VI. “Free” Enterprise and Competitive Order
1
In the coming years, there is likely to be an increase in government control in many parts of the world. This trend can be attributed primarily to the absence of a clear and consistent philosophy from those opposing socialism. Many groups claiming to defend free enterprise support policies that, if fully realized, would lead to socialism just as much as socialist policies do. This reveals a contradiction, as many advocates of market freedom are, in reality, defending selective privileges favoring their interests. Over time, once the government starts helping specific groups, it is inevitable that further controls will expand to satisfy broader public demands. Many leaders opposing government control need to embrace the discipline of a competitive market instead of merely opposing state intervention.
Political leaders often claim that their actions are limited by public opinion, but this current opinion has been shaped by the ideas of past economists and political philosophers. These ideas significantly impact how political and public issues are viewed. Ideas can have a much longer-lasting influence than vested interests. Therefore, any efforts to maintain or restore a free society must focus on spreading beliefs that support freedom rather than getting caught up in what seems practical at the current moment.
It is crucial to recognize that while the public may be open to reasonable arguments about policies, their deeper ethical values are often more resistant to change. Understanding these fixed values will aid efforts to promote freedom. A significant factor to consider is the demand for security and equality, which needs careful analysis in terms of what can realistically be achieved in a free society.
There is also a challenge in directing people's energies away from harmful policies towards promoting individual freedom. Learning from the past, where many believed simply reducing state involvement was the ultimate goal, shows that there are valid discussions to be had regarding how the state should operate within an ideological framework aimed at competition. The principle of private property needs a fair trial and effective management to truly function within a competitive order.
Overall, the focus should be on making competition more effective through careful government interventions, rather than restricting it, while recognizing that some necessary services cannot be provided by the market alone, and determining which services should be managed by the government.
2
There are two important problems related to creating a competitive market. First, monetary and financial policies are needed to ensure economic stability and reduce unemployment, with a focus on making monetary management more predictable. Second, it's essential to provide support for the unemployed and those unable to work, considering how this support can minimize its impact on market functions. It’s also important for people to openly debate these issues to keep them current and relevant in public discussions.
3
To create a competitive market, important issues must be examined, including laws about property and contracts, regulations for companies, and how to handle monopolies. The ideas of "private property" and "freedom of contract" are often seen as solutions, but they do not fully address the problems because their meanings can be unclear. It is essential to think carefully about what property rights and contracts should look like, especially concerning city land, as land use can affect the entire community. Additionally, when concepts of property are applied to patents and copyrights, this can lead to monopolies that reduce competition. This situation suggests that major changes are needed. It is important to look closely at how patents work because they can prevent competition and raise concerns about whether giving these monopolies is the best way to encourage research and innovation.
4
The issues surrounding trademarks and contracts show how a strict view of private property can lead to problems. Trademarks, which are supposed to help identify products, have sometimes given too much control to companies, allowing them to create monopolies. For instance, names like "Kodak" and "Coca-Cola" have become so tied to the products that only those companies can produce these items. One potential solution is to limit trademark protection to names that anyone can use.
In contracts, the idea of "freedom of contract" doesn't truly resolve the problems we face, especially when some contracts can be harmful, like those that restrain trade. As corporations gain more power, it's the law—not just the contracts—that shapes who is responsible and how property is treated. As laws evolve, they influence market competition. The development of laws related to corporations and limited liability has supported monopoly power, sometimes benefiting larger businesses unfairly. There is a need for governments to consider how legislation impacts competition and to explore ways to prevent excessive corporate growth without overly restricting freedoms.
5
It's important for employers to compete effectively before we can properly address labor issues. The challenge is creating a fair policy for labor and trade unions since liberalism has historically struggled with this issue. At first, liberalism opposed trade unions, but later it gave them many legal protections, sometimes allowing harmful actions. It's crucial to define the limits of trade unions for a free economy. Today's issues like full employment, monetary policy, international trade, and the balance between free and planned economies make things even more complicated and need careful attention while considering long-term goals.
6
Taxation is a big issue, especially progressive income taxation. High tax rates can stop people from becoming wealthy and make it hard for successful individuals to improve their social status. This also reduces the number of financially independent people, who are important for a free society because they help maintain diverse opinions and independence from the government. Inheritance taxes can either limit or encourage social mobility, depending on how they are used. Overall, many taxation issues need to be discussed more.
