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Comment by asciilifeform | Hacker News Reader

Then he bought two old Soviet dairy farms.

This sentence is the key to understanding why many Russians feel little or no sympathy for "victims" like him.

Soviet dairy farms once belonged to the Soviet people - in much the same way that, say, the Washington Monument, the US National Parks, or the US Army belong to the people of the United States. How would you feel if the most hardened violent criminals came to power in the US, and arranged to have these properties turned over to private owners, to run for their benefit (or to pillage and destroy, as was the fate of most Soviet industry) ?

One can debate the practical merits of planned economies all day long but this does not change the fact that privatization is theft. The former owners of Soviet facilities - the Soviet people - were not adequately compensated for their loss. It is highly doubtful that fair compensation for the privatization of public property is possible even in principle. Do you dole out homeopathic-sized shares of stock? (Criminals buy them back for pennies-on-the-dollar from the masses in lean times - or at gunpoint...) What do you issue to the not-yet-born citizens who will no longer be heir to the means of production? (Answer in practice: zilch.)

Privatization is "what's mine is mine and what's yours is mine" writ large, plain and simple.

Russians who are not in some way aligned with the thieves' guild which has been running that country since the Soviet collapse by and large quietly recognize this fact. This is why sympathy and political support for the so-called "entrepreneurs" is and will continue to be thin.

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"this does not change the fact that privatization is theft. The former owners of Soviet facilities - the Soviet people - were not adequately compensated for their loss."

There's also the original theft that enabled the existence of the Soviet state -- the theft of land and wealth from the former land holding class starting in 1917. The collectives were created from their lands, and they received no compensation -- in fact in many cases they were persecuted and murdered. Some excuse this breach of property rights by saying that the aristocracy was corrupt, evil, etc., just like today's elites are. It's only the communes and collectives who were "good" and whose property rights should be respected.

Should everyone be equal economically regardless of merit? The guy who does nothing all day long, and the guy who works hard to build a successful dairy firm -- they all should receive the same salary? It is this type of economic thinking that ruined the USSR - when there's no reward for doing good work, then there's no reason to do good work. Why should I work hard when I can rest and get my guaranteed salary?

EDIT: Please attack the arguments not the messenger. I've edited my comment to do the same.

you seem to believe that everyone should be equal economically regardless of merit.

Interesting implication. It says a fair bit about you, actually. That, like most people on this site, you place every person whose thoughts you read into one of a small number of mental "boxes." I, for instance, am apparently a "Looter" from Ayn Rand's novels.

Not everyone is a character from a morality play. Please try to remember this. Not everyone is an uncritical defender or mindless opponent of this or that fashionable doctrine.

the guy who works hard to build a successful dairy firm

How about the guy who works others hard to build a successful dairy firm? And his grand-children? What should they receive? This is the real issue regarding the aristocrats of any nation.

According to some, the USSR began to perish (through widespread cynicism of its own foundational myths) when it finally built a fresh aristocracy of inherited privilege - the Brezhnevian "nomenclature."

"That, like most people on this site, you place every person whose thoughts you read into one of a small number of mental "boxes." I, for instance, am apparently a "Looter" from Ayn Rand's novels."

Notice how you placed all the people on HN in a single mental box.

In the interest of fairness, can you tell me more about your outlook and why you believe privatization is theft?

My personality and political views won't fit into a HN comment box. And I dearly hope that yours wouldn't either.

Well then, why don't we just stick to your statement that privatization is theft. Bonus points if you can show me how your arguments do not fall in any existing ideology.

Try this example.

It is 2015, the US Federal Government is approaching true bankruptcy. The decision is made to denationalize the Yellowstone National Park. It is sold to Exxon Corp. for $300 million. They will prospect for oil there. You, one of 300 million eligible shareholders, are sent a stock certificate worth $1. You sell it for $0.50 to buy a stale loaf of bread from a local gang (your family has nothing else to eat.)

Did this story feature a theft?

Which traditional political ideology does it support?

"Did this story feature a theft?"

No. If the government had the right to sell the damn park and had done so transparently, then that was not a theft no matter how you spin your scenario.

In fact, as a person whose family is ostensibly in such bad straits that they would undersell promising stock in Exxon-Mobile by 50% for food I'm probably not all that interested in whether Yellowstone national park remains open.

The problem with how you look at it is that you consider transparency a possibility. It's not incompetence, it's corruption. If you believe such a deal would go through without a lot of money directly or indirectly exchanging hands behind the scenes then you're blindly idealistic.

> Did this story feature a theft?

It featured govt incompetence at a grand scale. No, not selling Yellowstone (or buying Yellowstone), but going bankrupt.

On the assumption that you think that Exxon did something wrong in your scenario, there are two cases - Exxon paid a "fair price" or it didn't.

In the "fair price" scenario, the problem is not Exxon. In fact, they're the good guys - presumably the US govt is better off making the sale, and no, Exxon has no obligation to subsidize govt incompetence.

In the "unfair price" scenario, Exxon can't buy a govt that isn't for sale.

> presumably the US govt is better off making the sale

This is a remarkably large assumption. The actually quite small group of people who together have the authority to make the sale are, presumably, better off making it (or they wouldn't). But there's no reason to think that they are even trying to maximize the benefit of "the US govt" as an institution, over time.

> In the "unfair price" scenario, Exxon can't buy a govt that isn't for sale.

So now you've defended Exxon from being the charge of thievery. Great, the government officials who made the sale were the "real" thieves, and Exxon was "only" their associate in crime.

> > presumably the US govt is better off making the sale

>This is a remarkably large assumption.

Not at all. If follows from the prerequisites for that case. If you don't agree with those prerequisites, you choose the other case.

> > In the "unfair price" scenario, Exxon can't buy a govt that isn't for sale.

> So now you've defended Exxon from being the charge of thievery.

Since they're not guilty of thievery (in this case), why are you offended by them being defended from the charge? Would you have the same reaction if it was "Happy Puppy Company"?

> Great, the government officials who made the sale were the "real" thieves,

Yes (and in more ways that one).

> and Exxon was "only" their associate in crime.

Not at all.

We're assuming that govt officials have the relevant authority. If they exercise it poorly ....

I'll assume that you think that govt "lets" Exxon do bad things. Let me point out that the fault for that is entirely govt.

To be fair, a govt that does certain things is highly likely to do bad things as well. If doing those bad things bothers you, perhaps you might want to stop govt from doing the precursors.

Not

>> > presumably the US govt is better off making the sale >>This is a remarkably large assumption. >Not at all. If follows from the prerequisites for that case. If you don't agree with those prerequisites, you choose the other case.

The good of the people, the government, and the politicians/cronies brokering the deal are all unrelated. Almost always the insiders profit, often the government (this party, not that - or this system, not that) does, but only rarely does this percolate down to the people.

>> So now you've defended Exxon from being the charge of thievery. > Since they're not guilty of thievery (in this case), why are you offended by them being defended from the charge?

They are guilty though. If I buy a TV from someone's home-care nurse, knowing the nurse doesn't have their patient's consent to sell it, I'd be a thief. Legally and more importantly, ethically.

If (the hypothetical) Exxon knew this $300M value was far below an honest evaluation or that the sale was achieved by kickbacks they'd know the public didn't actually consent, and thus they couldn't legitimately take ownership. But hypothetically they did, and it's theft.

> We're assuming that govt officials have the relevant authority. If they exercise it poorly ....

What a dumb idea that is. What precedent have you ever seen for that?

Seriously, a vote isn't a sign-off on anything a government does, it's a last-ditch effort to keep things from going really badly. Nobody I know has ever given consent to be governed, including abdicating their right to chose a better political system first. I know people who have changed their citizenship and who theoretically have agreed to the rules of their new country, but only because there were no other ways to have some say in the government that was already taxing them and claiming to act in their name.

Assuming anything, let alone something as monumental as a mandate to rule, from such minor and infrequent actions, is ridiculous.

Remember, if you buy a stolen TV it's not yours, and if you knew or should have known that it's stolen, you're a thief too. It's not just common sense, it's the law.

> They are guilty though. If I buy a TV from someone's home-care nurse, knowing the nurse doesn't have their patient's consent to sell it, I'd be a thief. Legally and more importantly, ethically.

While true, that's not the case here.

>> We're assuming that govt officials have the relevant authority. If they exercise it poorly ....

>What a dumb idea that is. What precedent have you ever seen for that?

It's almost always the case, so assuming otherwise is silly.

You're confusing "it would be bad for govt do to {something}" with "govt has no authority to do {something}".

