Текст книги "Ford and Stalin. How to Live in Humaneness"
Автор книги: (IP of the USSR) Internal Predictor of the USSR
сообщить о нарушении
Текущая страница: 8 (всего у книги 32 страниц)
«One often hears that the transition to market mechanism proclaimed there (in the former USSR and Eastern Europe – A.E.) is convincing proof for the market-oriented economy being superior to the centrally planned one. I think it is a mistake... The problem lies in CONNECTING, CO-ORDINATING, COMBINING THE PRINCIPLE OF THE TWO SYSTEMS IN A SINGLE MECHANISM.[132] (put in capitals by A.A.), finding a way of combining market mechanisms and government planning and regulation».
In order to apply the last sentence of the quotation to the global economy of mankind one needs to change it the following way:
To connect, co-ordinate, combine the principles of these two systems in a common algorithms of social self-government, to find a effective method of combining market mechanisms, national and global planning and regulation to the end of providing every person with a chance of living a life a human being is worthy of (deserves).[133]
Planning of economic development is performed after interindustry proportions and links are discovered, this has been mentioned before. Because it requires to develop productive capacities in compliance with pre-set figures of final product output in each of the industries (in other words it requires having pre-defined objectives and is impossible without the process of setting targets) theoretic and practical planning and control on a planned basis at the very start face the problem of determining needs and the consequences of their satisfaction. In the course of time as one gets a richer experience one inevitable comes to an understanding that all of the needs society has must be divided into demographically grounded ones and degraded parasitic ones.
The needs, which have been discovered and included in the plan, must be divided between the two classes every time a new project plan is being drawn for the upcoming period. The way this issue is dealt with determines where the plan’s control indices come from and what they are.
Earlier we pointed out that the many-sided issue of defining targets in its most aspects lies outside the mechanism of market self-regulation. Yet for same reasons it lies outside the methodology of mathematic modeling and plan optimization, as well as outside the methodology of implementing plans of economic and social development.
One and the same methods (algorithms) of making and optimizing plans, as well as identical control structures and procedures in certain cases can be used for achieving mutually exclusive objectives included in different plans. This is what those prejudiced against planned economy should be aware of.
Yet the problem formulated by S. Okito can be solved if the issue of dividing demographically grounded and degraded parasitic needs is solved. Let us remind you how this problem has been worded: to find and effective way of combining market mechanisms and state planning and regulation in a common algorithms of social self-control. This is so because if the contrary plan is pursued the system of plan-based control will face sabotage at best and at worst – deliberate counter-action.
The point is that generally controlling the multiindustrial production and consumption system on the basis of a plan involves the following: defining targets; distributing investments between industries and regions in compliance with the targets, as well as timing their provision and volume; addressed directive control of state-owned enterprises; working out and granting government contracts to private enterprises, defining policy on taxes, credits, insurance and subsidies connected with government contracts, implementing this policy while fulfilling the plan, etc.
If these heterogeneous means turn out to be in the hands of people, who advocate different conceptions of social order and economy and act at will, according to their moral principles the problem posed by S. Okito would become insoluble.
We must make special emphasis on the need to work out a policy on subsidies, credit and insurance for every planning period. Tariffs on service provided by the so-called «natural monopolies», other rates and prices (including loan interest rate) and rental payments are the basis of price-formation that sets the minimal costs of manufacture for products of all industries. The theory of similarity of production and consumption systems[134] unites those rates and prices in a group called «price list basis». All the other market prices are formed more or less freely by means of balancing active solvent demand and supply if the multiindustrial production and consumption system functions steadily.
Every price has a share which corresponds to tax payments and return of loans and insurance credit. Besides some producers are subsidized because otherwise production would be devastatingly unprofitable or it would be impossible to retain its volume. All these payments that are reflected in price along with the «price list basis» and subsidies to consumers of certain products form a sort of «financial press» which could enable one (if one knows how to adjust it properly) to force the market mechanism of production and consumption system’s self-regulation to give out (deliver) the desired range of production and consumption of final products.