1
There is a growing belief that we are starting to discuss the reconstruction of society in a more thoughtful way. For many years, people thought that carefully regulating social affairs would be better than the random actions of individuals, leading to calls for central direction in society. This desire for order assumed that free societies were just accidents of history. However, many key challenges of such planned systems have not been properly acknowledged. Discussions about socialism often focused on moral questions and whether people could be trusted to implement socialist ideas, rather than on whether planning could actually achieve the desired outcomes. This has led to a misunderstanding about the role of economics in evaluating socialism, as many think it only applies to capitalist societies.
2
There is a common belief that a socialist society would not face economic problems, but this might stem from a lack of understanding of what those problems are. Economic issues, particularly in a competitive society, are often not consciously addressed by individuals, as each person focuses only on their own economic challenges. The distribution of resources is an important societal problem, similar to individual issues. While current economic issues may not be solved with intention, a competitive system still arrives at solutions.
The misunderstanding arises partly because people often mix up economic problems with engineering problems. Engineering problems have clear goals and methods for achieving them, while economic problems are more complex. For example, an engineer aims to maximize output from given resources with a fixed purpose, like producing food or building a bridge. However, in an economic context, different needs, such as food and clothing, compete for limited resources, creating a dilemma that cannot be easily resolved.
Economic problems arise when multiple purposes vie for resources, forcing decisions based on cost and benefit. Cost refers to the potential advantages of using resources for other purposes, making economic choices complex. For instance, while one more doctor might be more critical than one teacher, training costs could make hiring multiple teachers more viable.
Most people do not recognize that these economic problems exist in society because they are not addressed directly. Economic decisions are often influenced by prices, and while individual choices impact prices, they don't determine them entirely. Understanding this complex interplay is essential, even if many people view engineers as effectively solving problems and economists as merely critiquing their efforts. However, economists highlight the underlying forces that shape the outcomes of these decisions.
3
Understanding economic issues has become less common since the 19th century when people were more aware of these problems. This change happened mainly because the classical political economy, which once helped explain economic ideas, fell apart due to oversimplification and weaknesses. As a result, people shifted from understanding why economic events happen to just describing them, leading to a loss of deeper knowledge about economic problems.
Another major influence was the rise of the historical school of economics. This school argued that economic laws could only be found by examining history with the methods used in natural sciences. This focus on recording events rather than theorizing about them created doubt about whether any economic laws really exist.
Social sciences, unlike natural sciences, have specific challenges because experiments cannot be conducted. This makes it hard to find consistent patterns in human behavior. While basic facts about human actions are clear, they do not easily lead to general laws like those found in the natural sciences. This confusion, caused by trying to use the same methods from natural sciences in social sciences, has led to the belief that economic situations are only the result of social changes and not tied to fundamental economic issues. As a result, the essential understanding of economic analysis has been weakened significantly.
4
A strong kind of socialism developed from historicism, mainly through Karl Marx's ideas. He did not use the classical economists' focus on competition but agreed that economic events came from specific historical developments. This idea was especially popular in Germany, where Marxism was widely accepted. Because of this historic view, many socialists struggled to see ongoing economic issues that were separate from history. Marx also discouraged detailed thinking about what a future socialist society would look like, saying it would naturally evolve. This influenced his followers and made it hard for other socialists to tackle real policy problems.
5
It is important to separate different ideas about socialism and planning. In the past, socialism and planning were often seen as the same thing, but today, they can have different goals and methods. The main goal of socialism, especially "proletarian" socialism, is to help people who do not own property by redistributing income, which means giving them a fairer share of wealth. This requires collective ownership and control of production resources. However, the same collective methods can be used by other groups with different, often unequal, goals. Because of this, there can be a lot of planning with little socialism, or the opposite. This difference helps us to study these topics more clearly, focusing on how effective these methods are in achieving goals instead of debating the rightness of the goals themselves. It is also important to see if a central authority can effectively manage resource distribution in a large society, which raises questions about whether this can match the efficiency of competitive capitalism.
6
Socialism is a system where production resources are collectively controlled, meaning they are owned by the community rather than individuals. The focus is more on the methods of socialism rather than its goals. There are various types of socialism, but traditional names like "communism" and "syndicalism" do not clearly define the different methods. A common view of socialism includes shared ownership of resources and a central authority directing their use, while still allowing individuals to choose what to buy and what jobs to take.
