@CM "Who in their right mind would not work when they know they would die if they didn't? "

Can *you* grow enough food to feed yourself, right now? Why not?

@Ghost: That is right libertarianism. This is left libertarianism. Look it up. Anyway, you're food won't be taken if you put it on the market for free. I've said that a million times, but apparently everyone here loves money so much that they can't understand the concept of free.

"If you make enough crops just for yourself, then people that have other jobs and need food will steal from you, and sudddenly you don't have enough to live on. If you make surplus food, then the surplus can be given away for free and you won't be stolen from and you end up with enough to live on. Understand now?"

yeah, i understand, but according to the second article you linked there will be no theft. They will be no reason to steal from me, i'm not producing fodd because i like producing food, in fact i'd rather produce no food (As i do today) and educate people, but then who is producing all the food?

@stratagos: You know we're not just talking about food, right? You can get a job in anything you want.

Conservative Man-

Simple question: If we can do anything we want, do you really think there are enough people who *love* farming so much that they can feed 7+ billion people? If not, then others are forced to farm and we can't really do whatever we want then can we?

Or perhaps you are suggesting that farming is one of the "undesirable" jobs that people will rotate turns at. In that case, all we will have is a bunch of people who know little to nothing about growing food being in charge of feeding us all.

"Anyway, you're food won't be taken if you put it on the market for free."

why do i have spare food for the market? I mean i know why i'm making food for myself.

Under the jobs nobody likes section it says they will be shared out - so perhaps everyone will work in farming for 6 hours a day (if nobody likes to do back breaking work)

unfortunately this requires a lot more training than in the current system, most people will not be as good at farming as professionals and it is hard to organise any large group of people (this managment effort can also be spread out among many people, but that doesn't reduce the fact that it has to be done)

@ Jamie

"Looking only at the economy, the Soviet Union from 1928-1973."

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

"This demand for more grain resulted in the reintroduction of requisitioning which was resisted in rural areas. In 1928 there was a 2 million ton shortfall in grains purchased by the state. Stalin claimed the grain had been produced but was being hoarded by "kulaks." Instead of raising the price, the Politburo adopted an emergency measure to requisition 2.5 million tons of grain.

The seizures of grain discouraged the peasants and less grain was produced during 1928 and again the government resorted to requisitions.

...

Due to high government production quotas peasants got, as a rule, less for their labor than they did before collectivization, and some refused to work. Merle Fainsod estimated that, in 1952, collective farm earnings were only one fourth of the cash income from private plots on Soviet collective farms.[11] In many cases, the immediate effect of collectivization was to reduce output and cut the number of livestock in half."

@drano: Well, given that we feed nearly that many today, I would say yeah, we could feed them.

@ora: We're just going in circles here. As I've said 10 times before, if you everyone produces just enough for themselves, they will be stolen from and not have enough. If they have more, they put it on the market for free and are not stolen from.

True we do Conservative Man, but those farmers work ridiculously long hours (upwards of 14-18 hours per day) and wear their bodies away at the same time. If you were to all of a sudden say they could do anything they wanted, I bet most of them would cut their production so they could rest a little and spend more time with family. They would see it as an opportunity to live a healthier life while still producing a surplus. However, your surplus would be smaller than before. And since in your system, it is their right to do whatever they want, you can't force them to work longer hours to produce more food.

Then that could be included in the unwanted jobs part. However, people are not forced to do it, it's just that if they don't, they could starve.

"@stratagos: You know we're not just talking about food, right? You can get a job in anything you want. "

*You* may be talking about "anything you want", but under the system you seem to like there wouldn't *be enough food*, so my desire to be a concert pianist or actor or business process re-engineer would be irrelevant, because my choices would be to *somehow* find a way to hunt and gather enough food to keep myself alive or starve to death.

Until you can explain the magic baton you're going to wave to conjure food from the air, or explain how you're going to compel enough farmers to grow a surplus - which, as has been repeatedly pointed out, will force them to work backbreaking labor for the grasshoppers who just leech off them, and would, shall we say, not exactly motivate them to bust their ass - then the rest of your argument is completely irrelevant?

"Who in their right mind would not work when they know they would die if they didn't?"

Arbeit macht frei?

"Then that could be included in the unwanted jobs part. However, people are not forced to do it, it's just that if they don't, they could starve. "

Ok. lets say there is one unwanted job left, just one. And everyone else is happy, and society is perfect. Are *you* going to take that unwanted job?

You guys are twising my words around and going in circles. I'm done here.