At the same time one should also know that all parameters, which determine the adjustment of «financial press» on delivering a definite range of production, are expressed in equations of interindustry balance. They are heterogeneous items of those equations expressed in value terms and form the price of any products taken into account in the interindustry balance.
If the planned range of production and consumption of products is grounded on demography and includes the products necessary for implementing the state policy different plan targets are defined for every planning period, different both in planned nomenclature and production and consumption volume.
In this connection one should keep in mind that when the society’s nominal paying capacity is always limited and no emission[135] occurs a broader range of consumers can be reached only through expanding production which leads to decline in prices as otherwise sales would be hampered by an unacceptable price.[136]
Within the integrity of the multiindustrial production and consumption system prices function as a means of limiting the consumers’ number after a certain level of production and supply on specialized markets has been attained. Therefore if production volume is sufficient for satisfying the needs of all people then there is no need in price as a means to limit consumption. Price can then be equal to zero if it is not impeded by other factors. In other words when demographically grounded needs are fully and assuredly satisfied – the perspective is zero price.[137]
While such ideal operation of the multiindustrial production and consumption system is being attained prices on some socially necessary products may fall below the level which production is profitable at. This happens because production covers the vital needs of society more fully. In his case it may be feasible (in the long-term historic perspective) to retain the socially necessary volume of production by means of grants and subsidies that are collected from other industries in tax form. This means that profitability factors are redistributed between enterprises, industries and regions.
It follows that in regard to the systemic integrity of multiindustrial production directed towards satisfying the vital needs of all laborers more and more fully the overall profitability of the system taken at historically long time intervals is more important than high profitability of some enterprises when other industries are hampered in their development due to the law of value’s being unchecked. The law of value is far from operating in compliance with a list of demographically grounded needs given in order of priority.[138]
Making this system profitable at historically long time intervals requires every short-term plan to be made up as a stage included into a long-term succession of plans (or one cannot be sure of the plan’s practical consistency). Developing a succession of practically consistent plans is possible only if the system of planning is aimed at the demographically grounded range of needs and operates within the bounds of a demographic policy that is in concord with the biosphere.
It follows from the two above-mentioned circumstances[139] that the tax policy, policy on subsidies, policy on credit and insurance must be worked out and coordinated for every planning period. They should be directed towards forcing the market mechanism by means of the «financial press» to deliver the planned range of production and consumption under the changing circumstances which the production system operates in.
Consumption is to be included into the plan because free price-formation in a society where inhuman psychic types are dominant is such that even if the necessary production level for the socially necessary products is attained their consumption could be blocked. Blocking can be caused by prices that needs to be high for production to be profitable or by the paying capacity being redistributed between the specialized markets, as well as by deliberately buying products up and destroying them to the end of speculating on the rise in prices.
This approach of organizing production and consumption involves applying the theory of control[140] and suggests that production and consumption of products within the demographically grounded range is the «useful signal» of the multiindustrial production and consumption system. On the contrary, production and consumption within the degraded parasitic range is «internal noise» and outside interference which are present in the system but are to be suppressed and excluded by means of self-control thereby allowing for an increase in power and quality of the «useful signal».
The clue to solving the problem posed by S. Okito consists in building a workable methodology of such planning and of state control necessary to carry out those plans. Yet the problem is insoluble if demographically grounded and degraded parasitic needs are not divided and if they are not differentiated in the country’s political practice.
Besides that there is also another crucial question that has to be answered to solve the above-mentioned problem.
How should the state and the society define the notion of «plan»?
– A target set unattainably high which the multiindustrial production and consumption system must reach at the breaking point of its ability?
– A target known to be achievable which sets a level of control indices; the production and consumption system must not operate at a level lower than those indices, yet exceeding them is not only desirable, it is must be guaranteed by the freedom and creativity in science, business and management?
The second answer to the question proves to be the practically consistent one.[141]
Besides conforming to the vital needs of society, the planned range of production and consumption must be known to be achievable. Exceeding the planned values of indices when it is socially useful must be guaranteed by business and control o r ganization in all industries and regions.
