Critique of the Gulch
Posted by deleted 2 years ago to Ask the Gulch
Galt's Gulch is not possible in practice.
I may be mistaken in my logic, so, correct me where I went wrong.
The "book" appears to communicate the idea that a utopia will ensue once the "moguls" (productive/wealth-seeking people?) move away from the leecher masses and into their own secret society.
The problem with the above idea is that it doesn't consider the reason why the "moguls" are so productive/wealthy. The "moguls" in the book are thought to possess some magic ability to produce wealth, and, therefore, rightfully so deserve to be paid. However, there is a specific reason for this productivity. Usually, it arises out of things like "economies of scale" and "automation". These things require a huge time/financial investment. Most importantly, they require a huge market to make financially viable. A small community of highly productive people isn't going to sustain such investments. A lot of products exist today and are available for purchase only due to the massive market that exists for them, which is able to support the extreme development cost and the mind-bogglingly huge supply chain that are required for their production. There isn't enough hours in the day of Galt's Gulch members to produce much of anything. Star Trek levels of automation technology is required for what is described in the book.
I may be mistaken in my logic, so, correct me where I went wrong.
The "book" appears to communicate the idea that a utopia will ensue once the "moguls" (productive/wealth-seeking people?) move away from the leecher masses and into their own secret society.
The problem with the above idea is that it doesn't consider the reason why the "moguls" are so productive/wealthy. The "moguls" in the book are thought to possess some magic ability to produce wealth, and, therefore, rightfully so deserve to be paid. However, there is a specific reason for this productivity. Usually, it arises out of things like "economies of scale" and "automation". These things require a huge time/financial investment. Most importantly, they require a huge market to make financially viable. A small community of highly productive people isn't going to sustain such investments. A lot of products exist today and are available for purchase only due to the massive market that exists for them, which is able to support the extreme development cost and the mind-bogglingly huge supply chain that are required for their production. There isn't enough hours in the day of Galt's Gulch members to produce much of anything. Star Trek levels of automation technology is required for what is described in the book.
