Talk politics.

Actually the bigger pitfall of the command economy is that bad economic performance becomes treason, to be punished with the Gulag or the bullet in the back of the head, followed by being dumped in an anonymous grave courtesy NVKD liquidation squads. The monopoly is bad, but not the worst by a long shot part of the historical command economies. This is also why command economies turned bullshitting and truthiness to art forms. Better to lie and say you met a quota that was unfulfillable than to be tortured by Beria's bully boys while he's raping your daughter.