–
Basically this is provides full coverage of the industrial civilization’s political economy extremely summarized. This subject must be understood at least in such general way and it should be seen in real life. But conventional sociology and economy have a custom of keeping silence on such issues as the mutually excluding nature of objectives of production and distribution of products in society, on the methodology of planning and on planned adjustment of the self-regulating market mechanism. This happens because professional clerks (economists, accountants, bank financiers, stock exchange brokers) as well as the rest of the crowd are not supposed to know that they are all controlled in a robot-like manner in a very simple way. Since early childhood their views and professional skills are being formed to suit the goals of the masters and bosses of the system but they are not consistent in practice.
We have dealt with these problems very briefly in this work but we have tackled their essence. More details are provided in the «Brief course» by the IP of the USSR. As known from experience of promoting the Conception of Social Security, many people think it unnecessary to read it and become familiar with it. We think though that it is obligatory that all supporters of the Conception of Social Security must study it because we live in a civilization where everyone is dependant on the system of production and distribution of products. Therefore no one has a moral right to speak on economic issues until he has formed at least a most general idea of the following things.
what are the interindustry balances of product and financial exchange;
how they are connected with each other;
how the processes within an industry are described by the instruments of mathematical statistics and the probability theory;
how these description of the processes within an industry are connected with the accounting system;
what the instruments of adjusting the market mechanism to self-regulating production and distribution are;
how these instruments are reflected in the interindustry balance;
how the objectives of production and distribution typical of the society are reflected in the interindustry balance;
how should the planning system be built so that it would generate a succession of planned balances corresponding to completing morally healthy objectives of production and distribution of products;
how should the policy on taxes, subsidies, credit and insurance change while the succession of planned balances is being realized so that the real indices of production and consumption would be better than the planned targets and that the chosen objectives would be completed.
And the main thing is to understand:
why should defining targets within the planning system be demographically grounded within the course of the global policy;
how are the demographically grounded and the degraded parasitic ranges of needs determined in practice;
what needs are attributed to each class today.
One must know, understand and feel this even if one is not going to make a career and take up the post of the state’s leader, prime-minister or the minister of economy. One must know this so that the «great» schemers[142] and liars could not fool people any more.
In order to make it easier to master this knowledge and to help people break free from the prejudice of pseudo-economic myths we have published “The Brief Course…”
Now on the basis of the information provided in this digression we could move on to discussing Ford’s and Stalin’s views on normal economy of society.
4.5. Planned Economy of Bolsheviks
is a Socialist Economy
Having provided a definition of the fundamental economic law of socialism at the end of Chapter 4.4 Stalin explains it further and differentiates objectives and the means of accomplishing them.
«It is said that the law of the balanced, proportionate development of the national economy is the basic economic law of socialism. That is not true. Balanced development of the national economy, and hence, economic planning, which is a more or less faithful reflection of this law, can yield nothing by themselves, if it is not known for what purpose economic development is planned, or if that purpose is not clear
As to economic planning, it can achieve positive results only if two conditions are observed: a) if it correctly reflects the requirements of the law of balanced
Yet the above-quoted extract (if divested of our explanatory comments put in
Many abide by this point of view justifying their stance by recalling the economic reality of the late «zastoi» and «perestroika» USSR. This was a time when there was shortage of most products ranging from foodstuff to furniture, housing and cars (that were yet considered to be among luxuries optional for a family household) and overstocking (glut) in some categories of products, such as an abundance of carpeting and cut-glass ware that existed at a time. Supplies of some products to the trading network experienced regular failures, among them even such basics as salt, soap, tooth-paste, sugar and sausage (which was at times available only in Moscow, Leningrad, republic capitals and closed «classified towns» («spetsgorodki»). Along with that there existed the «raspredeliteli» (distribution centers only for Soviet “elite”), where the Soviet “elite”, consisting of party, government, academic and other «nomenclature», got all the products they needed according to their individual rank no matter how poorly the public trading network was supplied. And those are just a few facts characteristic of that reality.
