[arcticbull]

Deaths in the Great Leap Forward were heavily concentrated as compared to the Industrial Revolution but the death tolls from IR-related famines weren't really all that far off. Industrialization was messy everywhere.

The Irish Potato Famine alone killed 15% of Ireland vs the GLF killing 5% of China.

That's not a reason not to plan 5 years in advance... is it? Any more than the Potato Famine is a reason we should't have capitalism.

I can't say that I've ever heard the argument that a plan led to a famine therefore we should never make plans, when we have great counterexamples that not planning also led to famine. Feels like learning the wrong lesson here.

[edit] I also think it's worth pointing out that America's response to the Dust Bowl was the Farm Bill, which it could be argued is one of the largest-scale examples of central planning in history. It continues to this day, and is part of the reason Americans pay less as a share of their spending on food than any other country on earth.

People say everyone remembers the hits, nobody remembers the misses - but that is the opposite of true for government. Everyone remembers the misses, nobody thinks twice about the hits.

[mystraline]

The Irish Potato Famine was a constructed starvation by England to Ireland. All of their real foodstuffs were being stolen by England to run world-level wars everywhere, and the Irish grew what they were permitted to. Potatoes.

Then the disease hit.