Is There any such Thing as socialist economics?
I don't see it
I looked for socialist economics but could not find it. My view of this is that usually when we say “Economics” we can assume the discussion will be about free market economics or capitalism. So, economics, free markets, and capitalism are to a large degree the same thing. What socialist economics is would be unclear. A king giving orders on how to distribute economic goods sounds to me like personal authority, which is something other than economics. Or it could be a socialist regime making those decisions. Such decisions could be made on any basis whatsoever. I cannot see how you can call that “economics.” If we have no access to information regarding how those decisions are made, ow can that be “economics”? It is political rule, whether by a party or an individual. The ones in charge make all the decisions. Now let’s contrast this with actual “economics.”
Individual economic behaviors are associated with some reward. The reward comes when the individual making the economic behavior is paid, either in money or credit. Some party is paid for that particular trade event (‘deal’ is the commonly-used but rather oblique term here), so that outcome or reward comes in the form of a payment, which, furthermore can be at the moment of transfer or, smarter, it may be deferred and paid later, with interest. This is usually better from the point of view of the businessman. Now we may look at all the other events that occur.
In other cases, which are neither economics nor politics, we do something for very different reasons — just for the sake of it. When we do something just for the sake of it we are being more deeply human. Is doing something just for the hell of it impossible—? ~ I don’t think so. You know I have put my paws on one really good book recently so I will cut and paste:
“We’ve painted images on rock walls,” writes Margaret j. wheatley, author of leadership and the new science (turning to one another; BK; 2002; San. Fr.).
- - - - - -
Why do we do it? Paintings of rock walls are unsigned. Because we are human; we do that. This author writes, “The entire world seems hypnotized in the wrong direction — encouraging us to love things more than people…”
- - - - - -
Eventually the human race will be destroyed. We will start all over again. (i.e. with the few remaining specimens—survivors if any)