It could seem that this experience of life in the USSR confirms that Stalin’s statements on the fundamental economic law of socialism and its implementation on the basis of planned control of economy are most surely nothing but preposterous meaningless babble; that real life has proved that planned economy is not viable if it is to serve the interests of the majority of people.
Yet if one correlates the extract quoted from “Economic Problems of Socialism in the U.S.S.R” with Digression 6 it becomes clear beyond doubt that on the contrary the history of the post-1953 USSR including the mess the country got into in the times of «zastoi» and «perestroika» proves that Joseph Stalin gave the right definition of the economic laws of socialism yet after his assassination the strategy of social and economic development was worked out and implemented in the way that severely violated both the fundamental economic law of socialism and the law of regular and balanced development of economy.
In order to exemplify this statement we shall make another digression.
* * *
Digression 7:
The Post-Stalin USSR
was an Anti-Socialist State
As for the fundamental economic law of socialism, which defines the goals of production and distribution of products in a society, there was no strict differentiation and division between the degraded parasitic and the demographically grounded range of needs neither in the general political economy of socialism nor in the applied theories of controlling economy on a planned basis.
In the Stalin period it can be explained by solving the tasks of the country’s social and economic development on the basis of Marxism which the Russian culture accepted but had no time to comprehend in correlation with the actual life situation. The intellectual potential was spent in struggles within the party, technological and organizational aspects of restructuring national economy in the 1920s – 1930-s. Then all every effort was directed to win the Great Patriotic War (World War II as it is called in the formed USSR) and to carry out the economical restoration and re-equipment of military forces (when missiles and nuclear weapon were introduced) that followed. But after the restoration period was over and “Economic Problems of Socialism in the U.S.S.R” was published the complete failure and futility of social and economic sciences in the USSR can be explained only by the degraded parasitic morality of the scientists themselves. The more vicious in morals – the more corrupt and obliging and higher in the social hierarchy, but at the same time the more stupid and less efficient in defining and solving the problems of actual life and social development.
As a result of such indifference of science and politicians towards the two incompatible ranges of needs alcohol and tobacco products were taking the leading places in the revenues of the USSR budget. And by the mid-1980-s each rouble gained from sales of alcohol was attended by 3 – 5 roubles (in different assessment) of direct or indirect damage registerable by bookkeeping. It was caused by faults, factory accidents, absenteeism, spoilage, hooliganism and more serious crimes and results of people’s actions under the influence of alcohol. There is also damage that evades bookkeeping and includes health damage to the new generations given birth by drinking parents and cultural damage caused by absence of proper education and by genetic potential’s degrading under the influence of alcohol.
The same can be said about the production and usage of tobacco products and, especially today, of different dopes.
As a result the USSR – Russia in post-Stalin period fell, falls and in the nearest future will fall behind the requirements of time in mass solving of moral, scientific, technological and organizational problems of its development which define its international position and the attitude the local “elites” and common people of other regions of the Earth share towards it.
It’s also no use speaking about the satisfaction of people’s needs by means of development and improvement of production on the basis of high technologies. The old enterprises were working for decades without upgrading their technological base and the new ones were constructed according to projects, which provided for the use of old technologies and morally outdated equipment. Above all «dolgostroy» (long-term building) flourished caused by the violation of proportions between the planned amount of works and the productive capacity of the construction industry.
It means that in the post-Stalin period it was not only the fundamental economic law of socialism that was violated but the law of planned proportional development was systematically violated as well. In our opinion the most striking example of violating proportions resulting from falsely defined targets i.e. from violating the fundamental economic law of socialism, – are the forays of «virgin soil reclamation» and the development of the USSR Armed Forces.
The first virgin soil crop exceeded all expectations. It was reaped … and mainly rotted because the infrastructures of accommodation, storage, grain processing and transport had not been created in advance. Moreover during the first forays on the virgin soil an agrotechnics, that did not agree with the natural conditions of Kazakhstan steppe, was employed and in some regions up to half a meter of fertile soil was carried away by weathering. It will take the soils thousands or at least hundreds of years to recover from this damage.
