As the centenary of the Russian revolution of 1917 approaches, it is worth reviewing the past 100 years' discussion amongst economists on the possibility – or otherwise – of economic planning under socialism. The socialist calculation debate is of fundamental importance, not merely as a...

Following Mises’s foundational paper, ‘Economic Calculation in the Socialist Commonwealth’, first published in 1920, writers in the Austrian tradition have argued that socialism is impossible, because under socialism there would be no private property in the means of production, and...