# Why doesn’t Stalin’s version of communism work? “From each according to their abilities, to each according to their labor?”

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-doesn-t-stalin-s-version-of-communism-work-from-each-according-to-their-abilities-to-each-according-to-their-labor/1032137>\
**Category:** Great Debates\
**Created:** [August 4, 2026, 11:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-doesn-t-stalin-s-version-of-communism-work-from-each-according-to-their-abilities-to-each-according-to-their-labor/1032137 "2026-08-04T11:50:45Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
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**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\
**Post date:** [August 7, 2026, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-doesn-t-stalin-s-version-of-communism-work-from-each-according-to-their-abilities-to-each-according-to-their-labor/1032137/89 "2026-08-07T20:11:29Z")

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> [@wolfpup](#):
>
> Well, you currently have the most ruthlessly corrupt, self-serving, and utterly incompetent president the US has ever seen. Where are these controls and why aren’t they working? Congress is supposed to be a check on presidential power, and Congress is AWOL, having literally done nothing – they may as well not exist. The Supreme Court has done very little, and Trump is working around the very few rulings that have been against him. Meanwhile important national institutions are being seriously damaged and international relations with the US are at a historic low point. So what’s being done?

And in a few years someone else will be in charge and the political landscape will look different. The United States isn’t going to scatter into its component states like the Soviet Union.

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