The presense of Commodity production does not mean the system is Capitalist. To that extent, if you have a 99% publicly owned and centrally planned economy, it must be Capitalist, and once that final 1% is absorbed, it becomes Communist. There is no Socialism by this definition, it's a straight jump from Capitalism to Communism. Even in the PRC, the majority of the economy is Publicly Owned and Centrally Planned. Engels disagrees with your stance:

Question 17 : Will it be possible to abolish private property at one stroke?

Answer : No, no more than the existing productive forces can at one stroke be multiplied to the extent necessary for the creation of a communal society. Hence, the proletarian revolution, which in all probability is approaching, will be able gradually to transform existing society and abolish private property only when the necessary means of production have been created in sufficient quantity.

You kill the Scientific and Dialectical aspects of Marxism and deny the existence of Socialism.

This is really 2 points in 1. "Employer" is not a class. Classes are not jobs, but relations to production. Communism will have managers, planners, and so forth to assist with economic production. The other point, on the PRC not using labor vouchers, that's for when China reaches Communism, when they are currently Socialist.
This is entirely anti-Marxist. The State is an extension of the class in power. In a fully centrally planned economy with full public ownership, there is no state. The bourgeoisie is focused on competition and accumulation, it isn't a "power dynamic" but a social relation to production. From Engels:

When ultimately it becomes the real representative of the whole of society, it renders itself superfluous. As soon as there is no social class to be held in subjection any longer, as soon as class domination and the struggle for individual existence based on the anarchy of production existing up to now are eliminated together with the collisions and excesses arising from them, there is nothing more to repress, nothing necessitating a special repressive force, a state. The first act in which the state really comes forward as the representative of the whole of society -- the taking possession of the means of production in the name of society -- is at the same time its last independent act as a state. The interference of the state power in social relations becomes superfluous in one sphere after another, and then dies away of itself. The government of persons is replaced by the administration of things and the direction of the processes of production. The state is not "abolished", it withers away. It is by this that one must evaluate the phrase "a free people's state" with respect both to its temporary agitational justification and to its ultimate scientific inadequacy, and it is by this that we must also evaluate the demand of the so-called anarchists that the state should be abolished overnight.

Bolded the most relevant bits. The state ceases to exist when classes cease to exist, because when all property is public there are no classes. However, production remains administrated and directed! I think it's quite obvious from reading the source material that Marx was no Anarchist, nor did he believe that Socialism was devoid of private property, nor could it be. This is a gradual process for Marx, one we call Socialism, as it works towards a fully Publicly Owned and Centrally Planned Economy, Communism. The government does not "extract surplus value" in a profit accumulating manner, but to pay for public services and infrastructure, directly spelled out by Marx in Critique of the Gotha Programme. The State is an extension of the dominant class, and the class which is dominant can be found through real analyzing of the trends and conditions of an economy. In the PRC, those trends are towards uplifiting the working class and continuing to fold Private Property into the Public Sector.

[–] cqst@lemmy.blahaj.zone -4 points 2 days ago (17 children)

The presense of Commodity production does not mean the system is Capitalist.

The first sentence of Capital:

The wealth of those societies in which the capitalist mode of production prevails, presents itself as “an immense accumulation of commodities,”1 its unit being a single commodity.

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/download/pdf/Capital-Volume-I.pdf

[–] Cowbee@lemmy.ml 5 points 2 days ago (2 children)

Yes, Capitalism is dominated by such a Mode of Production. It is not defined by it being present even in the microscopic. Answer, why do you think Marx and Engels wrong in the context of my quotations? This is a very "wikipedia" understanding of Marx. Do you think Marx believed Capitalism to not be dominant because feudalism was still apparent? This is silly.

[–] cqst@lemmy.blahaj.zone -4 points 2 days ago (1 children)

It is not defined by it being present even in the microscopic.

Yeah, China does not have a 'microscopic' amount of commodity production, it is infact, dominated by commodity production.

Answer, why do you think Marx and Engels wrong in the context of my quotations?

They aren't in that a certain level of productive forces are required to be present before the early stages of communism (socialism) can begin. No nation state has ever reached Socialism, in fact, it is impossible for a "Nation State" to really be socialist, from Engels principles of communism:

Will it be possible for this revolution to take place in one country alone?

No.

China is a bourgeoisie nation state, with a DoTB like every other nation state.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/996_working_hour_system

This system would NOT be possible in a DoTP.

[–] Cowbee@lemmy.ml 5 points 1 day ago

The PRC has a hair over 50% of its economy in the Public Sector, and another near tenth in the Cooperative Sector. The Private Sector makes up the minority of the economy. Furthermore, this Private Sector is gradually being folded into the Public Sector. Moreover, the Public Sector has key industries like Steel that the Private Sector must rely on, further making the Public Sector primary. In what manner is the Private Sector dominant? At what arbitrary point would you say the PRC needs to reach for it to pass your imaginary thresholds? This is silly, and anti-Marxist.

Your next paragraph elaborates on your conflation of Socialism with Communism. Communism must be international, and must be global, eventually. Socialism can begin in one country, as Socialism is the transitional phase to Communism. By your definition, a fully socialized economy in one country would still be Capitalist! Again, you directly shatter Marx and Engels telling you that under the DotP, Capital will be wrested gradually with the degree to which it develops, and call this phase "Capitalism" for seemingly no other reason than to discredit AES, even if it ends in absurd conclusions like a 99% socialized global economy being Capitalist, or a 100% socialized country being Capitalist.

This "no true Socialism" stance is anti-Marxist as well, Marx referred to the Paris Commune as a DotP and a Socialist system until it was overthrown. Even if we ignore all of AES that Marx never lived to, there has been Socialism even by Marx's words. Same with Engels, who analyzed Utopian Socialists who were working down the wrong path, but still could be considered "Socialist."

Additionally, productive forces have different levels of development in different sectors where public ownership and central planning makes more sense. There isn't such thing as a "general" level of development. Your steel industry may be well developed and thus easily planned, but your automotive may not be yet, at which point you want to use markets to centralize and then gradually increase control and ownership over that industry until its fully socialized. To go further than reality is anti-Marxist.

Further, you reference a joke, and not actual working hours, when trying to discredit the PRC. Furthermore, such a system absolutely can be present in a DotP, a DotP does not mean there is suddenly a "worker's paradise," but that the Proletariat is in control. The CPC has an over 95% approval rate, unheard of in most countries, and it owes this to the rapid transformative capacity of a Socialist economy to rapidly plan and build up infrastructure, and eliminate poverty. I want to stress, you opt to not analyze the structures and class dynamics at play, and instead believe you can reference a joke about how the PRC isn't a wonderland, not actual working hour statistics, and think that means the Bourgeoisie is in control? This is absurdity.

You have no points, Socialism is Communism for you, and you refer to a DotP with a largely publicly owned and centrally planned economy that is further absorbing the Private Sector as "Capitalist." Can you please make a point that logically follows what Marx and Engels were writing and explain why they clearly stated that the DotP will gradually wrest Capital from the Bourgeoisie, and why you believe this phase to be called "Capitalism?" This reeks of Trotskyism, which coincidentally is only really found in western countries as it isn't practical in any capacity and thus isn't dangerous to the status quo, and moreover adopts an anti-solidarity stance with AES in the Global South.

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