Conservative Man-

Two points: 1) It has already been pointed out that if farming is an unwanted job, you will end up having a bunch of inexperienced farmers out there who know little to nothing about growing food. This will cause a BIG decrease in the available amount of food thus requiring more farmers. Eventually you end up with a large portion of the population farming when they'd rather be doing something else.
2) They (the farmer) would not starve if they chose not to do it. They could do as Ora has suggested and have a small farm to feed themselves. The others (people who choose not to work or who have no inclination to farm) would be the ones starving. Therefore according to your logic, the ones who are starving should farm, but you have repeatedly said that they are going to steal from the small farmers instead. You are contradicting your ideas multiple times. Which is it? Will starving people learn to farm to eat, or will they steal?

How are we twisting your words? You have a thesis, we're asking you to defend it, you're failing.

No Conservative Man, we're just trying to show you the blatant holes in the logic of this system. It's a grand idea, it just has so many problems.

In fact, here's the easiest logic buster:

This system only works if EVERYONE is on board with it. Everyone has to do their part to contribute. Even if we were to take a vote and let's say 80% of the world agreed, that would still leave 20% (over 1 billion people) who are not happy and would more than likely ruin the entire thing.

Before I go:
@stratagos: I'm actaually defending it quite fine. It's just that when I shoot down your argument, you go back and restate something I've already shot down.
@Drano: It actually isn't an unwanted job. If the farmers work less and don't produce a big enough surplus, they would still get stolen from (albeit less). So they would have to keep farming like they do now. And given that they do that now, I wouldn't think they would have a problem with it.

Conservative Man, if you can convince a group of people to do a small scale experiment with you, do go ahead.

100% agreement with TGM. It's blatantly obvious that neither side is willing to cede any points to the other so the only real way to prove anything would be to try it.

Congrats on the successful troll - I don't know why I bothered getting sucked it, but the last statement was the icing. My Bad for being a sucker.

@Conservative man: but your system presumes there will be no theft because everything is free. I don't have any goods to put on the market at all because i don't like farming.

Where are the market goods going to come from? You say that i have to make them, but they system claims i can do whatever i want with my time.

So the claims are false. Or the underlying assumptions are false.

OK to move onto another point - one of the issues this system is trying to address is over-production, the production of surpluses which exceed market demand. The influence of advertising to drvie up demand.

I think it will work too well, as mentioned, but it will have a second side-effect. By increasing demand we increase productivity, we invent in adverse conditions (more so in war) and improve production methods. This means in the long term we will lose out on possible improvements to productivity.

Yes some people will still do basic research, but they will be no adversity in production to encourage inventiveness. The whole development of mankind will stagnate.

Now I am a massive socialist but I think a pricing mechanism is a great tool to leverage for the benifit of society. As proven by many many years of success. I am not argueing in favour of advertising or surplus production or control in the hands of the few (who use advertising as a tool to control/increase demand)

I'm not even in favour of surplus production going to waste because people can't afford it (if the US government bought* all the houses people can't afford to pay for, and rented them back to the people, the banks would get the invested capital they needed and the people would get places to live, and the government would get a source of income - to invest in other projects...) I just happen to think there is a better mechanism.

*oh and paying the reduced prices which are the base market value, meaning the banks actually lose money - whether the former home owners happen to default on the rest they owe the bank will have no bearing on whether they keep their new government owned rented home.

I have to say this one thing, because ora doesn't get it: You don't have to farm! You could work for a company that makes video games, or tables, or pillows. Whatever it is, you work for that company and they put it on the market for free. That is what this system is.

so it seems conservative man has gone off in a huff.

I'll have to take up the flag:

"Until you can explain the magic baton you're going to wave to conjure food from the air"

Robots! everything which people don't want to do will be automated! It's the perfect system!!!

I know i don't 'have' to farm, but i predict that not farming will result in my death, so i do farm.

Now i don't have to produce a surplus in your system, so i'm not going to place anyhting on the market. (or if i do i will claim it first, and your system determines ownership based on need, and the time the claim was placed) So i get to keep the fruit (and vegetables) of my labour.

@ ora - Will Smith doesn't seem to agree with you ;)

The essential problem in this system is that, given no incentive to actually do anything beyond liking to do it, we are going to have a bunch (as in most everyone) of people that do little more than play golf, go sailing, go hiking, play video games, watch tv, etc. These people are also going to want a bunch of stuff (even though they are not making it). How exactly is that supposed to function when nobody really wants to do anything productive (because it is work, and why work when I can just play)? Or even if we somehow "make" everybody do something, what I really want to do, for example, is be a professional golfer (even though I have a 14 handicap), so all I am going to do for my "job" is practice golf all day every day (and there will be a lot of people joining me). Also - in allocating work out for "undesirable" jobs - who does the allocating? What if I refuse to do them because I don't want to?

The percentage of the human population that would actually do productive work (in any useful quantity) if everything was free is probably quite minimal. Even if someone likes their job, if all they get from it is the sastisfaction of doing it (but no real compensation), then very few people are going to do much of anything.