If you don't want govt to do {bad thing}, you shouldn't give it the power to do {bad thing}, even if that authority is necessary to do {good thing}.

> Seriously, a vote isn't a sign-off on anything a government does, it's a last-ditch effort to keep things from going really badly.

Between that and not changing govt, you have consented. You may not like what you've consented to, but until you effect change, it's yours.

> If you don't want govt to do {bad thing}, you shouldn't give it the power to do {bad thing}, even if that authority is necessary to do {good thing}.

I didn't. I've never said "Yes, take this power", only "that power you've claimed, please don't use it like that".

> Between [voting] and not changing govt, you have consented.

Pft. Silence is not consent. And 'changing governments' means leaving the place I was born. That's not a valid choice.

> You're confusing "it would be bad for govt do to {something}" with "govt has no authority to do {something}".

Not at all. I'm claiming that because it'd be bad, and obviously so, that no competent person would have given them that power. And even if some people did that doesn't reasonably substitute for consent from the rest.

> [That the government has valid authority is] almost always the case, so assuming otherwise is silly.

No, that the government claims valid authority is almost always the case. That says nothing for their actual legitimacy by any objective and useful standard.

> While true [that knowingly buying stolen property is theft], that's not the case here.

Yes, it is. If something is sold without the consent of its owner, that is theft.

As long as a government claims to rule by a mandate from the people (unlike North Korea for instance) they can't very well act for people do don't consent to their rules.

That many (most? all?) governments do this simply means we haven't yet seen many (any?) legitimate governments.

I'll give you a simple and real example that happened in Bulgaria that is not bound to any ideology or theory.

In 2004 the national state-owned telecommunication incumbent company was privatized for a sum which nearly exactly matched the net annual profit in the very same year. (~120 x 10^6 Eur net profit out of ~500 x 10^6 Eur gross revenues; we're not a very big country, btw).

So the actual effective acquiring cost was nothing - zero - for the buyers. There were public voices that said this was betrayal of the nation's interest but the then ruling party, full with 30-something MBA-suites from NY/London just babbled cheerfully in corporate-speak about the "free market", the "right price", and the "right timing" in the very same pointless way so much detested here in HN when it's about examples of corporate stupidity.

A curious thing - the former chief economist of the World Bank,and Nobel prize winner, Joseph Stiglitz was a star-guest in a popular TV talk show and advised not sell at all at the moment (when was asked to comment on the matter, I happened to watch the show). He wasn't listened to, eventually.

But the MBA-boys in a way weren't stupid at all - after around short 3 years the company was resold for ~1.1 x 10^9 Eur. Nothing that much changed, neither was invested in the company that really made some real difference in the market share or company's gross revenues. The deal was formally fully observing the legal regulations - there was nothing that could be pointed out as strictly illegal.

In the political aftermath this party was voted out of the parliament into oblivion by the people. But those guys just don't seem to care anymore for the political life - they've "made" the bucks... foreign companies, investors, and top world investment bank consultancies were instrumental in the whole exercise.

No doubt for me, similar scenarios on various scale have happened throughout the whole former Soviet block of countries.

If this is theft and corruption - foreign western players milked also greatly from it (even if not the most of it).

Many similar robberies happened in other Eastern European countries. It's not as simple as X paid Y to get Z. As your example alludes, it's much more subtle than this. Closer to you scratch my back, I'll scratch your friend's of friend's of a friend's later. There are sufficiently enough layers that a normal person's this-can't-be-right sensors go off or it's simply too complicated to piece together with a reasonable amount of effort. Add a pinch of corruption in the judicial system and you got yourself a fertile ground for highway robbery. And don't think the same thing doesn't happen in the US... maybe a bit more subtle, but less and less so from what we've seen in the last few years.

How nicely said - I was literally struggling exactly with this, both as space limitation (something beyond me) and best possible achievable clarity as thoughts<->words choices (something depending only on me).

And from where did the land-owning class obtain the land appropriated from them in 1917, pray tell?

Is there an argument here? Care to expand?

Land "ownership" is (like debt) an arbitrary system enforced by threat of violence. Hunter gatherers may have been territorial, but nowhere to the extent that agricultural societies are.

From the prior inhabitants through the ancient and acceptable right of force-of-arms...

The Russian state first started with a small group of Viking princes in the area of Kiev and expanded to rule an area that used to be home to a wide variety of empires, states, kingdoms, and tribes.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_russia#Kievan_Rus.27

through the ancient and acceptable right of force-of-arms...

And that's exactly how the Communists, in turn, came to own it.

You seem to be issuing a wholesale approval of the Soviet economic system as just and moral. Are you actually serious? There's a very big difference between the Washington Monument and a dairy farm. A dairy farm is supposed to be an economic, well-administered business. You may wax poetic with Marx all you want, but history has shown conclusively that state ownership is terribly wasteful and inefficient.

Yes, there were lots of difficulties implementing privatization in Eastern Europe, and it's hard to find a perfectly fair system for it. That doesn't make it a theft. If you want an analogy think of a bankruptcy - except the whole economic system was bankrupt in those cases. Without a switch to private property all those economies would be much, much further down the economic drain right now; when instead, some of them have recovered quite nicely.

history has shown conclusively that state ownership is terribly wasteful and inefficient.

If history is teaching us anything here, it is that ownership by an absentee-lord (whether elected by Communist bureaucrats or stockholders, it matters little) is wasteful and inefficient.

And let's not forget that efficiency is a false god. An economy that leaves the masses starving or mired in lawlessness might still be "efficient" from some theoretical standpoint (efficient in feeding those who are fed, in protecting the lives of those who are in the designated protected class, etc.)

The USA is dying the death of the USSR:

http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dtxqwqr_20dc52sm

And it will be remembered in the same way, as a brutal dinosaur of an empire, run by sociopaths, riddled by economic delusions worthy of the wackiest religious cult.

Without a switch to private property all those economies would be much, much further down the economic drain

On what evidence, on whose word, should we believe this?

some of them have recovered quite nicely

Financiers, mafiosi, and their lackeys riding yachts is not a "recovery."

The US isn't a paradise, but we do have a system of law that is reasonably just and at least makes an effort to respect the rights of its citizens.

As the US has transitioned to an imperial power, some rather obvious warts have developed, but the democratic republican (lowercase is intentional) tradition persists.

Human society has shifted dramatically since industrialization, and we haven't perfected the system since then. The US and other Western nations aren't the ideal, but I think we're closer to it than the Soviets were or would have been.

True, closer, unfortunately rapidly moving away... at least from my experience.

>On what evidence, on whose word, should we believe this?

Pure capitalism is barter amongst two consenting and legitimate property owners. Trade makes us rich and allows for specialization and niche markets to exist. Forces that promote trade make us rich, forces that prevent trade make us poor.

Forces that promote trade are things like innovation and technology, capital that can be risked in order to try new things, Y-combinator and other incubator funds, savings invested for future use such as start-up companies. Things in this category are what "pure" capitalism is about. It is ideological, but reasonable as well.

Forces that prevent trade also prevent innovation, the development of technology, and ultimately our livelihood. These include tariffs, taxation, inflation, regulation, war, theft, murder, basically anything that hinders consenting adults from interacting. You can't trade if you ain't alive, or if you owe all your money to the State, or if trading is illegal.

The more you trade, the more prosperous you will become. America is declining because we don't trade, because we can't produce, because we can't invest when we're taxed thru inflation and bubbles. We invest in military and regulation which has yielded nothing but croneyism and bankers. A strong State always inflates and invests in war, it's a textbook maneuver.

"Consent" is the favorite weasel-word of market-worshippers. Pray tell, in what sense do I "consent" to turn over a large share of my income just to have a roof over my head and to put distance between my home and criminals? Consent in a bargain between vastly unequal parties (in this case, an ordinary citizen vs. a market of wealthy people peddling almost exactly the same raw deal via emergent, silent price-fixing) is not consent at all.

As for "legitimacy" - what makes your landlord the legitimate owner of his property? Fine, he paid for it. And the person he paid? Go back just a couple generations and you will find a corpse. And, not infrequently, a genocide.

The legitimacy of a political system is always a collective hallucination. This is not a moral judgment. Collective hallucinations make for fine Nash equilibria and can benefit the people involved. But sometimes they do not.

> what makes your landlord the legitimate owner of his property? .... Go back just a couple generations and you will find a corpse.

You touched off this subthread by arguing that

> Soviet dairy farms once belonged to the Soviet people [who] were not adequately compensated for their loss.

