Thanks.

has had an industrial policy of their own since 1980s geared towards plutocrats and what works to make them better off and keeping unions and people weaker.

Ask people from a country that literally spends close to a trillion per year on total war costs.

Calling it a defense budget does not change reality.

From their crazy theory of where wealth comes from to glossing over the Socialist Dream. The government control of industry and businesses.

Good luck getting even a majority of the Democratic left to support this nonstarter. Holding up our WWII economic policy as a goal. The government totally controlled the economy and was at the breaking point when they relented. And the whole bring back manufacturing to the US. What does that remind you of? Our poor working class whites?

Loved the way the glossed over all the serious economic research to justify their premise.

If Democrats support this pants load we will have decades more of republican control.

When serious Democratic Socialist claim that title, I give them the respect of believing them. This lays out their dream and is economic fiction and a huge electoral loser.

with everything in the green new deal but insects are going extinct. So we should be discussing what our plan is. US oil policy is probably Russian-Saudi corrupted. That should be rethought. So too buying goods from overseas so much. I am for free trade but there are ways to rethink that too. Retailers are going bankrupt as people are online tweeting or netfixing rather than shopping as a pastime. And if they do shop it comes to their home. We need a discussion in Dem circles.

First they set up a crazy, not scientific idea of how wealth is created.

Hell, the comment that Economics is not a science but a system is so much bullshit out of the 60’s, both 1860 Europe and 1960’s here, that it is a parity of itself. Even Keyensian economist, who I agree with would be frightened by the statement.

The whole thing reminds me of reading Soviet 5 year plans of how the government is going to create all this wealth and prosperity.

I dont know if it is true, but the article says AOC supports worker collectives? Please tell me this is false! Please! Cause that is off the rails.

But I have always given people who call themselves Socialist the benefit of the doubt.

Is this article is accurate, they are calling for the government to take over and direct industry and business to do what they want. Which very few democrats support because it is socialist bullshit.

Most here are Social Democrats. We want to use to government to regulate capitalism to insure that people with no capital are not left behind.

If this article is accurate, and I am only responding to the article I just read, Democrats should abandon this for the fallacy it is.

it is based on supply shocks to the aggregate supply curve in 1984 or 85. There was a graph and equations I believed it for years. It was bullshit. I have also heard from business people that economics is like autopilot. It works for things that are predictable to keep the economy airborn. Autopilot is based on science. It is true that economics is becoming more scientific but it is also full of GOP propaganda. So to say it is a social science as it is practised and taught today in the US is true too. The gop don't share all the information they have with us, with the public, for the greater good. How else do you explain the lack of keynesian spending after 2010. Or that John McCain was flipped into believing he didn't understand economics as he won the nomination race for 2008, so he toed the GOP line on the economy. So economics is badly practised by the right, to their benefit, to the point it is a social science. It is a human construct that benefits the wealthy politically in the US, as they practice it. Of course it is a war on the little guy. A war of keeping the important information on economics, and things like psychology, to themselves and their benefit.

Even in the 80’s in a southern university I was taught Keyensian Economics. But that did not call for government control of industry and business.

It was focused on monetary policy.

so many schools should point out that economics is less of a science the way some practice it. We learnt the port of entry theory too which was Marxist. Anyhow. If people are against major parts it is good to discuss it. And good that the discussion is happening two years before the election.

Socialism has one agreed upon meaning. Government(collective) ownership or control of the means of production.

I, like all democrats want an active government insuring all members of society are taken care of. Like in many Western European countries. Which are not, by any means socialist. But prosperous capitalist nations with strong social democratic policies.

Social democracy is not at all the same as Socialism. To believe such is buying right wing propaganda.

The article in question exposes something much closer to socialism than even most left leaning democratic voters favor. Perhaps that is why so many people exposing them wear the Democratic Party label so lightly.

Maybe go back and read it again and also the PDF posted up-thread --

https://ocasio-cortez.house.gov/sites/ocasio-cortez.house.gov/files/Resolution%20on%20a%20Green%20New%20Deal.pdf

It proposed the government deciding industrial policies. Economics be damned.

I’ve read this stuff before. It’s not new. It’s what socialist want. The government directly controlling industry to meet their goal. Been pushed for over 150 years.

