Bezos and Amazon Have Done What The Russians Could Never Ever Do ~ Build A Successful Soviet Union

Allow me to clarify something first about Karl Marx. It will be quick and not too boring.

But before we start there, we first have to talk a little about Elon Musk, and his possible new ringmate, since ostensibly, if we’re being kind: they’re both media hounds and bored billionaires.

Elon is very much intertwined with his two companies that grant him enormous wealth, and have been a driver of innovation, though what Bezos has crafted is infinitely more better (minus his version of SpaceX); these companies are, of course, SpaceX and the electric car manufacturer Tesla.

Elon is pretty much synonymous with these companies as Bezos is with Amazon. Which leads us to Marx.

How synonymous is the name Karl Marx with Soviet Communism, and how well deserving is he of that title?

The answer to question one is: Very. It’s been heavily propagandised by both sides, West, East, Liberal and Conservative.

To the second, the answer is certainly a big no. As in no way. No, thank you, sir or miss, and could you, please, now get out of my face and leave me alone.

This article could easily be an hour long explaining this, but since I, a Marxist-economist, easily get bored, and rarely wants to read something more than four minutes long, unless it’s an audible or podcast to fall asleep to; I’d rather just give you the shortened version.

Here it is. (Let me know what you think.)

Marx died.

Yep, that’s about it. Our dear Karl passed away nearly fifty years, 5–0, before there was even a Russian revolution or a USSR.

(So any attempts to sue him with that paternity test are likely to fail, if the judges are sane and reasonable.)

The other problem is, when Marx was talking about the conversion between Socialism to Communism from a rapacious capitalism, he was thinking of the United Kingdom, England, or Great Britain, as it was known, not a more primitive, less industrialised country like Russia.

Now, I have to skip over Lenin, Stalin, the Great Purge, and even Pootie to get to the thesis of this article.

Bezo’s Amazon, his unique vision, not a made by committee thing, is what the USSR was striving to be*.

(*Amazon departs from Marx here too, because Marx, in the same materialist tradition of Adam Smith, too, went with choice, believing in a market-oriented system along Socialist imperatives. Marx’s vision is not a command economy.)

Yet Bezos has achieved something that Elon and the defunct USSR could not, providing a company that works more as an appliance: like your refrigerator, your car, your shower, or even electricity; it is a user-upon-demand supplier, with its own internal divisions acting as both supplier, producer, organiser, manager, or Kommissar* of the system, chief regulator, shipper and provider.

And it does this all very efficiently.

(*Amazon have set prices for products, most notably ebooks, audibles; fixing prices on its platform, just like a Soviet Command Economy.)

By containing competition because it controls (in many but not all) the supply chain* (Amazon sets the prices. Again, not on all products.) the presentation, the negotiation, and collection of payment, and shipping to the consumer.

By handing all these tasks, in essence, Amazon works as a command economy, but unlike the past USSR, a successful one.

Why? That is, how has Bezos succeeded when the Russians failed?

A few quick ideas, so this article isn’t too long; Russians have in their history always struggled with corruption and internal divisions.

Who hasn’t right? These have existed in every country in any era of history. Yet it has been noted, documented, that is, by Russian economists, that the USSR wasted many of its inputs to production.

One great problem it had, was due to its repressive political system and diminished civil liberties, which predates the USSR, going back to the Tsars, when politics itself was essentially illegal, prior to the establishment of a state Duma (or parliament), and it was hobbled by an ideology that prevented a lack of incentives for its workers and overall productivity. Not that Amazon is that worried about its workers either, but unlike the USSR, Amazon is free of political restraints to make business decisions, and its workers can quit if they don’t like the pay or working conditions.

This in essence, allows the company to focus on results, and shed unnecessary workers and hire new ones* to meet needs and expectations.

(*The ability to sack workers is an important one. People who don’t work or are not committed to quality or the company’s goals, can have a huge effect on results , since it is workers, alongside automation creates all the value: quality of service, prices, efficiency, and output. Something the USSR had problems with for largely political reasons, not economic ones.)

If Amazon could only be expanded, put under some light political control; it could, as it is, or its model; be a great boon for everyone as a State Corporation.

China is having mixed success with this so-called State Capitalism, which is really a type of Socialism. But as mentioned earlier, though there are many efficiencies to marvel at; political prerogatives are too getting in the way; as the Chinese Communist Party exerts more political control, with golden shares, and outright detention or intimidating Chinese executives.

How successful the Chinese model is (It’s already very successful but not ideal.), is open for debate. One notable success is in investment in new technologies, especially with military applications and with A.I.

As for Amazon though, ironically, it might usher in a new epoch of Socialism for us, but hopefully, not China’s dystopian and autocratic form.

But a good kind of Socialism that benefits us all.

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