You find corpses in the past of the Soviet people's dairy farms as well. Why, then, is their ownership "legitimate" such that they should be "adequately compensated"?

So, nobody's got a valid claim. How come one guy who didn't build the farm can pay another guy who didn't build the farm and suddenly own it. Neither of them have any more claim to it than anyone else.

If you think about it you can see why private ownership of resources is ridiculous. Unless you bought my share from me, fairly, why should I recognize your ownership claim?

The only answer, of course, is the non-libertarian one: force. If you pay the biggest guy around for something he'll beat up anyone who wants a share of the payment and legitimize your claim because to prevent a run on his now-valuable right to sell everything, he has to crack down on theft.

It's a scam no matter how you slice it.

> So, nobody's got a valid claim.

Under the previous guy's reasoning, that if you go back in time far enough "you'll find a corpse" and that this makes the property claim illegitimate, this is true. It's not reasoning I agree with, but I thought it was worth pointing out that if one accepts his reasoning, it contradicts his prior point that the Soviet people deserved compensation.

> If you think about it you can see why private ownership of resources is ridiculous.

I've thought about it and I think private ownership is perfectly reasonable in most cases.

It's true that in the past, faction A took land or materials from faction B, who took them from faction C, and it's turtles all the way down. But within the context of faction A, I am the legitimate owner of certain items, and you are the legitimate owner of certain items, many of which we either created ourselves or received in exchange for other things we created. Since we have to start somewhere, "I am the present owner, and I paid for this in a legally binding manner" is as good a starting point as any. Trying to account for whether my ancestors paid for your share, or even how many shares we're entitled to based on the size of our family trees, is a waste of time.

it contradicts his prior point that the Soviet people deserved compensation.

My point was that a better concept of legitimacy would define it as flowing out of how you use the property, rather than how you came to own it. The notion of land as a resource which belongs collectively to all of mankind is not a new one, and more than one internally-consistent philosophical system includes it.

> a better concept of legitimacy would define it as flowing out of how you use the property

Why, then, do you argue that the Soviet people's loss of the property was not adequately compensated? If legitimacy is based on usage rather than how ownership occurred, why do you complain about how ownership came about? The statement that privatization is theft is a direct comment on the process of ownership transition!

One can certainly make an internally consistent philosophical system based on public or communal ownership. I just don't think you've presented one.

> But within the context of faction A, I am the legitimate owner of certain items

Yes, and within the context of A' I'm also the owner of your stuff. I see no reason except your force of arms for staying in context A, especially after how you legitimized the theft from B and C.

> Since we have to start somewhere, "I am the present owner, and I paid for this in a legally binding manner" is as good a starting point as any

We already did start somewhere, this is umpteen thefts later. I see no reason to stop before umpteen plus one.

> Trying to account for whether my ancestors paid for your share, or even how many shares we're entitled to based on the size of our family trees, is a waste of time.

Exactly, and that's why private ownership of limited resources is ridiculous. If you own that land it's by depriving someone else, if you rent it from the collective your rent compensates others for the lost opportunity cost.

All ownership comes down to force of arms. When picking someone to legitimize your claims of possession instead of picking a strongman, pick everyone.

> within the context of A' I'm also the owner of your stuff.

But I don't live in context A'. I live in context A (which I was born into). If you want to transition to A', you're going to need force of arms sufficient to overcome those of us who'll shoot back in defense of A. Good luck with that.

> this is umpteen thefts later. I see no reason to stop

Because theft is bad. I didn't participate in any of the umpteen previous thefts. I can't untangle them or reverse them, but I see no reason to add to the mess.

> if you rent it from the collective

If I use any "rivalrous" good, my use deprives someone else. Whether it's land or food, if I'm using it you're not. If that's your criteria for determining that something belongs to the collective, then I can never acquire the means by which to pay rent to the collective. Even my labor is rivalrous and therefore falls under the same objection -- if I choose to use it for one purpose, I deprive you of the ability to use my labor for another purpose. It seems to me that "use deprives someone else" is a poor choice counterargument to private ownership.

> When picking someone to legitimize your claims of possession ... pick everyone

You mean everyone you didn't kill with force of arms when trying to transition to A', right?

Why not actually include a true "everyone", by allowing people to voluntarily live under whatever system they choose? If you want to be a collectivist, go find or start a collective and donate all your stuff to it, and join with others who voluntarily agree to it. It can be done without using force of arms offensively. Whatever force of arms was used to steal in the past, leave that in the past.

> Because theft is bad.

Says the holder of a stolen TV.

> I didn't participate in any of the umpteen previous thefts.

Except to buy the stolen goods, thus making the thefts profitable. And to legitimize the thieves.

> I can't untangle them or reverse them, but I see no reason to add to the mess.

Strange, I see the TV as a reason to "add to the mess". My TV to be.

> If you want to transition to A', you're going to need force of arms sufficient to overcome those of us who'll shoot back in defense of A. Good luck with that.

Ahhh yes, legitimize the situation with force. That'll convince me of your rights.

> You mean everyone you didn't kill with force of arms when trying to transition to A', right?

I see. I'd be a dirty thief for trying to get me a piece of that stolen loot and you'd be heroic for defending it against me.

You'd shoot B and C too if they showed up and wanted their stuff back.

> If I use any "rivalrous" good, my use deprives someone else. [...] Even my labor is rivalrous and therefore falls under the same objection -- if I choose to use it for one purpose, I deprive you of the ability to use my labor for another purpose.

It could be seen that way. That's why we shoot slavers. They're insidious and dangerous.

> Whether it's land or food, if I'm using it you're not. If that's your criteria for determining that something belongs to the collective, then I can never acquire the means by which to pay rent to the collective.

No, you could use your labor. Or, if you were willing to farm the land (for instance) you could share a portion of the results.

If you picked an uncontested piece of land the 'rent' could be pretty low, just enough to ensure it could be cleaned up after you left.

> Why not actually include a true "everyone", by allowing people to voluntarily live under whatever system they choose?

The biggest factor in their decision would be if they owned a lot of resources from previous thefts. Of course they'd never be willing to give up their loot.

> It can be done without using force of arms offensively.

But why should it? I could work my whole life (in your salt mine) to afford a piece of what you lucked into, or I could "luck into it" myself...

> If you want to be a collectivist, go find or start a collective and donate all your stuff to it [...]

Or, I could donate all your stuff to it.

> Whatever force of arms was used to steal in the past, leave that in the past.

Says the guy left holding the TV...

You can't come up with anything that justifies the current distribution of stuff without justifying how we got here, and that justifies someone else coming and doing to you what you (collectively) did to others. This is how it is but it's not somehow 'right' despite having been grandfathered in.

> You can't come up with anything that justifies the current distribution of stuff

Nor do I need to.

All I need to do is justify the position that you shouldn't do more violence and engage in more theft against whatever faction I was born into just because you decided your faction has a claim (either past or future) on our stuff.

You can't change the past, regardless of how "right" or "wrong" you think it was. It doesn't matter if what people did in the past was justified; it's the past, and they're dead and gone, so leave it be. Choose to live at peace in the present.

> I see. I'd be a dirty thief for trying to get me a piece of that stolen loot and you'd be heroic for defending it against me.

You'd be a violent asshole for trying to shoot me and my family for our stuff, and I'd be heroic for protecting my family from a violent asshole. The fact that you'd also be a thief is secondary. The fact that you think your thievery is justified by your philosophy is irrelevant.

If you want to persuade me to give up my stuff voluntarily, I have no problem with that. If B and C show up and want their stuff back and simply present a compelling argument, that's great. If you or B or C want to initiate force against me, that's where I have a problem.

> If you or B or C want to initiate force against me, that's where I have a problem.

And of course, taking back their TV would be force.

> You'd be a violent asshole for trying to shoot me and my family for our stuff, and I'd be heroic for protecting my family from a violent asshole.

Exactly. Which is why I'd wait for you to leave your house for the day and break in, change the locks, and wait for you to use force on me, making me heroic.

> Choose to live at peace in the present.

I choose to live at peace in the next present. This one is all camped out.

> All I need to do is justify the position that you shouldn't do more violence and engage in more theft against whatever faction I was born into

It doesn't matter what faction you were born into, if you buy a TV that was stolen - even if before you were born, you're a thief.

You're hiding behind the defense that violence is bad (unwarranted violence is...) and as such, because taking TVs involves violence, that the TV must stay with you. That the violence in question would be directed at those enjoying already violently stolen property lessens the impact of the second round of violence, in the eyes of the observers. After it happened you'd be B, and history. Nobody would care.

