“The Russian economy should be transferred to the State Planning Commission”

The need to revive the State Planning Commission for the defense industry was discussed even in the Russian Ministry of Industry and Trade. But I think that Gosplan 2.0, as a strategic approach on fundamentally new technological grounds, should be introduced everywhere and everywhere, regardless of the sectoral affiliation of enterprises or their form of ownership. No one cancels the multistructural nature of the economy; it is simply necessary to approach the system of economic relations not as an element, but as an organized, connected and, as one would like, purposeful entity.

I will briefly outline what is meant by Gosplan 2.0.

Firstly, this is an approach to managing the national economy, in which the state unambiguously forms its strategic goals (this is partly reflected in the May Decrees) and, based on these goals, identifies tasks for regions, industries, and complexes. Roughly speaking, for the period of the “five-year plan” we, as a country, know exactly what national goals we must achieve and what economic milestones we must overcome. Strategic goals can be very different, from, say, ensuring economic growth at the level of 10% over 10 years, and ending with the achievement of the number of citizens in the country, say, 200 million by 2025 with a living wage, for example, 30 thousand rubles. By defining these goals, the state sets tasks for all organizations and enterprises in the country based on their capabilities and priorities. If there is no one to set a task, then an entity is formed (with the involvement of private or state capital), ready to solve and solve the tasks set. In fact, national goals should be decomposed to the level of specific decisions and instructions, according to which (after a certain time) a signal of execution should be received.

Secondly, Gosplan 2.0 is also an institution formed at the level of the Prime Minister of the Russian Federation headed by one of his deputies. Organizational form is, of course, a secondary issue. The main thing is the presence of authority, the ability to set tasks and control their implementation. One way or another, the current Coordinating Council for Meeting the Needs of the Armed Forces is the prototype of the future Gosplan 2.0.

Thirdly, Gosplan 2.0 is a fundamental part of the mobilization economy, an opportunity to combine all disparate economic processes into a single national economic organism. Such consolidation is not only a chance to become bigger and stronger, but also the creation of conditions for more intensive growth and holistic development.

Now about the difficulties, contradictions and possible objections of opponents …

The first obvious difficulty is the unambiguous difficulty of managing everything and everyone. Let me remind you that the system of Soviet planning reached a dead end, among other things, because its complexity was inferior to the complexity of the complex of all economic processes. That is, the control system was easier to control, which is neither more nor less – but it contradicts the systemic laws of the universe. It is impossible to manage the modern economy with “punched cards”. Accordingly, the control system must be radically complicated. For these purposes, the tool of modern digital (in particular, blockchain) platforms is perfect. It is obvious that the modern State Planning Commission can only be digital, that is, organized on the basis of processing millions (and in fact millions millions millions …) of ongoing and planned transactions (big data). Schematically, Gosplan 2.0 can be represented in the form of a classic “black box” from cybernetics. At the entrance to the “black box” we have national goals and public and state priorities, and at the exit – tasks and instructions for all possible participants to achieve the stated goals and priorities. The mission of Gosplan 2.0 is to translate goal-setting from the language of slogans into the language of operational plans and tactical tasks understandable to the final executors. Is it possible to ensure the passage of these procedures technologically? We answer: it is possible! All technologies, as well as the necessary capacities, are available in our country. Let’s use them!

The second contradiction is the availability of the necessary array of critically important (or rather, complete) information about all transactions in the country, which is necessary for the operation of the “black box”. Do we have this information? We answer: there is. For example, at present, the Federal Tax Service (FTS), as they say, “sees” everything that happens in the national economy in real time. If we add information from the Federal Customs Service (FCS) here, then the volume of up-to-date data automatically increases by taking into account export-import operations in the space of the EAEU and its partners. By adding data from the MFC and the Gosuslugi portal (place of work, education, relocation, changes in the property or family status of citizens, etc.), we get an almost complete picture of everything that is happening in our economy, both now and in retrospective order . Fixing what is happening in the blockchain makes the arrays of this information not only accurate, but also protected from fraud and manipulation.

