Communism, as a country’s political and economic view, might sound ideal in theory. However, why does not it work in practice?
Communism is a political and economic system where a commune, mostly represented by the government, owns the factors of production. Those factors cover labors, entrepreneurship, capital goods, and natural resources.
The Marx-authored Communist Manifesto has a great saying such as “from each according to his ability, to each according to his need.” Despite promoting economic equality, Communism in practice is not able to provide the visioned equality among people.
As per today, there are only five Communist countries left in the world, which are China, Cuba, North Korea, Laos, and Vietnam respectively. That said, these countries do not practice pure Communism due to its inability to adapt to the global development.
Accordingly, why can’t Communism work and sustain in the world? Here are several disadvantages of the ideology.
Also Read: Do Capitalism and Democracy Mutually Coexist?
Communism Eliminates Free Market
If a country abides by the ideology, they will most likely have no free market. The supply and demand does not set prices and production for the government or the authority does it all.
Considering the situation, there will always be shortages as people’s demands vary more following the global development, yet only the government has the authority to set prices and production.
As a result, people mostly create black markets where they trade unauthorized products such as in North Korea. This, accordingly, betrays the very concept of pure Communism that Karl Marx suggested.
Sharing is Caring
To some extent, ‘sharing is caring’ is a good altruistic concept. However, oversharing never leads to a good outcome at the end of the day.
In the ideology, there is no private property ownership as everything, such as land, is owned by the government. It no longer becomes your or my land as it becomes our land.
For instance, a person, in an actuality, owns a potato field. By the harvest time comes, the potatoes should be redistributed properly as it belongs to government-controlled commodity. However, not everything has the same ‘redistribution’ treatment.
Nobody Gets Rich, Nobody Works Harder
Since everyone will have to work and earn wages at a seemingly indifferent amount, nobody will be rich. Automatically, nobody will also put extra efforts in their work.
Although this might not always be the case, but, in most cases, this is what happens. Despite sounding pretty fair, it is no longer fair when a colleague of yours put a minimum effort during work while everyone has to put extra to cover it. After all, everyone will earn the same.
Also Read: How Can Politics Affect Currency Values?
