Karl Polanyi
Karl Polanyi (1886-1964) who was an editor of the Austrian weekly Der osterreichische Volkswirt developed his model of a socialist economy (Polanyi 1922) in response to Mises to whom he conceded that the problem of economic calculation was insoluble in a centrally administered socialist economy.
Institutionally, Polanyi proposed an economy based on guild-socialist principles. Polanyi also took great effort in elaborating a system of economic accounting. Costs and prices are calculated in the decentralized production units. He introduced a basic distinction between purely technical costs caused by nature and costs imposed on production by society, in order to make clear that the setting of social standards and minimum wages must be reflected in the cost of production. According to Polanyi, there is a constant conflict between technical productivity and the social purpose of production, which must be solved politically through bargaining, compromise, and also majority decision. In an article published in 1925 Polanyi cautiously tried to dissuade Austria’s Social Democrats from their preference for centralism and administrative-bureaucratic procedures in their economic proposals. He pointed to the examples of trade unions and the party as alternative procedures for generating information.