And here we recall the third difficulty – the need to effectively manage this information and perform operations with these arrays. Here, the modern information technologies already indicated above come to our aid, capable of working with almost any gigantic amount of data. Our “black box” is evolving from a signal converter to a critical tool for strategic and operational planning. That is, information from various sources (the Federal Tax Service, the Federal Customs Service, Gosuslugi, etc.), entering the “black box” in real time, becomes the basis for setting goals and objectives for all economic entities in the country.

The next difficulty that you can identify is the confusion, chaos, excesses and voluntarism in setting goals. Roughly speaking, I immediately recall corn from Nikita Sergeevich Khrushchev, which they tried to plant everywhere – from the taiga and tundra to the subtropics. Here I would also like to focus on the fact that the adoption of any decisions in Gosplan 2.0 is designed to be based on incoming operational and accumulated information. Roughly speaking, the past positive (as well as negative) experience in the “black box” cannot be ignored. Accordingly, the role and place of this or that organization, association or production complex in Gosplan 2.0, in theory, should be determined based on the possibilities and prospects for economic development.

Here we can be “presented” with the following, fifth, contradiction, which can be formulated as follows: how can one ensure the adequacy of planning in changing market conditions and constant turbulence? There is also a completely understandable answer to this objection: any planning, especially strategic, is in the nature of setting goals “within the limits of the possible”, that is, it is important not to guess the accuracy of forecasting up to fractions of a percent, but to get the result planned within the declared norm “from and to”. In addition, the constant receipt of primary data and verified information in real time on thousands of different parameters (including information about countries and competing systems in the world) allows you to adjust and refine not only tasks, but also control signals to performers, their operational plans and road maps. ” in real time.

How might all this look in practice? As I have already said, the state determines its goals, objectives, plans and priorities for the future. This information is open to enterprises. Accordingly, companies can also plan their future, knowing about the possible sale of their products. It is easier to get a loan for the implementation of formulated and published plans, since the bank is confident in the reality of economic processes. No one cancels competition either, since the multistructural nature of the economy implies a competition of proposals for solving certain production or social problems. Again, the state nature of the plans allows companies to diversify their activities and timely rearmament in the right direction. Economic prospects become clear both for the state and for the market. In such conditions, work becomes not only more predictable, but also more productive.

In fact, the digital Gosplan is also solving a whole range of parallel and extremely practical tasks. For example, it is easier for an enterprise to look for partners and suppliers (all the information is available). Here, the Gosplan 2.0 platform functions as a marketplace, reducing transaction costs and saving time and other resources for enterprises. Gosplan 2.0 can also perfectly manage the harmonious spatial development, eliminating the territorial imbalance and correcting the social and economic development of our territories in the right direction. This also adds the management of the personnel potential of territories and industries. Gosplan 2.0 can help optimize migration flows, and it can help specific people in building an individual professional career trajectory, suggesting in time where and what kind of specialists are needed, in what quantity and what qualifications. In addition, Gosplan 2.0 is a state order exchange, a showcase of development institutions, a platform for promoting projects, attracting personnel, partners and investments. If you like, Gosplan 2.0 is also a bit of a metauniverse, but in addition to the virtual part, it also has a very real life both in the forms of economic relations familiar to us and in promising forms.

Now about the practical implementation of the ideas for implementing the principles of Gosplan 2.0… I would like to point out right away that technologically and organizationally we are already unequivocally ready to introduce Gosplan 2.0 into real life and manage the economy. It is necessary to bring the necessary regulatory and legal framework, which, in principle, is also quite realistic. Accordingly, it is necessary to make a decision on the implementation of Gosplan 2.0 at the highest level, which does not have to wait – it needs to be prepared. And, in my firm opinion, there is simply no alternative to state target planning based on modern technological digital solutions.