Another Explanation about Star Trek

In a thread about Karl Marx moving to the US there is a suggests that socialism (and communism) would then spread in 19th century America. The thread begins with a discussion about Techno-Socialism. The discussion breaks down into an explanation of proper industrial development. Since the Gilded Age after the US civil war was a period of rapid industrial development and the concentration of wealth any action that would prevent the Robber Barons from either robbing or reduce their swag would then prevent industrial development. This attitude to Scarface some much for some theoretical goal is as scaring the commies. The agreement is that a lack of suffering will lead to lower pig iron production. Then the argument is that the US with early socialism would merely be a mere northern Brazil. But the US resembles Brazil. Brazil and US were among the last practitioners of slavery. Slavery and the production of slaves were the main exports and were also important industrially. Both countries have wide income and wealth disparities to this day.

Buried in the thread amidst the ravings about the lack of inequality was this amusing Star Trek analogy.

My pet theory on Federation society is that its a techno-communist state. The vast majority of citizens live lives of leisure and hedonistic pleasure, supported by automated production facilities. A tiny minority of self-starters work; in government sponsored research labs, or Starfleet, or administration. This results in terribly inefficient designs, such as TV remote phasers that cannot be aimed, warships with most space taken up with civilians and research labs, usage of torpedoes to carry warheads when matter transmission technology should make it a simple matter to transport warheads directly into contact with enemy shields, etc. With Starfleet made up of essentially hobbyists on a lark, there is massive rank inflation, with most of Starfleet being made up of officers with almost no enlisted personnel, as well as terrible command decisions such as taking the entire command staff of a starship on an away mission with only one anonymous security trooper for escort.