> The fact that you think your thievery is justified by your philosophy is irrelevant. >> You can't come up with anything that justifies the current distribution of stuff > Nor do I need to.

If you want to enjoy the property with a good conscience, you do.

Without the secondary market in stolen TVs you represent there wouldn't have been a profit in stealing the TV originally.

Your attitude would seem less self-serving if there wasn't an almost certainty that your government is complicit in the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, at least at level where you or I would be an accomplice under law, despite these wars being fairly obviously just a resource grab, not security related as they were originally justified. (And if not these injustices, then countless others.)

In other words, the mechanisms of your day-to-day life are busily creating more Bs and Cs all the time. And yet you have the arrogance to dictate that you're the end of the line. If your definition of ownership involved who could do the most good with a resource there would be an measure with which to determine your rights, but if you simply measure ownership as possession, if I take things away from you I own them as truly as you do. I was merely pre-defending myself (A') against the thieves of A.

As you have been unable to suggest any mechanism for ownership that doesn't come down to opposing violence, and your imagined rights as a non-combatant to have the violence happen to others, I'm going to say again that you've failed to make the case for private ownership of resources.

Your conscience says that property ownership makes one complicit in all the thefts and violence that came before; mine does not. Seeing as you have no problem threatening further theft and violence, it seems "a good conscience" is out of reach for you, but I'm doing just fine.

> if you simply measure ownership as possession

I do not. I measure ownership through the legal mechanisms under which I reside; "possession" hardly plays into it. I consider it appropriate to transfer ownership through those mechanisms, and not appropriate to worry about whatever violence may have happened prior to the establishment of those mechanisms generations ago. I also consider it appropriate to use the mechanisms provided by that legal system against those who attempt to illegally take possession of others' property; breaking in to my house and changing the locks makes you subject to arrest within this legal context.

Of course, as I said before, you can try to create your own context of communal ownership through voluntary donation and persuasive means. Or you can try to change that legal context through force of arms, and deal with my side shooting back at your band of violent assholes.

> you've failed to make the case for private ownership of resources.

I'm not interested in making the case for private ownership of resources. I'm just making the case that I'm OK with the context I live in (and I'm OK with you voluntarily living in some other context), and that you'll probably get shot if you try to violently overthrow my society.

> Seeing as you have no problem threatening further theft and violence, it seems "a good conscience" is out of reach for you

Not at all. I'm just pointing out the hypocrisy of standing there holding a blood-covered TV arguing that this is exactly where the violence needs to stop.

And yet you're not actually concerned at all about ongoing thefts that enrich your context, just that which would deprive it.

> I measure ownership through the legal mechanisms under which I reside; "possession" hardly plays into it.

You do not. Those laws make knowing possession of stolen property a crime, regardless of how many steps it's been laundered through.

But yes, the government itself ignores that. You should consider what it says about the illegitimacy of a government that thinks it can bless theft.

> I consider it appropriate to transfer ownership through those mechanisms, and not appropriate to worry about whatever violence may have happened prior to the establishment of those mechanisms generations ago.

Of course not, the law says you don't have to. Don't worry, The laws in A' would say the same things.

> Or you can try to change that legal context through force of arms, and deal with my side shooting back at your band of violent assholes.

If you saw someone carrying a blood-covered obviously stolen TV you'd try to (even if only indirectly by calling the police) violently (if necessary) change his context. Why the hypocritical attitude when it comes to the idea of someone correcting your context?

> Your conscience says that property ownership makes one complicit in all the thefts and violence that came before; mine does not.

No. If that were true you wouldn't justify the theft inherent in your situation with the circular logic of the law of the latest conqueror.

> It is highly doubtful that fair compensation for the privatization of public property is possible even in principle.

What? The state-owned dairy farms had a cost, covered by the citizens, presumably in the form of taxation. And they had a product: dairy.

After privatization, tax revenue ceases to be collected for the dairy farm. People instead pay for the same products directly.

Of course the criminal and the corrupt can interfere with this, and continue to impose the tax burden or some such, but exactly what compensation is incalculable here? The farm had a value to the citizens in proportion to how much value it generated for how much cost. And it still does.

Taxation in the Western sense was not key to the Soviet economy. You are thinking using the concepts of a world where money is the main unit of exchange. The USSR was not such a world.

That country was run quite a bit like a non-profit version of a giant American corporation. Does upper management at IBM levy taxes on the Shipping Department or Human Resources?

Okay but you can at least go some way in translating my point in terms of valuations more generally. Different divisions within large corporations do have a specific amount of value, and are sometimes thought of as assets and even split off and sold. If you don't like currency you can use whatever metric of value you'd like.

I realize there are a lot of assumptions about valuation, property, and/or currency built into my criticism that you or anyone sympathetic to Soviet-style public ownership would probably reject. But that's part of the reason why I pointed it out. You have to accept a lot of IMO implausible views to claim that a publicly owned dairy farm has incomparably more value to citizens than a privately owned one.

You seem to be claiming that many Russians at least implicitly hold these views. I hope that's not true.

A publicly and privately run dairy both produce milk. That is their only similarity. The private dairy enriches only the owner, the public dairy enriches everyone.

If your only concern is buying a widget then selling your share in the widget factory doesn't seem like a bad idea - they'll keep making them. But if you're concerned about affording the widget it's a horrible idea. As soon as your cash runs out you're widget-less.

As such, and seeing as how this is pretty obvious to most everyone, privatization is theft in most people's eyes. There is no fair price when the government is selling our means of productions/resources for short-term gain. No sane person would do it, and no honest representative would do it for them.

You're implying that it's never in anyone's best interest to sell ownership in a business, when wealthy, successful, well-educated and self-interested people do that every day in every stock exchange all over the world.

Yes, but rarely for a non-earning resource, unless they're short on that specific resource elsewhere. (Such as needing Vespene for an upgrade...)

Selling your productive assets is economic death. Renting them out, or selling your share of non-renewable resources, might make sense.

A government that privatizes industry sells businesses in exchange for short term cash, and in exchange for greater long term productivity in the economy as a whole, productivity which is in turn taxed.

the private dairy enriches only the owner, the public dairy enriches everyone

That's a snappy soundbite, but the fact is in the West where we have privately-owned dairies, we don't have queues around the block for butter. Now who's enriched?

Everyone who doesn't live in a totalitarianism. If you're sent to Siberia it doesn't matter if you owned your farm.

Are you Russian? Still living in Russia?

I ask, because I don't know any Russians (or citizens of former Soviet-controlled states) who want Russia to return to the way it was, though I think everyone can agree the current state of things is still frighteningly corrupt. But, my exposure is limited. Perhaps the people I know represent an extremist bent; the kind of people who escaped to the US when doing so was extremely difficult, and sometimes dangerous. Just like not all Cubans hate Castros regime, but nearly all the ones who live in the US do.

Still living in Russia?

Moved to the USA as a child.

I highly recommend exploring outside of one's ideological echo-chamber (all of us sit inside such chambers.) You will learn many interesting things! Many of my own political bits have flipped as a result of such exploration.

>Moved to the USA as a child.

Then you have no idea what you are talking about...

So you won't read Gibbon, because he never even set foot in ancient Rome? That impostor.

Most of what any thinking person reliably knows about the world comes from the printed word.

I agree. Unfortunately you did not back any of your outrages statements with anything but you being born in USSR.

All I wanted to point out is that it is not enough.

Out of curiosity, what would be "enough"? Can you even imagine yourself being convinced of the positions I brought up? (Are we dealing with a "religious" difference of opinions here?)

And what kind of biography would the person doing the convincing need to have? (I only brought up my birthplace because someone specifically asked. I fully agree that it is irrelevant. However, there is the added caveat that much of the relevant material on the implicit question of "was the USSR irredeemably Satanic, and are its destroyers automatically saints?" - the material which collectively forms Soviet culture - will never be translated into English.)

He may not necessarily say that owning former state assets is good or evil, but that the perception of entrepreneurs has been tainted by the mafia that took over right after the Soviet collapse. So, stories like these don't evoke the empathy and outrage that are required.

This is perfect point which I agree with completely.

What I don't agree with is OP's blanket statements like 'privatization is theft'. So far the only argument to support his views were his childhood memories.

I could cite a wealth of literature describing what Soviet life was actually like for people other than dissident whiners.

But it would be a waste of time, because 1) it would persuade no one - everyone here appears to have read-only minds on the subject and 2) most of it has never and will never be translated to English.