There is a debate about whether these freedoms are essential for socialism or if they can be sacrificed for other benefits. Fully centralized socialism, which is similar to historical communism, involves complete control by a central authority over all production activities. Less centralized forms have often struggled to manage economic activities effectively. However, some modern socialist thinkers have suggested reintroducing competition as a way to improve how resources are utilized. It is crucial to determine how much central control is necessary for a system to still be considered socialism, ensuring that the community can effectively manage its resources.
7
Central control of production is necessary for effective planning in an economy. Without this control, planning becomes impossible. While many people think planning could work in a system where private property exists, true planning needs specific guidance about what to produce, how to produce it, and what prices to set. Trying to implement planning without proper authority can lead to problems that require even more control, eventually placing all economic activities under one central authority.
State intervention in a capitalist society is mentioned but not deeply discussed, as it doesn't offer a solid solution to economic problems. It's important to understand the difference between having a legal framework that encourages private action and a system that needs central direction for changes. The current changes in the economy do not mean a return to older social systems but represent a significant move towards central planning. Today, the mix of partial planning and regulations is very different from both rational capitalism and consistent central planning, creating a situation described as "interventionist chaos." The current economy is far from an ideal capitalist system or a well-organized planned economy.
8
Classical political economy started to decline because it did not clearly explain what value is based on how people act in the economy. The labor theory of value was more about searching for something specific that represents value, instead of focusing on people’s behavior. A major breakthrough in economics happened when economists began to ask how and why people value different goods. Understanding this competition for limited resources was essential in studying how various economic systems handle value.
Early discussions about centrally directed economies took place in modern economics, often simplifying things by assuming there was a single shared value system, usually in a Communist framework. This assumption helped show that value outcomes like rent, wages, and interest can still appear in a controlled economy. However, the lack of a common value system made these issues seem less significant in practice. Some early economists thought they could combine individual feelings about value into a collective scale, but many later realized that this idea was unrealistic.
As economic studies progressed, doubts arose about whether problems could be solved through deliberate decisions. Economists began to argue that central authorities would struggle with complex economic interactions. The need for a pricing system to establish the value of goods became a major topic when discussing socialism. The key point was that socialist economies would still face value problems similar to those in competitive economies, which means that rational calculations about value would always be important.
9
After World War I, socialist parties took control in many countries in central and eastern Europe. They needed to create specific plans for how to manage production under socialism. The discussions were influenced by wartime experiences when governments managed food and resources to deal with shortages. People believed that this central control could work well for a socialist economy. Austria stood out as a key place for these debates because its socialists had a significant impact on economic policies, more so than in other countries outside Russia. However, the economic experiments in Austria after the war have not been studied much.
A notable idea from this time came from Otto Neurath, who suggested that economic planning could be done without considering the value of goods, using physical amounts instead. Other socialist leaders in Austria raised similar points, which showed the difficulties in understanding socialist economics. In Germany, discussions were focused on a "socialization commission" that looked at how to shift industries to state control. However, these proposals often did not suggest a completely socialist system. Overall, the ideas from both countries reflected changing public opinions on how to organize economies during this period.
10
Ludwig von Mises, an Austrian economist, explained an important problem in socialist economics in 1920. He showed that making smart economic decisions relies on money prices, which help people understand the value of resources. He argued that for a system to work well, prices must apply not only to final goods but also to all intermediate products and factors of production. His ideas became a key starting point for future discussions about socialism. At the same time, German sociologist Max Weber also reached similar conclusions, saying that planned economies struggle to use capital wisely without a pricing system. In Russia, economist Boris Brutzkus independently criticized the economic ideas of the Communist leaders, agreeing with Mises and Weber that a socialist system lacks the ability to calculate value rationally due to the absence of prices.
11
Max Weber and Professor Brutzkus pointed out important issues in socialist economics, but Professor Mises provided a more detailed explanation in his work, "Die Gemeinwirtschaft." After it was published, many tried to argue against Mises’ claim that rational calculation is not possible in a centrally planned economy. Although these discussions went on for years and Mises responded to critics, it became clear that his main argument was correct. Traditional socialist plans could not reliably achieve their intended goals. Some people accepted that the loss of efficiency in socialism might be an acceptable tradeoff for a fairer distribution of wealth. Others looked for new socialist ideas that could avoid the problems pointed out by Mises. These new ideas involved either more extreme planning that removed consumer choice or added some competition into the system. The debates continue about whether these new designs can successfully solve the economic challenges of socialism.
