Socialism – Ideas so Good That They Have to be Mandatory
Terrorism, politics and divisiveness, but what’s on Page 2? How can a populated country run out of bread? It would be understandable if a natural disaster or devastating war caused a shortage, but neither of these has happened in Venezuela – and they’ve been running out of bread and other staple necessities for years now. Why? Well, Socialism, of course.
When the food crises was worsening, Venezuela installed fingerprint scanners at supermarkets nationwide. The idea is that in order to stop food shortages the government must limit people’s ability to buy food. Before customers can buy bread and other items they must produce an ID and have their fingerprints scanned in order to make sure they don’t exceed their allocation. The government will give you a smaller slice of the pie, so that more people can have pie and you will have to wait in a longer line to get it. One definition of socialism is “Ideas so good that they have to be mandatory”.
If socialism was so great, then why would the government have to do this? We in America take for granted the fact that we can buy up all the bread we want because we know the shelves will fill right back up again. It’s a miracle Adam Smith described as the “Invisible Hand.” It’s important to remember this because capitalism gets no credit. Nobel Prize winner Milton Freidman once said “The free market has no press agents. The government has a great many press agents, and, the Federal Reserve has a great many press agents.” Unfortunately this means they often have the ability to define the narrative and the narrative in Venezuela is that greedy shoppers are causing shortages.
So this bread shortage is a good lesson in why socialism will never work. In a normal economy, as the price of something rises, consumption falls and production increases. In Venezuela the opposite is happening. Constrained supply pushes the price of bread higher, but consumers sense a shortage and demand more, anyway. The only way to correct this problem is to focus on supply and not demand. How? By lowering barriers for production – like tax rates, regulations and eliminating corruption. And since the only reason people produce is so that they can consume, limiting demand can actually hinder production because work effort falls in value. Why work if bread is too expensive and in short supply? Venezuela continues spiraling downward and fingerprint scanners are just a piece of evidence.
Hungry consumers will find ways to put bread in their pantry. Traveling to a neighboring country where store shelves are full and prices reasonable seems like a good idea. The socialist’s then do what socialist’s always do when a whiff free markets sneaks in. They close the borders blaming their neighbors for their own failed policies.
On the other hand, living standards in the US have risen 20-fold since 1850. Government did not do this, although the establishment of a rule of law, a protection of property rights, a strong national defense system, and limited interference in private activity allowed capitalism and the entrepreneur to flourish. If Venezuelans want to consume all the bread they desire, all they need to do is drop the scanners and free up the markets, move back toward capitalism and give up their failed socialist experiment.
What’s next? Could those fingerprint scanners thwart foes of the regime and their families from obtaining any bread at all?
Originally published by David Eckess July 26, 2016.