Please, share your best sources. Russian is my native language. I lived in USSR (Central Russia and Far East, Ukraine, Georgia). My children were born in Russia. Don't mind if I take your literature with a grain of salt though.

PS: And I know for a fact that it was not possible to "get high-quality milk and cheese into peoples' stomachs without American notions of "profit"" in USSR for any reasonable period of time.

Privatization in theory is not theft, the same way communism sounds great on paper. In practice, however, when you're dealing with the level of corruption that was / is present in former communist countries, you can pretty much assume that every privatization involved theft. For somebody who lived through the process is as obvious as saying the US government is influenced by corporations.

the perception of entrepreneurs has been tainted by the mafia that took over right after the Soviet collapse

If that were all he was saying, I wouldn't be arguing with him. I think Russia is a mess right now, and a lot of it has to do with the mafia and former KGB running things. But, that's nowhere near all he's saying...that was just the tip of the iceberg.

I think it is the other way around; You have no idea what you are talking about. How can you draw that conclusion from such a premise?

Since you enjoy exploring and learning, I suggest an afternoon of reading: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Political_repression_i...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collectivization_in_the_Soviet_... (Wherein we learn how it came to be that "the people" owned the dairies that were later sold to the subject of this article.)

If we're going to play "morality via contest of body counts"... A foolish game to play, but hey, why not. Good sportsmanship and all.

So:

The history of the New World.

Had enough? Is the "winner" of the murder-Olympics still so clear to you?

How about after adjusting the slaughter-count logarithmically to account for world population growth? (You can't kill people who have never lived yet.)

I hope that we both live long enough to read post-USA texts on American history. I'm sure they will make for at least as exciting an afternoon of reading as the now dime-a-dozen works on Russian atrocities.

You went after his first link but ignored the second one on collectivization which I think is more pertinent. At least with privatization the government, which represents the interests of the people, acts within its mandate: It sells assets that belong to the people. With collectivism the government is coercing citizens to give up property against their will. If anything, collectivism is theft.

With collectivization, the government, assuming that it represents the interests of its people, is also acting within its mandate. Our difference of opinion appears to be that you believe a government which collectivizes property to be automatically illegitimate, and one which privatizes formerly collectivized property to be automatically legitimate. You define the act of nationalizing property to be one which leads to loss of legitimacy.

There are excellent reasons to believe that most Soviet citizens opposed privatization. In that case, the Western "democracies" lie through their teeth when they claim that "the will of the people was done."

I think you're misunderstanding.

The government represents the people as a whole.

If the people as a whole (i.e. the government) take something from one individual person, that could reasonably said to be theft. (It isn't necessarily theft, but it's not an unreasonable viewpoint.)

If the people as a whole (i.e. the government) sell something they own to one individual person, that cannot be theft. The nation cannot rob itself.

That's the distinction being drawn here.

If the people as a whole (i.e. the government) sell something they own to one individual person, that cannot be theft. The nation cannot rob itself.

Jesuitry.

If the US Congress sells its entire collective political power to Warren Buffett, who then becomes Fuhrer, nothing has been stolen from anyone?

Your civics is weak.

If Buffett bought the Congress, he would also need to buy the Judiciary and the Executive branches before he would have the power of a "Fuhrer".

Furthermore, the states could then revoke their consent to be governed by the Federal Government, just as they have revoked their consent to by governed by other authorities in the past (see the American Revolution, the Articles of Confederation, and the Confederate States of America).

Your civics is weak... he would also need to buy the Judiciary and the Executive branches

In practice, owning the legislature would probably suffice. There are provisions for a Congressionally-declared state of martial law.

Confederate States of America

This last one is a good guide to what will happen if a state were to "revoke its consent to be governed."

"There are provisions for a Congressionally-declared state of martial law."

Where? I've read the entire Constitution and didn't find anything of the kind. And amending the Constitution requires the approval of 3/4 of the state legislatures.

> Our difference of opinion appears to be that you believe a government which collectivizes property to be automatically illegitimate, and one which privatizes formerly collectivized property to be automatically legitimate. You define the act of nationalizing property to be one which leads to loss of legitimacy.

I'm not thinking in such absolutes. Any government must balance individual rights against society's interests. Sometimes collectivization is reasonable. However, collectivization involves coercion and therefore should be employed only in extreme cases.

On the other hand, privatization is a deal between two willing and legitimate parties, with no coercion involved. Specifically the government is entrusted by the people to manage its assets, and selling an asset is a legitimate transaction.

The problems with privatization lie with the execution rather than the idea. Many governments don't properly represent the interests of the people in such transactions, either because of incompetence or because of corruption. But with governments' conduct, incompetence and corruption seem to be the rule rather than the exception.

> There are excellent reasons to believe that most Soviet citizens opposed privatization. In that case, the Western "democracies" lie through their teeth when they claim that "the will of the people was done."

In representative democracies, what "most" citizens think about a specific government decision carries no weight. If the citizens are unhappy with the government, they can protest and they can vote to replace the government. But it is crucial that making unpopular decisions does not revoke the legitimacy of the government.

If the citizens are unhappy with the government, they can protest and they can vote to replace the government.

How much good does this do you once the government has sold off the national infrastructure (and perhaps even its own sovereign powers) to mafiosi, foreigners, and their agents?

Where can you vote for reversing the destruction of industries which took 70 years to build?

Where is the voting booth where you can go to vote against having had your popular culture murdered through vulgarization?

> How much good does this do you once the government has sold off the national infrastructure ...

It does a lot of good if you vote in a government that buys back said infrastructure. "Sold" does not equal "destroyed".

But let me address your more general point as I understand it. There is no system that will protect you from a government that makes terrible decisions that destroy the country. What is your solution? Don't allow the government to sell anything? That's like banning knives because knives can be used for murder. Or perhaps have a committee that decides what can be sold? Well the government is already such a committee.

The only "solution" I see is to decide the government owns everything, so nothing important can be sold by mistake. Well the evidence of the previous century suggests that this creates much worse problems than it solves. This system has been tried, and it failed.

Governments, and people in general, make terrible decisions. Some of them outright disastrous. The best you can hope for is a system that lets you minimize the damage. Today it seems that democracy and capitalism is the best combination we have for minimizing the pain inflicted by people upon themselves.

And sometimes they make corrupt decisions. For instance, the example given in http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2589559 seems like an obvious example of corruption. There should absolutely be recourse for actions like this on both ends of the trade rather than just kicking the old guys out and having to buy it back for almost 10x what it was sold for.

If you buy stolen property, you're pretty much screwed. If you get sweet deals from corrupt officials, you should get screwed too.

Clearly, smallpox is more evil than communism.

This is the weirdest thread I have read in a long while. Some guy gets jailed because he does not want to sell his business and you call him a thief?

And what did you make of the 1 in 3 prisoners are businessmen. Do you actually hate business per se? How are we to live if not by trading? Shall we all go back to farming and villages?

I am furthermore amazed that you are the most voted. Did you forget that the Russians were starving in 1989? Whatever public property they might have had, it did not produce. So the bottles of milk were, back then, left empty, there were cues in the line for bread.

You must have also forgotten that Russia went banckrupt. Ideology does that to you. But, you see, Russia had no money! If America goes to the point where it has no money at all, it too will sell the Washington Momentum and the public parks. They are public today, because of prosperity through trade, which allows them to afford such amenities.

Now, what do you do when you do not have food, but have assets? You sell them right? Because assets without food are of no use. Especially if these very assets are meant to create food but are not creating it. So how does, turning a bankrupt society, into what now appears to be with food on the table, amount to theft?

Oh, and have you spoken to your father? Has he told you about the public hangings? The hush hush neighbour informer, the gota go to the party rally.

We do not do things for no reason. Man needs incentives. For more than 5,000 years other system have, and probably will be tried, but they have vanished to the footnotes of history. Have you seen the great civilisations? They all were centres of trade. We are not and we shall never again be, farmers.

Now, try some philosophy. Information can be exciting, but dangerous too without some ability to absorb it by critically, practically, as well as theoretically, evaluating it.

starving in 1989

1) Some privatization and other social experiments were already underway 2) Some Americans (and hell, someone in just about every country in the world) are starving now.

have you spoken to your father? Has he told you about the public hangings? The hush hush neighbour informer, the gota go to the party rally.

I recommend reading about life in the real-life, post-Stalin USSR, as opposed to the Hollywood dystopia you are describing. You are in for some major surprises.

