Who sat up with the Sick Cow?

San Jose, California – Under Communism, just about everything is free except the people. Under the optimum strategy, all private property is abolished, and jobs are, apparently, assigned according to what the social planners think is the best place for them. The way everything will be is planned according to a select group’s decisions.

According to the established laws of economics this is a disaster. It is impossible to know what everyone in society will want, so impossible to assign it. Communism has historically been the cause of famine, bloodshed, and civil unrest. Under Communism, because everyone will eat and live regardless of how much work they do there is not much incentive to work at all. Thus, when one Communist says there enough potatoes to touch the face of God, and the other tells him there is no God in Communism, he can reply that there are also no potatoes.

The cow is an important part of the economic system and market. It gives milk, leather, and beef. If you are the settlers on the Great Plains, it also gives fuel. For a long time, in some places, your wealth was measured in cattle. The cow has been so important to some societies that when the cattle began to die off, or if there was an outbreak among them, the people quickly followed them to the grave.

Sitting up with a sick cow all night is not necessarily the most glorious or fun job. If there is no incentive, it will not be done, and even in a Commune probably not delegated, it being one of those things that planners do not think about; the creation of the department of watching sick cows.

Since it is no one’s job, in Communism, it will most likely not get done. In the end the cow will usually die, and so will Communism.

Andrew C. Abbott