1
In the coming years, there is likely to be an increase in government control in many parts of the world. This trend can be attributed primarily to the absence of a clear and consistent philosophy from those opposing socialism. Many groups claiming to defend free enterprise support policies that, if fully realized, would lead to socialism just as much as socialist policies do. This reveals a contradiction, as many advocates of market freedom are, in reality, defending selective privileges favoring their interests. Over time, once the government starts helping specific groups, it is inevitable that further controls will expand to satisfy broader public demands. Many leaders opposing government control need to embrace the discipline of a competitive market instead of merely opposing state intervention.
Political leaders often claim that their actions are limited by public opinion, but this current opinion has been shaped by the ideas of past economists and political philosophers. These ideas significantly impact how political and public issues are viewed. Ideas can have a much longer-lasting influence than vested interests. Therefore, any efforts to maintain or restore a free society must focus on spreading beliefs that support freedom rather than getting caught up in what seems practical at the current moment.
It is crucial to recognize that while the public may be open to reasonable arguments about policies, their deeper ethical values are often more resistant to change. Understanding these fixed values will aid efforts to promote freedom. A significant factor to consider is the demand for security and equality, which needs careful analysis in terms of what can realistically be achieved in a free society.
There is also a challenge in directing people's energies away from harmful policies towards promoting individual freedom. Learning from the past, where many believed simply reducing state involvement was the ultimate goal, shows that there are valid discussions to be had regarding how the state should operate within an ideological framework aimed at competition. The principle of private property needs a fair trial and effective management to truly function within a competitive order.
Overall, the focus should be on making competition more effective through careful government interventions, rather than restricting it, while recognizing that some necessary services cannot be provided by the market alone, and determining which services should be managed by the government.
2
There are two important problems related to creating a competitive market. First, monetary and financial policies are needed to ensure economic stability and reduce unemployment, with a focus on making monetary management more predictable. Second, it's essential to provide support for the unemployed and those unable to work, considering how this support can minimize its impact on market functions. It’s also important for people to openly debate these issues to keep them current and relevant in public discussions.
3
To create a competitive market, important issues must be examined, including laws about property and contracts, regulations for companies, and how to handle monopolies. The ideas of "private property" and "freedom of contract" are often seen as solutions, but they do not fully address the problems because their meanings can be unclear. It is essential to think carefully about what property rights and contracts should look like, especially concerning city land, as land use can affect the entire community. Additionally, when concepts of property are applied to patents and copyrights, this can lead to monopolies that reduce competition. This situation suggests that major changes are needed. It is important to look closely at how patents work because they can prevent competition and raise concerns about whether giving these monopolies is the best way to encourage research and innovation.
4
The issues surrounding trademarks and contracts show how a strict view of private property can lead to problems. Trademarks, which are supposed to help identify products, have sometimes given too much control to companies, allowing them to create monopolies. For instance, names like "Kodak" and "Coca-Cola" have become so tied to the products that only those companies can produce these items. One potential solution is to limit trademark protection to names that anyone can use.
In contracts, the idea of "freedom of contract" doesn't truly resolve the problems we face, especially when some contracts can be harmful, like those that restrain trade. As corporations gain more power, it's the law—not just the contracts—that shapes who is responsible and how property is treated. As laws evolve, they influence market competition. The development of laws related to corporations and limited liability has supported monopoly power, sometimes benefiting larger businesses unfairly. There is a need for governments to consider how legislation impacts competition and to explore ways to prevent excessive corporate growth without overly restricting freedoms.
5
It's important for employers to compete effectively before we can properly address labor issues. The challenge is creating a fair policy for labor and trade unions since liberalism has historically struggled with this issue. At first, liberalism opposed trade unions, but later it gave them many legal protections, sometimes allowing harmful actions. It's crucial to define the limits of trade unions for a free economy. Today's issues like full employment, monetary policy, international trade, and the balance between free and planned economies make things even more complicated and need careful attention while considering long-term goals.
6
Taxation is a big issue, especially progressive income taxation. High tax rates can stop people from becoming wealthy and make it hard for successful individuals to improve their social status. This also reduces the number of financially independent people, who are important for a free society because they help maintain diverse opinions and independence from the government. Inheritance taxes can either limit or encourage social mobility, depending on how they are used. Overall, many taxation issues need to be discussed more.