Have you spoken to your father? Did he tell you about midnight War on Drugs arrests, of stoolies and plea bargains, and of prisons where HIV-positive anal rape is an expected part of a sentence? What, he never mentioned those things? Are they not "as American as apple pie"?

Who is to say what the USA will be remembered for? The dead (empires or people) cannot speak, cannot defend themselves.

Have you seen the great civilisations? They all were centres of trade.

Who said anything about dispensing with trade as a whole?

I don't know, I thought that is what Russia did. I take it you have not spoken to your father then? He has lived through it. You have not. This is not Hollywood, this is not glitters and crazy drugged house flying with birds. This is real life.

I asked if you remember about the lines of bread? I have not heard of any American's starving, but this is not about a comparison. That can become distracting. Let us first learn about what Russia was.

Now, two things by Googling can be confirmed. There were bread lines. It went bankrupt.

When you have no food you sell your assets. So how did he steal? How is he the thief and not, say Stalin? Or indeed your Mr Putin.

My parents never saw an execution, never sat in a prison camp, never quaked in fear of stoolies. Their complaints about everyday life were much the same as those of any American mired in corporate bureaucracy. All bureaucracies are largely alike.

There were bread lines. It went bankrupt.

Have you wondered why? And why it happened when it did?

At this point, you (and all the rest of us in the USA) will be educated the old-fashioned way: by watching the same thing happen in person. It is very sad but appears to be unavoidable. Soon you will not need to bother opening a book to learn how a country goes bankrupt and begins to be famous only for bread lines and a foggily remembered past full of assorted atrocities.

>The dead (empires or people) cannot speak, cannot defend themselves.

Shockingly, this is false.

On the other side of the coin, there was little guaranty that most state run businesses would survive any way. Yes, some were bought up by by shady characters, dismantled and sold of by parts for profit. However, others were bought by the likes of the protagonist of the story who invested in them and made them profitable businesses. The alternative would have been for those companies to become abandoned, which means they would have been picked apart by the locals anyway.

there was little guaranty that most state run businesses would survive any way.

Why? Oh, because their immune system, that keeps parasites down (the State in question) was murdered. That's right, murdered.

The alternative would have been for those companies to become abandoned

Why?

As long as the natural resources to run the farms continue to be available (and why should they not?) and Russians still want to drink milk and eat cheese (they do), the farms would keep going happily ever after.

made them profitable businesses

It is possible to get high-quality milk and cheese into peoples' stomachs without American notions of "profit" being in the mix at all.

Is the sewer system in the town where you live profitable?

It is possible to get high-quality milk and cheese into peoples' stomachs without American notions of "profit" being in the mix at all.

The evidence of this assertion is significantly lacking. I know several Russian immigrants; who came to the US during the Soviet era. The difference in quality and quantity of food available in US supermarkets was a point of amazement for them.

Honestly, I feel like you're trying really hard to play devil's advocate rather than actually believe any of this stuff. It's just too outlandish to believe someone would try to present the USSR as a successful, functioning, state. History has already given its verdict on the USSR. It was an abysmal failure.

In fact, now that the walls preventing communication have come down, and people are able to speak freely about how things really were, we know things were worse in the USSR than we in the US ever realized at the time. People were poorer, corruption was worse, shortages of necessary goods were more widespread, the state itself was in a much more chaotic state most of the time than we ever imagined (the US feared the USSR, because of its perceived strength and unity of focus; but most of those fears turned out to be based on myth).

Is the sewer system in the town where you live profitable?

In some cities in the US (and probably Canada, as well), water/sewer is provided by a private, presumably profitable, company; private co-ops are also common. They operate under strict guidelines and regulations at both the local and federal level (for safety and to insure low-income families have access to clean water and sewer service), but it's not all that uncommon, and I'm unaware of anyone raising a fuss about privately owned utilities (power, garbage service, and communications, utilities are all frequently privately owned in the US and Canada).

What's your point?

> I'm unaware of anyone raising a fuss about privately owned utilities (power, garbage service, and communications, utilities are all frequently privately owned in the US and Canada)

That's not true at all. Net neutrality? Muni broadband plans being blocked by the likes of comcast? Infrastructure should be state owned, because duplication is a huge waste, and there can't be a normal level of competition because the start up costs.

Net neutrality?

That's a different issue. That's a question of whether privately owned communications companies should be regulated to enforce some level of fairness or equal access. I don't know any net neutrality proponents pushing for state takeover of AT&T, Comcast, etc. Is that what you're suggesting net neutrality is really about? You think it's a baby step toward state ownership of communications? And, you think that's a good idea? Government owning the means of dissent seems extremely frightening to me.

Don't conflate state ownership with state regulation.

Muni broadband plans being blocked by the likes of comcast?

Again, a different issue. One worth talking about, but not related to whether Comcast should be "collectivized". Do you honestly believe cities should take over Comcast operations within their borders? I hate Comcast as much as the next guy, but, I don't think city governments are going to do a better job than Comcast, generally speaking.

Infrastructure should be state owned, because duplication is a huge waste, and there can't be a normal level of competition because the start up costs.

Evidence seems to indicate otherwise. In areas where there is competition, prices go down, almost universally (including in industries where it leads to "waste", like power and communications). And, I think you're going to be very lonely at your meetings if you start a group pushing for the state to take over currently privately owned infrastructure. That's a pretty extreme position, and one I believe would be very hard to defend given what we know about free market economies vs. communist ones.

And, I think you're going to be very lonely at your meetings if you start a group pushing for the state to take over currently privately owned infrastructure.

I'd show up.

Nationalizing the communications hardware (the towers and cables), then having a state-owned company lease the bandwidth wholesale to private-owned cell carriers, doesn't strike me as inherently a bad idea. It is not much different in principle from roads being state owned.

By eliminating the huge capital requirement to starting a cell carrier such a model would increase competition, not decrease it. The current price gouging on text messaging would disappear overnight for example, if anyone could just resell bandwidth. There would also be secondary effects where the handset manufacturers would not be as pwned by the carriers as they are now, so we could see more innovation there too.

Now, the US Government is very incompetent in many ways, in part because the US political system is so broken, so it may in practice be a bad idea there.

Other than creating a chokepoint for government censorship of the internet, of course.

> Government owning the means of dissent seems extremely frightening to me.

And corporations, whose intrinsic and only raison d'etre is monetary profit, owning the means of dissent doesn't?

Multiple corporations and multiple local businesses and non-profits owning the means of dissent does not cause me nearly the distress that one single entity with direct motivation to stifle speech owning those means would. Nothing is perfect, because humans are flawed. But, competition helps keep the conflicting interests of large groups of people in check.

I find the notion of one point of control to be frightening, especially if that one point of control is in the hands of the people that the citizens would most need to be able to speak out against. As bad as AT&T may treat its customers, they don't have the power to imprison them or execute them; governments have that power. And, if things are bad enough from AT&T, I have options; none of those options may be great, but I do pretty much always have options, and those options are getting better as providers compete for more of the pie. FiOS and 3G/4G/WiMax have become viable broadband options in many places in the US, just in the past couple of years (I use 3G/4G Internet because I travel full-time).

There is nothing perfect in this world. But, a competitive landscape is safer for little guys like me, than one in which I have no choices.

Without a single entity, a powerful government, breathing down their neck, your multiple corporations would merge or form a cartel, because they can make more money that way.

That's debatable, but it's not an argument against having government and business and non-profits and individuals able to keep each other in check. Again, competition and having organizations with cross-purposes having to work together to peacefully co-exist seems to result in better outcomes for most people. Again, nothing is perfect. But, unchecked power is scary, and a world with only one powerful organization (whether it be government, the mafia, a corporation, or a church) would be a terrifying one (and history provides many examples).

Also note: I have, nowhere in this thread, suggested the wholesale destruction of government and replacing it with corporatism (or whatever you want to call it). I have opinions on those subjects, but I'd rather we stay on-topic.

The muni broadband issue is about towns being allowed to offer free net connections at all. As is obvious to almost anyone, only free access is worth offering because the micropayment problem means you can't collect any worthwhile payment for the service. A town could offer throttled wifi along a main street for a hundred dollars a block - an amount too small to break up among the thousands of visitors over the next years, and this tiny expense could easily pay off in tourist dollars captured, etc.

The telcos want to retain their captive market (the townspeople and tourists) and want barriers on sharing to do so. Remember, every cookie you bake and share with friends is theft-of-potential-service from a local bakery!

As for competition, no. That's clearly wrong. Everyone agrees that the waste from multiple sets of roads would be too much and the state maintains a monopoly on roads, etc - delegating this (toll roads) but never letting go of it.

