Obviously, the difference is that the Khmer Rouge regime existed in reality (and thus experienced the real-world effects of forcibly moving large populations from where they wanted to live to where a utopian central planner wanted them to live), as opposed to “Ecotopia” which exists in fiction (where those real-world effects can be avoided by the magic handwave of authorial denial). If you’re writing political propaganda, you can say that two and two make five all you want – if you’re trying to function in a real society, they have to make four.
Several other people have beaten me to that. The key points are:
You can’t make everybody live in the cities (Ecotopia) or the countryside (Pol Pot) without using totalitarian methods – too many people just ain’t gonna go. Ditto on being required to spend a year working in the Young Pioneers* before being allowed to have your own house or prevented from working that 21st hour to improve your standard of living.
You can’t support anywhere near existing First World populations by replacing modern large-scale agriculture with small-plot cultivation and/or hunter-gathering. (As Bryan Ekers pointed out, the author cheated by handwaving and assuming that lots of people would just leave. Where they would go, why they would just leave without fighting for their homes, and how they would start over again without the proceeds from selling their property-- which would be practically worthless in such a scenario – is left as an exercise for the reader.)
*Yeah, that’s another Commie-Godwinization. I call 'em like I see 'em.
Great Ghu, I’d forgotten just how profoundly deep the author’s ignorance of human nature ran. I’m not sure whether to say “Thanks” or “Damn You” for the reminder…
I’m still trying to comprehend how they’ll have this with the population spread out over large areas, as it will have to be to support itself by hunting. They’ll presumably depopulate any edible animals near the cities, too. But can’t you see Joe coming back on the monorail with a nive buck slung over his shoulder.
Iritatingly, that tech already exists. It’s just politically unpopular with the green crowd.
There are a lot of people in them who work more than the “average” and even so they are falling behind the US in productivity and wealth.
I’m not very good at debate, which is why I’ve basically kept out of my own thread, but I wanted to make a few comments:
smiling bandit:
I shouldn’t have emphasized the hunting so much, I guess. The book pretty clearly painted hunting as a supplement to standard agriculture. Still, I don’t recall how/where the agriculture was organized – it may well have been glossed over. (And there actually was a scene much like what you depict in the book.)
Steve MB:
It’s true that the move to urban living was assumed to be voluntary, since the entire population pretty much shared the values of the book. But on the other hand, it seems like a close approximation (say 90% compliance) could be achieved in the real world without violence, using financial incentives and stricter regulations.
And a correction on the “Young Pioneers” scenario: only people who want to build a house need to volunteer their time. Buying a house wasn’t restricted. It was at least in part a measure to restrict sprawl.
Also, while I concede that I know almost nothing about the 20-hour week issue (so I don’t know if it would really make sense to do), I don’t see enforcement as nearly that draconian. Companies today are restricted to a 40-hour workweek; they get fined if they start requiring unpaid overtime. Why would similar rules not be applied to a 20-hour week?
** Kimstu**:
I think you’re right, that seems to be an underlying question in this discussion. I wonder how one would go about trying to answer it?
Huh? Companies are not restricted to a 40-hour workweek. They can ask you to work as many hours as they wish (except regulated jobs like airline pilot). Sure, they have to pay overtime. Unless you’re a salaried employee, then you can work as much as you wish for the same amount of pay.
If you just want to make 20 hours a week the cutoff for requriing overtime pay, then fine. It won’t make much of a change, since all the employers can just cut their base rate of pay by something like 2/3rds. Kind of pointless though, since it won’t do anything to reduce the number of hours worked per person per week, which I thought was the purpose.
Heh. A 100% tax doesn’t sound like a good way to generate revenue. Laffer curve anyone?
A 100% inheritance tax might make sense from a social engineering standpoint, but it surely isn’t going to get you much money…especially if everyone is kept near the poverty level through your other social engineering policies. If all your social engineering is designed to prevent people from accumulating wealth, they probably aren’t going to have much on-the-books wealth when they die anyway.
Long time since I read the book, but I think the purpose of the 20-hour work-week is to prevent unemployment by spreading the jobs around. It’s cheaper for an employer to hire two people to work 20-hour weeks at the same wage, than to hire one to work 20 hours at the regular wage plus 20 hours at overtime rates.
Yeah, but it would be even cheaper to hire one guy for 40 hours and pay him 2/3rds the regular wage. And what about all the people who now have to work 2 20 hour a week jobs, and have to spend extra time commuting to their first job, commuting to their 2nd job, then commuting home?
Anyway, the whole premise makes no sense, like there are only a finite number of work hours to be done, and the whole economy is a zero-sum game. The more people work, the more goods and services are produced, thus increasing the supply of things to buy with your money. Increase the supply, lower the price. Decrease the supply, raise the price. Capping work at 20 hours a week means you make half as much as before, except everything also costs roughly twice as much, so your effective economy is 1/4 the size.
This is how recessions and depressions work…people are out of work, they spend less, fewer goods and services can be sold, factories and companies that provide those goods and sevices cut production, they have to lay off employees, those employees are out of work, they spend less…
But economic booms work in reverse…if I make twice as much money, I’m going to (all else being equal) consume roughly twice as many goods and services as before. That CREATES new jobs, jobs for people who are providing those goods and services. Those people consume more goods and services, creating more jobs for producing those goods and services.
