia!

Anonymous November 9, 2009 at 9:31 pm

You need to update your slogan for the 21st century – that’s for the greater glory of Mother Pelosi and the tanks are paper mache cars that run on hope and change.

Chris Meisenzahl November 9, 2009 at 8:08 pm

Outstanding, thank you.

SaulOhio November 10, 2009 at 11:05 am

More importantly, people aren’t eggs.

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