1
There is a growing belief that we are starting to discuss the reconstruction of society in a more thoughtful way. For many years, people thought that carefully regulating social affairs would be better than the random actions of individuals, leading to calls for central direction in society. This desire for order assumed that free societies were just accidents of history. However, many key challenges of such planned systems have not been properly acknowledged. Discussions about socialism often focused on moral questions and whether people could be trusted to implement socialist ideas, rather than on whether planning could actually achieve the desired outcomes. This has led to a misunderstanding about the role of economics in evaluating socialism, as many think it only applies to capitalist societies.
2
There is a common belief that a socialist society would not face economic problems, but this might stem from a lack of understanding of what those problems are. Economic issues, particularly in a competitive society, are often not consciously addressed by individuals, as each person focuses only on their own economic challenges. The distribution of resources is an important societal problem, similar to individual issues. While current economic issues may not be solved with intention, a competitive system still arrives at solutions.
The misunderstanding arises partly because people often mix up economic problems with engineering problems. Engineering problems have clear goals and methods for achieving them, while economic problems are more complex. For example, an engineer aims to maximize output from given resources with a fixed purpose, like producing food or building a bridge. However, in an economic context, different needs, such as food and clothing, compete for limited resources, creating a dilemma that cannot be easily resolved.
Economic problems arise when multiple purposes vie for resources, forcing decisions based on cost and benefit. Cost refers to the potential advantages of using resources for other purposes, making economic choices complex. For instance, while one more doctor might be more critical than one teacher, training costs could make hiring multiple teachers more viable.
Most people do not recognize that these economic problems exist in society because they are not addressed directly. Economic decisions are often influenced by prices, and while individual choices impact prices, they don't determine them entirely. Understanding this complex interplay is essential, even if many people view engineers as effectively solving problems and economists as merely critiquing their efforts. However, economists highlight the underlying forces that shape the outcomes of these decisions.
3
Understanding economic issues has become less common since the 19th century when people were more aware of these problems. This change happened mainly because the classical political economy, which once helped explain economic ideas, fell apart due to oversimplification and weaknesses. As a result, people shifted from understanding why economic events happen to just describing them, leading to a loss of deeper knowledge about economic problems.
Another major influence was the rise of the historical school of economics. This school argued that economic laws could only be found by examining history with the methods used in natural sciences. This focus on recording events rather than theorizing about them created doubt about whether any economic laws really exist.
Social sciences, unlike natural sciences, have specific challenges because experiments cannot be conducted. This makes it hard to find consistent patterns in human behavior. While basic facts about human actions are clear, they do not easily lead to general laws like those found in the natural sciences. This confusion, caused by trying to use the same methods from natural sciences in social sciences, has led to the belief that economic situations are only the result of social changes and not tied to fundamental economic issues. As a result, the essential understanding of economic analysis has been weakened significantly.
4
A strong kind of socialism developed from historicism, mainly through Karl Marx's ideas. He did not use the classical economists' focus on competition but agreed that economic events came from specific historical developments. This idea was especially popular in Germany, where Marxism was widely accepted. Because of this historic view, many socialists struggled to see ongoing economic issues that were separate from history. Marx also discouraged detailed thinking about what a future socialist society would look like, saying it would naturally evolve. This influenced his followers and made it hard for other socialists to tackle real policy problems.
5
It is important to separate different ideas about socialism and planning. In the past, socialism and planning were often seen as the same thing, but today, they can have different goals and methods. The main goal of socialism, especially "proletarian" socialism, is to help people who do not own property by redistributing income, which means giving them a fairer share of wealth. This requires collective ownership and control of production resources. However, the same collective methods can be used by other groups with different, often unequal, goals. Because of this, there can be a lot of planning with little socialism, or the opposite. This difference helps us to study these topics more clearly, focusing on how effective these methods are in achieving goals instead of debating the rightness of the goals themselves. It is also important to see if a central authority can effectively manage resource distribution in a large society, which raises questions about whether this can match the efficiency of competitive capitalism.
6
Socialism is a system where production resources are collectively controlled, meaning they are owned by the community rather than individuals. The focus is more on the methods of socialism rather than its goals. There are various types of socialism, but traditional names like "communism" and "syndicalism" do not clearly define the different methods. A common view of socialism includes shared ownership of resources and a central authority directing their use, while still allowing individuals to choose what to buy and what jobs to take.