The personal blame for this sabotage, this biosphere environmental crime lies completely on Nikita Khrushchev, the members of the Central Committee of Communist Party, the deputies of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of those years, the State Planning Committee, the corresponding departments of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR and the Lenin All-Union Academy of Agricultural Sciences.
This could have not happen if it had been done according to common sense, the fundamental economic law of socialism and the law of planned proportional development of national economy.
In this case the roads and accommodation would have been built first of all. The agricultural production would have been limited by the amount necessary to feed the new-coming population. In several years aeromechanics would have been modified to agree with natural conditions of the region. And then on this basis the problem of food self-sufficiency of the USSR would have been solved in the regular succession of generations and in constant care for the sustenance of the soils’ fertility[143].
One does not need to be a genius to work out in advance a plan for reclamation of virgin soils very much like this sequence of successive and mutually coordinated actions. It was necessary simply not to regard a plan as some sort of a record to beat, not to make much of abstract numbers in order to blow up a propaganda boom, but to concentrate on what in particular should be done, in what succession and by whom, what resources are necessary for it and what metrologically consistent indices give ground that one may proceed to the next stage of a complex plan.
Another expression of the “elite” policy of constraining population to the degraded parasitic range of needs are «khrushchevki» (standard blocks of flats built during the times of Khrushchev). Their «architecture» psychologically depresses an individual and their overcrowded conditions (or «compactness and «combined lay-out» of everything and all, if to use the slang of those times). Their small size and number of rooms destroyed the extended family. Thus the «khrushchevki» epoch caused an irretrievable damage to formation of individuals in several generations, because nothing can substitute an everyday communication of a small child with his grandparents[144].
If to dwell further on the problem of individual formation let us recollect a well-known phrase «architecture is music in stone». And in the same way as musical background (radio, audio-records) influences human psyche and activity, architectural background also has this kind of influence. In textbooks on ancient history, which everybody (in the USSR) studied by in the 1960 – 1970s, it was told how an enemy army burst into the Athens acropolis. When the warriors beheld the statue of Pallas Athena standing in front of them on the pedestal they were stunned and retreated without committing any plunder. This is an example of the influence of architecture which is if not ideal yet closer to an ideal than that of modern cities. And when we try to investigate the reasons of youth riots like the one in the center of Moscow on June 9, 2002 when Russia lost the football match to Japan it should be kept in mind that the majority of the participants of that hell-bender grew up against the «architectural» (if it can be called such) background of «khrushchevki» – «vivarium»[145].
One can often hear that «khrushchevki» caused rapid growth of housing construction, that people moved from communal flats and cellars, that the housing problem[146] in towns was being solved. But these are two different and hardly interconnected questions: the first is a question of architectural forms and styles and the second is a question of building materials, technologies and constructions. Nothing, except an anti-national neo-Trotskyite political course, prevented from applying more productive building technologies in combination with a life-asserting architectural style instead of the unnatural style of «khrushchevki» – «vivarium».
Besides, in order to raise the statistics on «housing construction» the doors in «khrushchevki» were installed not on the borders between a room and a corridor (or a kitchen and a corridor) according to the rectangular outline of rooms, but within a meter from this border towards the corridor. A passage to the kitchen through a niche in the dining room in some «khrushchevki» can be explained by the same desire to fake report statistics. This niche appeared as a result of eliminating the wall between the dining room and the corridor that led to the kitchen passing the bathroom. Because of such architectural perversions each room or a kitchen acquired up to two additional square meters, which could not be used but were included into reports on housing construction. These meters were also charged according to tariffs on usable are and were taken into account in case of an application for improvement of living conditions.
The same happened with the staircases. Lifting a piano to the fifth floor became an theme for jokes of that epoch. However the reality was that millions of elderly people could not descend those staircases and that the deceased had to be turned over in order to be carried down because the coffin could not fit into the narrow space of stair flights. It will take several generations to overcome the consequences of that period.
Besides, «khrushchevki» were tightly connected with the notorious «six hundred square meters»[147] land allotments, which were sometimes a hundred kilometers away from the town place of habitation (it deserves no other name). The result is:
