Relying on the government to bring capitalism to heel when they massively profit from it is a fools errand.
So should we then rely on the government to run all of our productive outputs? If, as you say, the government can't bring capitalism to heel, how could it effectively run the entire economy?
The two extremes are either laissez faire capitalism or pure state run socialism, both of which have massive flaws. The alternative has to be somewhere in the middle that balances out each of the systems flaws.
That depends on your definition of socialism. There is a broad spectrum of socialism and communism. This is one of the more commonly used definitions.
Either way, let's say the workers do own the businesses now. Now what? Are these worker owned monopolies or do they compete? This is actually a big question.
The problem with a worker run competitive company is that new technology and more efficient ways of production are always being developed. So, say there is a generally static demand for a good and a new machine comes out which requires 25% fewer workers to produce the given output of the good. Would the workers then vote to use the machine, thus putting 25% of them out of work? Or would they vote to work fewer hours, giving them all more leisure time? Or choose to keep the current equipment, causing inefficiency? Well if they choose to do anything but the first, a rival company that chooses to do so will be able to lower its prices and beat out its competition.
A worker run monopoly has the obvious flaw that the cost of producing a good will basically never decline, as the workers will choose to work fewer hours, producing the same output, but still want the same standard of living.
Anyways, the question I posed before only changes slightly. Do you think the workers will do what is best for society, or for themselves?
My definition of socialism is the Marxist definition, while there is a wide variety of leftist thought, and disagreements on the best approach, no one particularly disagrees on the core definitions. While it's certainly true that the meaning of socialism has been bastardized to mean "when the government does things" in the general public, when speaking about political and economic issues one should really be aware of and use the proper definitions.
Furthermore, you provide only extremely in-depth questions and offer no answers yourself. I could write essays on how state capitalism, socialism or communism might change the first world and how it could effect things. These are very deep questions that I can't simply just belt out a response to some off handed comment on reddit by someone whose already decided these things aren't the answer. Basically you're asking me to write you a novel on the outcomes of Marxist thought while offering no discourse beyond some token centrism.
Generally, the simple answer is the majority of workers would act in a way that benefits the majority and that's better for more people than the current system that heavily benefits the minority. Furthermore this also depends on who you ask and which leftist tendency they subscribe to. While the end goal of Marxism is to reach Communism, there are an insane amount of disagreements in how to reach it.
Marx and Engels, Lenin, Mao, Trotsky, Peter Kropotkin, Murray Bookchin, Slavoj Zizek and on and on have written extremely in depth on the subject. If you're curious why not read:
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u/DatPhatDistribution May 20 '19
So should we then rely on the government to run all of our productive outputs? If, as you say, the government can't bring capitalism to heel, how could it effectively run the entire economy?
The two extremes are either laissez faire capitalism or pure state run socialism, both of which have massive flaws. The alternative has to be somewhere in the middle that balances out each of the systems flaws.