Wal-Mart doe not run a centralized economy. It runs a business that buys items for one price in one location, then sells them at another price in another.<p>Running an economy is a political affair. People can decide not to go to Wal-Mart; they cannot as easily decide not to be a citizen.<p>Quite frankly, a large majority of the horrors of the 20th century were due to folks thinking &quot;Oh, I understand where we went wrong this last time with our centralized planning. This time will be much better!&quot; There&#x27;s a ton of reasons for this -- enough to put in a book. Or several books. And those books are out there if you are interested in them.<p>A related question is this: can you run just a simple store like Wal-Mart through a technocracy? You probably can to a certain degree, then it falls apart. The more you can automate, of course, the less actual value you are creating. Software continues to eat the world.<p>But no, feedback cycle time is not the issue. Not even close.