: In fact, I would go as far as to say that the entire economic structure of this country would collapse [without capitalists] and you would see nation-wide (if not world wide, [think about how much the U.S. drives the world economy]) famines, chaos, and general disorder. The stock market would crash, causing all the other worlds stock markets to crash, and you would end up with a depression that made the 1930s seem like a golden age.The history of the U.S.S.R. 1917-1970 disproves that melodramatic statement.
Without capitalists, the Soviet Union transformed a semi-feudal country into a world superpower in less than two generations. Indeed, the Soviet Union was the ONLY industrialized nation unaffected by the Great Depression (which resulted from capitalism, not communism).
What you are describing is simply the plot outline of Ayn Rand's paperback novel, Atlas Shrugged.
Of course, you will want to counter by saying the U.S.S.R., throughout 1970-1991, experienced a significant period of underproductivity. Granted.
Perhaps you'll wish to extrapolate from that (while acknowledging that the U.S. has also experienced a significant period of underproductivity in the same years compared to the years 1933-1970) that that the U.S.S.R. ultimately crumbled because they had no 'promethean' capitalists in which to sustain their society.
But you might want to read Kotz and Weir's Revolution From Above and Solnick's Staealing the State BEFORE you stick out your neck that far...