Once I read their fictional idea of what creates wealth and the whole manufacturing job retention BS I knew enough. But I read the whole thing. When your premise is that government investment and direction is the cause of wealth you are lost at sea.

I remember when Honda’s started showing up here. Small cars. Extremely reliable, and great mileage. People laughed at first. Then they became a threat. And some wanted imported cars banned. Give the government the kind of power this article talks about and my 78 Grenada would be the car we would be driving today. Because imported cars costs American jobs.

This is nothing new.

Government controlled economies create poverty. I want a Social Democratic government like I see when I visit Germany or France. Capitalist countries that use the wealth of capitalism to insure those without capital enjoy the benefits of a rich nation. And there is no richer nations than ours.

in creating jobs, fail at times. That is where a rethinking of everything comes in.

People will buy what they want.

But that does not mean government cannot set limits on what is available. Car manufacturers have to meet a fuel economy standard for their fleet. If I want a big truck, I can have it, but it will have an increased price. That is how government can effect the market.

And the labor market is the most in need of government intervention. Any American working a full time job should not live in poverty.

But that is not socialism. It social democracy setting limits on capitalism.

Last edited Thu Feb 21, 2019, 03:17 AM - Edit history (1)

of the economy. Healthcare is a market failure. So someone invented something called insurance which gets healthy people to share in paying for the sick with insurance premiums. The US healthcare system with private insurance then failed by having too many people who could not afford to be insured resulting in bankruptcies and 45,000 deaths a year. So Obama care came into play. That is what I mean by market failure and government involvement in the market. Now Trump has chipped away at it while the people have been informed that single payer results in even better outcomes for keeping costs down and covering all, both values efficiency and equity are better in a single payer plan, so hopefully Obama care will give way to something better. So too the market fails in r&d and secrecy so the government does some of that. Like inventing the internet which was government defence and is now private industry. Or running NASA. Now the market can handle r&d on putting satellites into orbit so that is often done through private industry now and things are more efficient in private satellite launching. Again you have values of equity and values of efficiency. The market will meet those values or not. If it doesn't, you have market failure. Different parties have different values. When the markets work - great privatize. When they don't regulate.

Here is something that summarizes the types of market failure.

https://www.economicsonline.co.uk/Market_failures/Types_of_market_failure.html

Types of market failure:

A market failure is a situation where free markets fail to allocate resources efficiently. Economists identify the following cases of market failure:

Productive and allocative inefficiency

Markets may fail to  produce and allocate scarce resources in the most efficient way.

Monopoly power

Markets may fail to control the abuses of monopoly power.

Missing markets

Markets may fail to form, resulting in a failure to meet a need or want, such as the need for public goods, such as defence, street lighting, and highways.

Incomplete markets

Markets may fail to produce enough merit goods, such as education and healthcare.

De-merit goods

Markets may also fail to control the manufacture and sale of goods like cigarettes and alcohol, which have less merit than consumers perceive.

Negative externalities

Consumers and producers may fail to take into account the effects of their actions on third-parties, such as car drivers, who may fail to take into account the traffic congestion they create for others. Third-parties are individuals, organisations, or communities indirectly benefiting or suffering as a result of the actions of consumers and producers attempting to pursue their own self interest.

Property rights

Markets work most effectively when consumers and producers are granted the right to own property, but in many cases property rights cannot easily be allocated to certain resources. Failure to assign property rights may limit the ability of markets to form.

Information failure

Markets may not provide enough information because, during a market transaction, it may not be in the interests of one party to provide full information to the other party.

Unstable markets

Sometimes markets become highly unstable, and a stable equilibrium may not be established, such as with certain agricultural markets, foreign exchange, and credit markets. Such volatility may require intervention.

Inequality

Markets may also fail to limit the size of the gap between income earners, the so-called income gap. Market transactions reward consumers and producers with incomes and profits, but these rewards may be concentrated in the hands of a few.

Neither the article nor the House Resolution propose "government directly controlling industry", nor "[g]overnment controlled economies".

The Resolution proposes goals and projects related to the climate crisis, wage stagnation and other economic ailments, pollution and social ills. Toward those goals and projects, it proposes the Federal government invest in infrastructure and industry, and review, revise or make new policies and regulations.

The goals are lofty, but there's nothing wrong with that. I don't see how public investing in renewable energy manufacturing is any more socialism than all the public investing we've done in fossil fuel industries.