Hence, the science of the history of society, despite all the complexity of the phenomena of social life, can become as precise a science as, let us say, biology, and capable of making use of the laws of development of society for practical purposes.

Hence, the party of the proletariat should not guide itself in its practical activity by casual motives, but by the laws of development of society, and by practical deductions from these laws.

Hence, socialism is converted from a dream of a better future for humanity into a science.

JV. Stalin
September 1938
Dialectical and Historical Materialism

I’ve been too harsh on Amazon and it’s clumsy intervention in tenant landlord legislation in Olympia. Amazon should be involved and in a way more significant than writing unsigned letters and contributing a couple million bucks to eviction prevention. Let’s just turn housing over to Amazon and let them run it. I think it could work out, as our President says, beautifully. No more worries about resource allocation or those pesky prices. Here’s how it could work.

Rents

If we use our phones, Amazon could tell everyone exactly how much we should be paying for rent. By bringing to bear hundreds if not thousands of variables and running historical and economic analysis, the algorithm could tell you how much you should be paying. If you’re paying too much, then Amazon could raise other people’s rent, take that extra money and allocate it to cover yours. The other person wouldn’t feel it because all these calculations would be instant and entirely based on an income formula that would take into account all costs. We would see the world described by Karl Marx in his Critique of the Gotha Program, “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.”

Housing Distribution

And if we finally made housing a right, all my worries about there being rationing would be mere pearl clutching. Amazon’s data systems would be able to quantify and qualify every square foot of real estate in a city or county and match up people with that space. Along with income data, we’d achieve the planner’s dream, everyone would sort into exactly the allocated space, say 500 square feet, and they’d pay exactly 30 percent of their income for that space, no more and no less. If you were looking for housing all you’d have to do is sign up and you’d get an address. It’s yours! The lease would be preapproved based on your credit scores and income. If anything changed in your income, no problem. You’d just be sorted into another spot.

Income and Spending

Eventually, along with housing we could have world in which all income and spending is simply taken out of our hands. In this world, we wouldn’t need cash, just an application on our phone that would tell us exactly what we should be earning and how much we should spend. Want to earn more? No problem, just tell Alexa how much you want to earn and you’ll be signed up for whatever educational resources you need to get that dream job. You don’t need to go anywhere or do anything; it’s all taken care of.

The United States of Amazon

Let’s stop squabbling about all this housing stuff and turn things over to people who know what they’re doing. Just sit back, relax, and order some stuff.  The United States of Amazon is Earth’s most customer-centric country, where citizens can find and discover anything they might want to buy online, at the lowest possible prices. Well, we won’t need prices anymore will we? Our phones will tell us what to do. And that apparent distinction between capitalism and socialism will be resolved. It will all work out in the end. It’s science after all.