Posted on 06/14/2008 7:40:17 AM PDT by stockpirate
It was common in those days, as it is in ours, to identify the Communists as leftist and the Nazis as rightists, as if they stood on opposite ends of the ideological spectrum. But Mises knew differently. They both sported the same ideological pedigree of socialism. "The German and Russian systems of socialism have in common the fact that the government has full control of the means of production. It decides what shall be produced and how. It allots to each individual a share of consumer's goods for his consumption."
The difference between the systems, wrote Mises, is that the German pattern "maintains private ownership of the means of production and keeps the appearance of ordinary prices, wages, and markets." But in fact the government directs production decisions, curbs entrepreneurship and the labor market, and determines wages and interest rates by central authority. "Market exchange," says Mises, "is only a sham."
Mises's account is confirmed by a remarkable book that appeared in 1939, published by Vanguard Press in New York City (and unfortunately out of print today). It is The Vampire Economy: Doing Business Under Fascism by Guenter Reimann, then a 35-year old German writer. Through contacts with German business owners, Reimann documented how the "monster machine" of the Nazis crushed the autonomy of the private sector through onerous regulations, harsh inspections, and the threat of confiscatory fines for petty offenses.
"Industrialists were visited by state auditors who had strict orders to examine the balance sheets and all bookkeeping entries of the company or individual businessman for the preceding two, three or more years until some error or false entry was found," explains Reimann. "The slightest formal mistake was punished with tremendous penalties. A fine of millions of marks was imposed for a single bookkeeping error." Reimann quotes from a businessman's letter: "You have no idea how far state control goes and how much power the Nazi representatives have over our work. The worst of it is that they are so ignorant. These Nazi radicals think of nothing except ‘distributing the wealth.' Some businessmen have even started studying Marxist theories, so that they will have a better understanding of the present economic system.
"While state representatives are busily engaged in investigating and interfering, our agents and salesmen are handicapped because they never know whether or not a sale at a higher price will mean denunciation as a ‘profiteer' or ‘saboteur,' followed by a prison sentence. You cannot imagine how taxation has increased. Yet everyone is afraid to complain. Everywhere there is a growing undercurrent of bitterness. Everyone has his doubts about the system, unless he is very young, very stupid, or is bound to it by the privileges he enjoys.
"There are terrible times coming. If only I had succeeded in smuggling out $10,000 or even $5,000, I would leave Germany with my family. Business friends of mine are convinced that it will be the turn of the ‘white Jews' (which means us, Aryan businessmen) after the Jews have been expropriated. The difference between this and the Russian system is much less than you think, despite the fact that we are still independent businessmen."
As Mises says, "independent" only in a decorous sense. Under fascism, explains this businessman, the capitalist "must be servile to the representatives of the state" and "must not insist on rights, and must not behave as if his private property rights were still sacred." It's the businessman, characteristically independent, who is "most likely to get into trouble with the Gestapo for having grumbled incautiously."
"Of all businessmen, the small shopkeeper is the one most under control and most at the mercy of the party," recounts Reimann. "The party man, whose good will he must have, does not live in faraway Berlin; he lives right next door or right around the corner. This local Hitler gets a report every day on what is discussed in Herr Schultz's bakery and Herr Schmidt's butcher shop. He would regard these men as ‘enemies of the state' if they complained too much. That would mean, at the very least, the cutting of their quota of scarce and hence highly desirable goods, and it might mean the loss of their business licenses. Small shopkeepers and artisans are not to grumble."
"Officials, trained only to obey orders, have neither the desire, the equipment, nor the vision to modify rules to suit individual situations," Reimann explains. "The state bureaucrats, therefore, apply these laws rigidly and mechanically, without regard for the vital interests of essential parts of the national economy. Their only incentive to modify the letter of the law is in bribes from businessmen, who for their part use bribery as their only means of obtaining relief from a rigidity which they find crippling."
Says another businessman: "Each business move has become very complicated and is full of legal traps which the average businessman cannot determine because there are so many new decrees. All of us in business are constantly in fear of being penalized for the violation of some decree or law."
Business owners, explains another entrepreneur, cannot exist without a "collaborator," i.e., a "lawyer" with good contacts in the Nazi bureaucracy, one who "knows exactly how far you can circumvent the law." Nazi officials, explains Reimann, "obtain money for themselves by merely taking it from capitalists who have funds available with which to purchase influence and protection," paying for their protection "as did the helpless peasants of feudal days."
"It has gotten to the point where I cannot talk even in my own factory," laments a factory owner. "Accidentally, one of the workers overheard me grumbling about some new bureaucratic regulation and he immediately denounced me to the party and the Labor Front office."
Reports another factory owner: "The greater part of the week I don't see my factory at all. All this time I spend in visiting dozens of government commissions and offices in order to get raw materials I need. Then there are various tax problems to settle and I must have continual conferences and negotiations with the Price Commission. It sometimes seems as if I do nothing but that, and everywhere I go there are more leaders, party secretaries, and commissars to see."
In this totalitarian paradigm, a businessman, declares a Nazi decree, "practices his functions primarily as a representative of the State, only secondarily for his own sake." Complain, warns a Nazi directive, and "we shall take away the freedom still left you."