Some things are natural monopolies. While maintenance of a sewer may be contracted out you don't see many parallel competing sewer systems. It'd be a waste. Heh.

As for what we know about market economies, we know we've never seen a communism that wasn't a totalitarianism from the beginning. Basing anything on a few obviously horribly twisted examples is wrong.

And lastly, don't conflate state ownership with state regulation. You may have to pay for the EM spectrum your wireless ISP uses - because it's everyone's spectrum and you are blocking it from other use, but that doesn't mean the government necessarily has any control over it beyond collecting payment.

food available in US supermarkets was a point of amazement for them.

How much will this eye-pleasing superficial variety matter once you and I can no longer afford to buy anything tastier than petroleum-based "cheese product" (if the latter is even available following petrocollapse...)

And of just how much use to you personally are the two hundred brands of toothpaste? I'd rather have access to free basic health care and free education up to the Ph.D. level, as my parents did.

History has already given its verdict on the USSR. It was an abysmal failure.

History is in the process of issuing its verdict on Anglo-American-style market economies. Don't change the channel! It will be quite exciting. And, I'm sure, quite surprising to you.

People were poorer, corruption was worse, shortages of necessary goods were more widespread...

Yeah, compare the Western nations (with centuries of experience in industrialization, the thorough "domestication" of their masses, and centuries of accumulated rewards from the plunder of militarily-weaker foreign lands) to an empire created out of agrarian savagery and thin air in just a few short decades.

its perceived strength and unity of focus... turned out to be based on myth.

All societies are based on myth.

The experience of having your own foundational myths (say, financial success as a reward for hard work or clever enterprise) shattered should prove very educational. Remember my words in the coming years.

What's your point?

That Russia and its satellites were raped and plundered, rather than "civilized" as many Westerners seem to believe. That this was the specific goal of the West since at least Napoleon. That impoverishment-via-massive-theft of a whole nation is at least as heinous an act as that of a man who picks your pocket. That it is obscene that this is even a controversial position.

Try spending more than an hour visiting every produce store in your (hypothetical) town to find a loaf of bread because they all out of stock by mid-morning, and than tell me that a well-stocked supermarket near by is of no use.

Try going to your free dentist for a filling and have their drill bit break in half while inside your tooth.

Lastly, quality of many food products available outside of major cities was not much different from "petroleum-based cheese product".

Oh, I will try. And so will you. In a few years.

Does a high-quality American (well, probably Japanese) drill bit enter your teeth if you can't pay the dentist?

And what will you eat from the (temporarily) well-stocked market shelves once your bank account is empty?

You seem to be harboring a lot of anger. What is really going on here?

You seem to be harboring a lot of complacency. What is really going on here?

What makes you think I am complacent?

What makes you think he is angry? He has a point. It is consistent. It might be false, might be true but most certainly it is partially true. He doesn't need to be angry to state his point.

By demonstrating certain naive views about soviet union, people here motivate him to try and shake their world picture in hopes that it would somehow fix itself a little.

Not that I agree to all the things he writes, but many Russians would. Many would not, but that's what pluralism is about.

I got the impression that he was angry because he kept on deflecting the conversation onto other countries. I commonly see that behaviour "in real life" from people that I would consider to be angry.

He kept comparing to other countries, but he never intended to shift the discussion focus off Russia entirely. Therefore he didn't just deflect.

There's privatization, and then there's privatization via selling businesses to gangsters.

Personally, I live in a country that went the opposite direction and nationalized formerly private corporations. I don't feel any better now that the American people own AIG and General Motors, and will celebrate the day that these firms return to private ownership.

Why? These firms needed money badly and someone stepped up to offer it. What do you care if it's a public or private fund?

Of course we'd all be better off if loser companies were allowed to fail, especially banks. Bailouts should go to cheated customers, not the cheaters.

ObTopic: Renting the resource to the gangsters wouldn't be half so bad as the outright sale. That's just ludicrous.

What do you care if it's a public or private fund?

If it's a private fund, someone else's money is wasted on buying failed companies. If it's the government, my money is wasted on buying failed companies.

Yeah, that's what I meant by simply not wanting the bailout and letting failed corps fail. I'd agree.

Though imho using a tax pool, printing more money, giving banks 0% loans, etc, are all spending public funds one way or another. And it's unfair competition for the companies who didn't abuse the system and have been struggling to make an honest profit.

> One can debate the practical merits of planned economies all day long but this does not change the fact that privatization is theft.

No, it's not. Theft is theft. Privatization is privatization.

There's been some pretty poorly implemented privatizations in history, but also some decent ones. I'm in Mongolia now, and they did an okay job of it -

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mongolian_Stock_Exchange

Still imperfect, but much better than the clusterfuck that was communism.

Seriously, everyone remotely educated in an ex-communist country hates communism. I've been to most of them - Cambodians, Chinese, Mongolians, Ukrainians, Czechs... it's only people who live in the outstandingly, legendarily prosperous West that wax poetic about the horrors of that era.

Seriously, I've seen a lot of it firsthand. I've also been to still-somewhat-communist places like Vietnam, and they operate a hell of a lot worse than their neighbors.

Anyways. Generally speaking, trying to repair a massive, systematically flawed system is hard. It's like how the tax breaks on mortgage interest screw up American housing prices, making it so high earners have more of an incentive to buy housing, thus locking younger people, lower earning people, and senior citizens out of housing, or making them pay inflated prices.

It's screwed up. It's a bad system. But unwinding it now would cause a cascading set of problems in the housing market. Thankfully, that poor system of incentives is limited to one sector of the American economy, whereas communism pretty much systematically destroys innovation, free thought, invention, and any semblance of sanity and order.

Seriously, go compare equivalent communist and non-communist countries. West Germany and East Germany, Taiwan and PRC, Cambodia/Vietnam and Thailand/Malaysia/Singapore (not perfect comprables, but close-ish). Hong Kong and PRC.

Oh yeah, and North Korea and South Korea.

Communism sucks. Unwinding a broken system is hard to do, but thank god they're trying to move past communism.

Edit: Lots of upvotes and lots of downvotes. To the people downvoting, look - Hacker News is, what, 80%+ Western Europe, USA, and Australia?

If you're sitting at your computer in San Francisco, you've never been further out of the States than Cancun, and you've gotten your worldview from some professor of Postcolonial Studies that also has never gotten outside of San Francisco, then I don't know what to tell you. Seriously, stop and reflect for a moment. Communism actually fails in real life. And I don't mean fails the way AT&T's customer service fails. I know it's not a realistic short term suggestion, but if you get the opportunity, check out Cambodia, the Killing Fields, and Security Center 21. Check out Saigon, and note that much of the infrastructure hasn't been replaced since the Fall of Saigon in 1975 (the fire hydrants are still almost all American-made - when they've occasionally failed, they're just removed and not replaced). Compare West Berlin and East Berlin for a stark contrast.

Seriously. I don't know what to tell you. Communism is really, really bad. If you're in the West and have never left the West, you don't understand and can't understand. Go through a few of these countries critically, yes on paper, but also in the real world and see how bad things were, and how much better they are in sane places with private property and rule of law. I'm not writing this for my health - if you currently are sympathetic to forced-collectivism, I'd really encourage you to look at how it's turned out historically. If you're sympathetic to communism, I'd like you to stop that, because I think it's destructive the same way that believing in religious violence is destructive.

Hear. Hear. I am very familiar with the PRC and Taiwan comparison, as a speaker and reader of Chinese (since the Cultural Revolution) who has been to both countries, and your point is quite correct that it is by no means easy to wind down a communist system. Russia had a communist dictatorship for a whole human lifetime, and less challenge from an alternative model across a border with free flow of information, so that task is especially hard in Russia.

Its not really fair to compare PRC with Taiwan, they started off on completely different footings. From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwan:

"When the KMT government fled to Taiwan it brought the entire gold reserve and the foreign currency reserve of mainland China to the island, which stabilized prices and reduced hyperinflation.[citation needed] More importantly, as part of its retreat to Taiwan, the KMT brought the intellectual and business elites from mainland China.[63] The KMT government instituted many laws and land reforms that it had never effectively enacted on mainland China. The government also implemented a policy of import-substitution, attempting to produce imported goods domestically. Much of this was made possible through US economic aid, subsidizing the higher cost of domestic production."

China in 1949 just started baby booming after the war. I'm not saying whether Communism is better or worse, but it does tend to drive away those already in positions of wealth and power.

