What Happens to a Capitalist in a Communist Economy?

Don't be silly, there are none.

I was once asked this question: “What happens to a capitalist in a communist economy?”

I laughed when I answered, “Well, when they begin to succeed and prosper, the communists jail them or just kill them.”

This morning, I thought about the converse of that question: “What happens to a communist in a capitalist country?”

Well, the answer to that is that they apparently get elected to Congress or become mayors of one of America’s major cities.

The existence of Zohran Mamdani and Brian Johnson proves that Marxism can exist inside a capitalist system, but a capitalist cannot exist inside a communist system.

When I was thinking about The Zohran’s promised policies of giving everything to everybody, the only way to do that – even in the short term – is to confiscate everything as sort of a universal wealth tax.

Then I thought about something Uncle Marxie said:

“The Communists disdain to conceal their views and aims. They openly declare that their ends can be attained only by the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions.

Let the ruling classes tremble at a communist revolution. The proletarians have nothing to lose but their chains. They have a world to win.

Working Men of All Countries, Unite!”

About a decade ago, Tom Edsall of the NY Times agreed with the French economist Thomas Piketty that there is only one way to cure the world’s problems.

Institute a global confiscatory wealth tax.

I don’t agree with Edsall’s conclusions because a global “wealth tax” will do nothing to reduce supposed inequality. I find it interesting that we see another “progressive” paradox, that being the admission that progressive policies can’t stop inequality – when those policies are to tax and redistribute – and yet the solution that Edsall and Piketty propose is to tax and redistribute – just with more vigor.

Like every communist in history, these two believe that the reason that this economic system and the ideology that supports it has failed did so not because they are bad ideas, they have failed because they just never have been done right. We are perpetually challenged to believe that they will get it right this time.

Capitalism spurs rapid economic and technological development. Capitalist economies can adapt and change with a degree of rapidity that collectivist, centrally planned economies can’t. With price as the signal, capitalism adjusts supply and demand with each transaction and even more importantly, signals the market what innovations are desired.

In a capitalist economy, individuals can choose at what speed and difficulty they wish to move. In capitalism, the economy is driven by innovation, desire and achievement and the underclass is temporary and volatile (it changes in number and demographics). To rise out of the underclass, the individual has the responsibility to keep up with the pace of development through improving his education, his drive and his ambition.

The central planning of collectivism slows response time to market changes – this is as true when comparing national economies to other national economies as it is comparing the performance of individual to individual. There is perhaps no better example of this than the statement printed on Apple’s iPhone and iPad boxes: “Designed by Apple in California. Assembled in China.”

Capitalist economies innovate. Collectivist economies stagnate.

Forget global wealth taxes and redistribution. If we want true progress, abolish collectivist governments and communist economies. Change the current roles of centrally planned government to the simple protection of the conditions that allow opportunities to be created. It isn’t wealth inequality that is the problem, it is the lack of the ability of individuals and economies to respond to market changes fast enough.

Trust the market. We need more free markets – more capitalism, not less.

Capitalism is the only system with a fast enough clock speed to adapt.

Collectivism and central planning are like using an IBM XT computer with an 8086 processor from 1982 running at 16 megahertz when the world is running AI on the Frontier supercomputer which has a total of 8,730,112 cores and scores 1.1 EFLOPS (or exaflops) on benchmark tests.

If we don’t want to see such a crippling mismatch created in skills, abilities and economic standing created by the inability to keep up that we create the future world of H.G. Wells’ Morlocks and Eloi, we need to stop blocking individual enlightenment and progress.