What's wrong with communism?

[Tobiasly]

Originally posted by sycamore
What's wrong with communism? Sure it was bad in practice, but it's a nice theory, IMO.

What's wrong with communism is that you can't separate practice from theory. Even a die-hard Reaganomics proponent like me agrees that "to each according to his need, from each according to his ability" (sorry if I butchered that) sounds like a pretty cool idea.

However, humans are greedy people. I'm greedy, and you're greedy. We're also lazy. It's in our nature. Some of us are more greedy than others, but when it comes right down to it, each one of us will take care of ourselves and our loved ones first. Communism tries to pretend that this isn't the case, but you can't change human nature. Capitalism doesn't try to ignore this fact; it <I>counts on it</I>. By rewarding people who take risks and succeed, our whole society moves forward.

Of course it's not perfect, and there is a need for some control of the process to make sure it doesn't get outta control. But capitalism is the only economic paradigm that is based on the way humans think and act, and that is why it's the only viable choice in a modern world.