I was born in a communist country (which ceased to be communist ~2 years later) and I downvoted you for gross generalizations and incendiary statements that have little to do with communism as an economic system. Thanks for assuming.

Normally a fan of your comments Jarek - you're a smart dude and I like reading what you have to say - but when you see an incorrect generalization, you can just point out how your experience is different rather than saying "that's wrong" without saying where or why.

As for incendiary, I don't know man. Is calling the Nazis really fucking bad incendiary? Is calling the Crusades utterly barbaric incendiary? Is calling the Genghis Khan not a nice guy incendiary?

That's the class and order of magnitude of horror we're dealing with here. So, you were 2 years old when an SSR started transitioning to a liberal democracy (or whatever the system is, I don't want to be assuming). Yes, "everyone educated" is a generalization, but it's true enough to be correct.

I do see people that are pro-Communist, but they tend to be the uneducated nationalists. They're the same kind of people that are pro-white power in the American South, neo-Nazis in Germany, and Islamic fundamentalists in the Middle East. I don't think they're actually pro-Communist in terms of the economics, so much as they're in rage and want to cling on to any cause.

That's what I've actually seen with, y'know, walking around and talking to a lot of people and doing business and socializing with a lot of people across a lot of different classes. The people who are educated don't like communism. Pretty much all of them, from taxi drivers to entrepreneurs to professors to writers to journalists to construction workers to... everyone.

But again, I've liked your comments so you're welcome to express disagreement here if you want a discussion. I do think communism is really, really bad, and should get the same treatment as Nazism, slavery, the crusades, etc - because when it was implemented, it did equivalently large amounts of damage. (Actually, more damage, technically, than any of those)

Perceptions of communism is actually an interesting topic for me. I can't right now, but I'll try to write up a reply longer than three lines later today here.

"when an SSR started transitioning to a liberal democracy"

When USSR started transitioning to a banana republic that has to import its bananas from Finland.

This is how it was in 90-s.

>This is how it was in 90-s.

So, in addition to all your other nonsense, you're claiming that they grow bananas in Russia these days. Compare to FSB isn't spying, businessmen aren't extorted, etc... bananas being grown in Russia would be the most realistic of your claims about Russia so far.

They probably could - Soichi has palm trees: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sochi#Climate

And, there are several species of cold-hardy bananas: http://treesandshrubs.about.com/od/selection/tp/hardybanana....

So, growing bananas in Russia hardly seems like nonsense.

man, you probably never been to Sochi. I've been there. You can try to research/Google the agricultural profile of bananas and the climate profile of Sochi. This is snow in Sochi:

http://www.sochiclub.ru/sochiphotos/category/5-snow-in-sochi...

>So, growing bananas in Russia hardly seems like nonsense.

Well, the same thing was thought about corn in 60ies (state-wide corn enforcing campaign, 40+ years later still a source of countless jokes as you can force people to plant corn, yet you can't force corn to grow in that climate) and about putting monkeys into Siberia in 70s-80s (fortunately it was only a small pack of monkey that experiment was conducted on)

You're right! I haven't. You won the Internet. ;)

...

Your pictures are blocked at work for me, but Wikipedia shows pictures of both snowy mountains and lush sea-side vegetation in Sochi. Elevation as well as latitude affects growing conditions.

As far as growing corn in Russia or having monkeys in Siberia goes, they are entirely different matters as to whether or not it is possible to grow bananas in Russia.

Wikipedia reports that Sochi lies in a 8b/9a hardiness zone. The banana species I linked to can grow in hardiness zone 5. I maintain my position that it is possible to grow bananas in Russia.

Thank you for playing! Please try again.

>As far as growing corn in Russia or having monkeys in Siberia goes, they are entirely different matters as to whether or not it is possible to grow bananas in Russia.

you win as your logic's complexity is beyond my understanding considering that Iowa is in zone 5 and corn can be grown even in zones 2-4.

Stop being obtuse.

Here is a picture of a Musa Basjoo banana plant growing in Sochi: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Musa_basjooSochi1.JPG

The Musa Basjoo banana plant is growing in Sochi. Sochi is in Russia. Therefore, bananas can grow in Russia.

90% certain those are metaphorical bananas.

He's also claiming they grow bananas in Finland. I bet he thinks they grow on the North Pole too.

The term "banana-republic" means a failed state with a corrupted government, the banana joke was mostly likely not meant to be taken literally (but more like "it was so bad that it was like banana-republic without even the bananas").

The whole banana discussion is missing the point.

I downvoted you because your post has nothing to do with the parent's original assertion (that privatization is viewed by many people as unfair - what does privatization in the UK have to do with communism?), and your constant use of the word "seriously." It's seriously annoying.

> I downvoted you because your post has nothing to do with the parent's original assertion (that privatization is viewed by many people as unfair - what does privatization in the UK have to do with communism?)

I linked to how the Mongolian People's Republic (ex-Communist) privatized by giving shares in state companies to their own citizens, on their own locally-run Stock Exchange, which has nothing to do with the UK.

It was a pretty good way to privatize without just giving company control over to the former communist leaders. Click the Wikipedia link if you didn't, it's kind of interesting how they did it.

> and your constant use of the word "seriously."

That's valid, though. Touché, comrade.

"Click the Wikipedia link if you didn't, it's kind of interesting how they did it."

I just did. Apparently you don't know anything about how privatization was done in other post-communist countries.

The voucher scheme was used in Russia, with disastrous results (http://cog.kent.edu/lib/Ellerman5.htm) and is remembered as one of the biggest scams of the "wild 90s."

One thing you also don't seem to know is that Mongolia was governed by the incumbent communist party during the time the privatization took place (they won 85% of the vote in the 1990 elections and continued to govern without major opposition until 1996). This is why the following bit of information from the Wikipedia article is very informative:

"Government Resolution No. 170 announced that the state would retain a stake of 50% in some large enterprises; mining, energy, transportation, communications, and water supply companies were excluded from the privatisation scheme entirely."

The communist government kept those enterprises from the same fate they suffered in Russia by preventing their privatization. This is very similar to what happened in Belarus.

PS - Many sectors in the UK underwent privatization in the 1980s. I don't see how that is irrelevant.

Just one caveat that the clusterfuck in the mortgage market is not a product of 'capitalism', but rather perverse state incentives.

No offense, but you sound like a broken western propaganda record. Having been born in USSR, I know a lot of highly educated people that grew up, went to universities, and built various careers in the USSR. While none think communism is perfect, or even worked in that particular case, it has a lot of merits and these people recognize them.

As Putin said, (paraphrased) "anyone who doesn't miss Soviet Union doesn't have a heart; anyone who wants to bring it back doesn't have a brain." I think this reflects well people's feelings towards the regime. It didn't work in the long run, but it wasn't all bad - far from it.

I'm sure the USSR had its virtues as you say, but the government forcibly prevented its citizens from leaving. That fact alone seems rather damning.

I'm surprised Putin paraphrased Mussolini (anyone who isn't a socialist as a teenager doesn't have a heart, anyone who is still a socialist as an adult doesn't have a brain)...

As another Soviet emigré, I concur strongly with this assessment. One-dimensional, sophistic Cold Warrior propaganda does not for an erudite treatment of the manifold facets of life in the USSR make.

Nationalization:

    Government takes X$ from your pocket to buy asset A of X$ value.

Privatization:

    Government sells asset A for X$ and gives you back X$ (in the form of 
    cutting taxes or spending it somewhere else).

How is this theft? If I had to pick, nationalization fits the definition of theft better than privatization.

You took as axiomatic that if government makes a profit of $X then an equal value will be returned to the people through lower taxes or higher spending. If you believe that, then a government can never steal [from its own people].

Of course it's an oversimplification but it seems clear to me that if one or the other is theft, it has to be nationalization. If I steal 1M$ from a bank (nationalization) and give it back in 10 years with interest (privatization), I'm pretty sure I'd still be considered a thief.

Most of what was "Soviet" was taken from individual owners in the first place. My family fled Estonia from invading Soviets, giving up several businesses. I visited a couple years ago and 4 families now live on the plot of land that was once rightfully ours. It's part of life, deal with it, we did. The making public of private land was also theft in the first place so I guess I don't quite get your point, he rightfully bought the land according to the laws at that point in time, he doesn't deserve to go to prison.

The USSR nationalized plenty of formerly-private land and natural resources, but it built its industrial capacity almost entirely from scratch. (At enormous human cost - which is the only way to uplift an agrarian backwater to modernity in decades instead of centuries.)

The factories which were sold as scrap metal to the West for pennies on the dollar were fully public property.

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