COMMENTARY ON THE RELEVANCE OF THE PROBLEM OF ECONOMIC CALCULATION TO PRESENT TURMOIL by Manuel F. Ayau At the Caracas meeting I suggested that on this occasion, attention be given to the problem of Economic Allocation of Resources (the Problem of Economic Calculation) in an economy where private ownership of resources does not exist due to formal abolition as in a socialistic or communistic state, or is to a high degree absent de facto as a consequence of legal intervention by government in the market, whereby the price structure that would otherwise exist is intentionally distorted to varying unmeasurable degrees, depending on the amount of intervention and of economic planning. It is understandable that this topic be absent in the dis- cussions of the "left wing" environments of the free world; it is indeed a very sore point. Not surprisingly, however, it is a matter constantly being discussed in Eastern Europe and Russia, without doubt because since the sphere of true market transactions is SO limited, the significance of the problem to them is more apparent, the irrationality of their system more and more evident. My suggestion was prompted by the observation that this very crucial point is conspicuously absent in the repertoire of arguments in the periodicals and discussions involved pre- cisely in defending Liberalism and opposing Socialism and the Welfare State in all its forms. Needless to say, I am not going to say anything new on the nature of the problem of economic calculation. As far as I