In 1933, six years before Reimann's book, Victor Klemperer, a Jewish academic in Dresden, made the following entry in his diary on February 21: "It is a disgrace that gets worse with every day that passes. And there's not a sound from anyone. Everyone's keeping his head down."
It is impossible to escape the parallels between Guenter Reimann's account of doing business under the Nazis and the "compassionate," "responsible," and regulated "capitalism" of today's U.S. economy today. At least the German government was frank enough to give the right name to its system of economic control.
_________ Ralph R. Reiland, owner of Amel's Restaurant in Pittsburgh, is associate professor of economics at Robert Morris College. Further Reading: Ludwig von Mises, Omnipotent Government (Libertarian Press, [1944] 1985); Guenter Reimann, The Vampire Economy: Doing Business Under Fascism (Vanguard Press, 1939); F.A. Hayek, The Road to Serfdom (Chicago, 1947). Books by Mises and Hayek are available in our on-line catalog.
Let the fight begin, it's later than you think.
Well, that will never happen here. Except that it already has, twice. The first time was during the Woodrow Wilson Administration, and the crisis that allowed it to happen was World War I. The second time was the Roosevelt Administration and the crisis was the Great Depression. The National Recovery Administration (NRA) was every bit as facist as any organization in Germany or Italy. In both cases America woke up when the crisis ended and pulled back, at least in part, from the extreme measures that had been put in place
So, will it happen a third time in the United States? The answer is yes and it will be brought to us by a Democrat Administration under the guise of a crisis - global warming and carbon emissions. This time the crisis will never end and the world as we know it will never be the same.
I wonder why he refers to the Nazis as right wing. I would put them in the same group as the Soviets. I could of sworn somewhere I read Hitler led a Socialist party.
The only conflict at this point is who will own us, the judges & lawyers or the multilevel government.
“Herr Smith, where is your Carbon Certificate? This is very bad Herr Smith, very, very bad! I am afraid we shall not be renewing your gasoline purchase card!”
These days only left wing professors still think that way.. to offer a diversion to students who can figure out themselves the extreme error of socialism.. if given a chance.. So the proffessors don't give them the chance.. they tell them LIES.. that they fully know are LIES.. because the proffessors lie to themselves A LOT..
ELse they would not be left wing zealots..
Socialism, Fascism, communism are pretty much the same thing..
Same results, same desire to murder, they are all parasites on capitalism..
Capitalism creates wealth, the three above use that wealth UP.. like VAMPIRES..
Almost 100 years of Leftist propaganda have convinced generations that the Nazis were Right Wing. They were not, nor were the Facists. All different flavors of the same ice cream. Nazi was a nickname for the National Democratic Socialist Workers (Arbeiters) Party (NDSAP). They were to the right of the Communists, but not by much.
obama, hillary and bill;
fuehrer, vice fuehrer, vice-vice fuehrer (not to mentions procurer.)
IMHO
bump de bump.
“So, will it happen a third time in the United States? The answer is yes and it will be brought to us by a Democrat Administration under the guise of a crisis - global warming and carbon emissions. This time the crisis will never end and the world as we know it will never be the same.”
I think IF you look at our own energy sector and the FACT that the Democrats already control production and a lot of other aspects of the industry you will see it ALREADY has happened.
A newbie. And your saying Obama isn’t a Marxist to boot.
Nice try.
The article equates very well with what is going on now.
Those who don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it.
Obama IS A MARXIST, and McCain is a Socialist.
And you are just wrong.
The Nazi’s have always been leftists,. as in ALWAYS.
The communists and the nazi’s were just different flavors of the same drink, Marxism.
Of course it does. Modern American leftism is not as radical or as violent, of course, as nazism or communism but the underlying common principle of the individual's existing for the good of the community instead of for his own benefit is well established here.
That's all that's necessary to begin the process that led to the USSR and The Third Reich.
“To say an American democrat is a Marxist takes all the power away from the word. What is Castro, what was Mao...super duper Marxists? LOL. When someone smokes a cigarette in your house to you scream “Oh my God, my house is on fire!!!”
What exactly do you think I am “trying”? Only thing I’m trying is to apply rational thought to political debate.”
Are you as dumb as you sound or are you just pulling my leg?
If a person embraces the Marxism they are MARXIST. It is really as simple as that.
If you smoke cigarettes you are a smoker, not the house is on fire.
Try another tack this one won’t work here.
And the fact that you JUST signed up and you are trying to twist the truth for Obama means you son’t be here long troll.
First there is no such thing as an extreme Marxist, exterme Conservative, extreme Socialist.
A Marxist is one who follows and embraces the Marxist beliefs.
A Conservative is one who follows the US Constition.
A National Socialist is a Marxist that using a different method to take ove an industry than Communists. But be not decieved the industry is in fact taken over.
In the case of oil, if the free market was at work oil company’s would not need the permission of Congress to drill for gas and oil. So the Congress controls the means of production. MARXISM.
I think I guessed correctly about you and you are a newbie pro-Obama troll. Which means you won’t be posting here long. Or a McCain troll.
Screw McCain and Obama equally.
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