There is a debate about whether these freedoms are essential for socialism or if they can be sacrificed for other benefits. Fully centralized socialism, which is similar to historical communism, involves complete control by a central authority over all production activities. Less centralized forms have often struggled to manage economic activities effectively. However, some modern socialist thinkers have suggested reintroducing competition as a way to improve how resources are utilized. It is crucial to determine how much central control is necessary for a system to still be considered socialism, ensuring that the community can effectively manage its resources.
7
Central control of production is necessary for effective planning in an economy. Without this control, planning becomes impossible. While many people think planning could work in a system where private property exists, true planning needs specific guidance about what to produce, how to produce it, and what prices to set. Trying to implement planning without proper authority can lead to problems that require even more control, eventually placing all economic activities under one central authority.
State intervention in a capitalist society is mentioned but not deeply discussed, as it doesn't offer a solid solution to economic problems. It's important to understand the difference between having a legal framework that encourages private action and a system that needs central direction for changes. The current changes in the economy do not mean a return to older social systems but represent a significant move towards central planning. Today, the mix of partial planning and regulations is very different from both rational capitalism and consistent central planning, creating a situation described as "interventionist chaos." The current economy is far from an ideal capitalist system or a well-organized planned economy.
8
Classical political economy started to decline because it did not clearly explain what value is based on how people act in the economy. The labor theory of value was more about searching for something specific that represents value, instead of focusing on people’s behavior. A major breakthrough in economics happened when economists began to ask how and why people value different goods. Understanding this competition for limited resources was essential in studying how various economic systems handle value.
Early discussions about centrally directed economies took place in modern economics, often simplifying things by assuming there was a single shared value system, usually in a Communist framework. This assumption helped show that value outcomes like rent, wages, and interest can still appear in a controlled economy. However, the lack of a common value system made these issues seem less significant in practice. Some early economists thought they could combine individual feelings about value into a collective scale, but many later realized that this idea was unrealistic.
As economic studies progressed, doubts arose about whether problems could be solved through deliberate decisions. Economists began to argue that central authorities would struggle with complex economic interactions. The need for a pricing system to establish the value of goods became a major topic when discussing socialism. The key point was that socialist economies would still face value problems similar to those in competitive economies, which means that rational calculations about value would always be important.
9
After World War I, socialist parties took control in many countries in central and eastern Europe. They needed to create specific plans for how to manage production under socialism. The discussions were influenced by wartime experiences when governments managed food and resources to deal with shortages. People believed that this central control could work well for a socialist economy. Austria stood out as a key place for these debates because its socialists had a significant impact on economic policies, more so than in other countries outside Russia. However, the economic experiments in Austria after the war have not been studied much.
A notable idea from this time came from Otto Neurath, who suggested that economic planning could be done without considering the value of goods, using physical amounts instead. Other socialist leaders in Austria raised similar points, which showed the difficulties in understanding socialist economics. In Germany, discussions were focused on a "socialization commission" that looked at how to shift industries to state control. However, these proposals often did not suggest a completely socialist system. Overall, the ideas from both countries reflected changing public opinions on how to organize economies during this period.
10
Ludwig von Mises, an Austrian economist, explained an important problem in socialist economics in 1920. He showed that making smart economic decisions relies on money prices, which help people understand the value of resources. He argued that for a system to work well, prices must apply not only to final goods but also to all intermediate products and factors of production. His ideas became a key starting point for future discussions about socialism. At the same time, German sociologist Max Weber also reached similar conclusions, saying that planned economies struggle to use capital wisely without a pricing system. In Russia, economist Boris Brutzkus independently criticized the economic ideas of the Communist leaders, agreeing with Mises and Weber that a socialist system lacks the ability to calculate value rationally due to the absence of prices.
11
Max Weber and Professor Brutzkus pointed out important issues in socialist economics, but Professor Mises provided a more detailed explanation in his work, "Die Gemeinwirtschaft." After it was published, many tried to argue against Mises’ claim that rational calculation is not possible in a centrally planned economy. Although these discussions went on for years and Mises responded to critics, it became clear that his main argument was correct. Traditional socialist plans could not reliably achieve their intended goals. Some people accepted that the loss of efficiency in socialism might be an acceptable tradeoff for a fairer distribution of wealth. Others looked for new socialist ideas that could avoid the problems pointed out by Mises. These new ideas involved either more extreme planning that removed consumer choice or added some competition into the system. The debates continue about whether these new designs can successfully solve the economic challenges of socialism.