American View on Socialism

I wanted to open a thread to help understand, or find out, what a number of members on this forum thing about the idea of Socialism. At this point I should probably point out that we need to make a distinction between Socialism and Communism, I'm not talking about the forced handing over of private property or land, or even the abolition of the class system. When I talk about Socialism I refer more to the light hearted European form-using the wealthy to improve the lot of the poor through a balanced welfare system, socialised healthcare (such as the NHS) and the like.

 

Socialism is fine up to a point. We need to take care of those who can't take care of themselves. But when you keep expanding it to the point you take away the incentive of working, it's bad. When you tax the rich so much that they feel like they are much better off living somewhere else, that's also bad. They wind up taking their money and jobs with them. That's bad for the country. I'm afraid that is what has happened in the U.S. and Europe today.

 

Socialism knows it merely takes social morals for free to achieve a Commune of Heaven on Earth that Capitalism can never reach without a profit motive for a stairway.

 

Absolutely. That's always the essential, fundamental flaw with socialism - it always seeks to redistribute wealth, rather than equalise opportunity. Equalisation of opportunity for people to to well for themselves through their own talents and efforts also has to include elements like decent healthcare for everyone (because poor health is very effective at holding people back!) and having those with the broadest shoulders having the greatest relative share of the tax burden (and, of course simple human decency towards those who genuinely cannot succeed for themselves or who fall on temporary hard times), but it never goes so far as to remove incentive or punish those who do succeed.

That is why socialism will never succeed - ultimately it always falls foul of its own fundamental deficiencies, and then inevitably flounders towards authoritarianism and excessive nanny-state-ism.

Social justice and common decency ultimately aren't well served at all by 'Socialism', no matter how well intentioned it may be (to begin with at least), any more than they are well served by restrictive and conformist preserve-the-old-order 'Conservatism' or hands-off-everything, every-man-for-himself 'Neo-Liberalism'.

 

You may be missing the point about full employment of resources by solving for simple poverty; it means no one would have any excuse to stay poor on an at-will basis but for the subjective value of morals. Only the religious lay claim to poverty on an at-will basis, usually.

 

Socialism, which actually is not an ideology but a step towards one, in all its forms, is basically theft.

It is against the natural law of liberty that all men are born with. EVEN if a group (society) enters into a social contract and willingly agree to give up what is theirs, it is theft unless everyone agrees.

What is poverty? Who defines it? Me, you, the rich man, the poor man.......if you cannot define something it means that not everyone agrees. Will you decide by majority rule or the utilitarian principle that we decide actions based on the "greater good"?

Socialism equates to equal outcomes, not equal opportunity.

 

Solving simple poverty promotes the general welfare. We could be solving poverty with existing infrastructure in our republic. Why not solve poverty in a market friendly manner under our form of capitalism, ostensilby to enable Persons as market participants, to better conform to rational choice theory.

 

You can not solve poverty.

If people did not want to be poor now then there are ample ways for them to avoid it already.

 

I am not sure what you mean; we have representative government not heredetary government.

Our social and written Contract and Constitution, enumerates our privileges and immunities as persons in our republic.

Socialism requires some delegation of social powers to Government, for the greater good or the general welfare over the Individual welfare.

 

This thread was about socialism, not about our current form of government, at least that is what I thought. I realize we have not fully embraced socialism officially but there is no mistake that we are leaning that way, as most Western Nations are.

 

The title of this thread is a lie. You are describing a welfare state, not socialism.

 

Is there a difference?

 

There are for some people, indeed even many people, but there are some significantly disadvantaged groups for whom the opportunities are so reduced (in various ways) that the realistic chances of escaping the 'poverty trap' are almost zero. That is why you need to address the opportunity deficit for those who are born, through no fault of their own, into circumstances that massively decrease their opportunity to succeed by their own efforts and talents.

That does cost money, of course (in education, healthcare, infrastructure improvement, etc.), but the long-term advantages for EVERYONE are huge - it is very often people from those same groups needing that help that otherwise become devoid of hope, become a drain on society through welfare, etc., and turn to crime (against everyone else) as they see from those around them no hope of succeeding no matter what effort they put in.

The problem with an entirely 'libertarian' position on such issues is that it essentially assumes that everyone starts off in a position where their life success is based on what they themselves do, but for those disadvantaged groups that just isn't the case - it is far more heavily based on circumstances beyond their control. The 'libertarian dream' of everyone being rewarded for their own efforts can only begin to exist in some way if you first address the circumstances that are currently preventing it from happening for large numbers of people in certain groups.

In other words, you can't address 'poverty', or lack of sufficient wealth to have a decent life despite every effort being made, or whatever, either by just taking money from the rich to give to the poor OR by just telling the poor to just put more personal effort in. The world really doesn't work like that!

 

Yes.

The 'Welfare State' is a mechanism of providing help for the worst off in society. It can be constructed as a part of 'socialism' and 'welath redistribution', or it can be constructed as a part of addressing the opportunity deficit - it can be aimed at outcome, or it can be aimed at opportunity (in reality, of course, it will always end up doing a bit of both to some extent). It isn't inherently either, but can be used for both.

 

For starters, how do you define socialism? ANd in congrast, how do we define capitalism?

 

Your critique of libertarianism is duly noted but that critique is not new and has been addressed. If it were that difficult for people not to break out of very difficult circumstances then we would not see so many people doing it. The excuse you mentioned is simply false.

In order for your statement to be true we would have to believe that people do not understand what poverty is, that they do not understand what success is, that they have absolutely no access to knowledge about how to get out of poverty. I will search for the statistics for you, I used to have them, but roughly 40 or 50 % break out of extreme poverty....maybe it was 30%.....into the lower/middle, middle class income ranges. That does not support your theory at all.

This is the argument about socialism which wants equality of outcome, not equality of opportunity. Yes, perhaps 70% may remain in poverty, but that is not because there is no way out for them, it is because they are not motivated to do what that 30% have done.

 

Welfare State: A capitalist country that uses taxation to fund an overkill social safety net.

Socialism: An economic system based around collective ownership (whatever that means) of everything.

Communism: System of government based around Socialism.

 

It is subjective.

 

You forgot the Warfare-State: It needs enemies of the State in order to pertuate itself, even if we have to sacrifice Individual Liberty for the sake of perceived security.

 

The almighty dollar prevails over patriotism. Luvit or Leevit, well, that's one thing. "payit or leevit" is a whole new ballgame.

 

Funny, that's how I feel about capitalism.

 

A healthy nation is a prosperous nation - so NHS (socialised medicine) is surely a win win

 

Of course we would see people doing it - there will always see some who manage, because the opportunity is massively reduced, not actually zero. The problem is that we don't see enough people doing it - people giving equal effort and with equal talent are not getting anything like equal life chances, based on circumstances beyond their control and that are no fault of their own.

For example, if education in poor areas is poor (which it often is), then pupils of equal talent giving equal effort will almost always end up getting poorer results. It's not their fault at all, but it happens because of the educational opportunities they have being less. Some people, of course, will have more talent and/or put in greater effort (and effort is not only entirely their fault either - family circumstances, including family health issues, can have a huge effect on the effort kids are able to apply) and will get better results, but those are the exceptional ones - for the rest, the simply fact that they were born into poverty restricted their educational opportunities and therefore their life chances.

It's nothing to do with understanding the problem - they know if their school is rubbish. They can't do anything about it, though - it's not their fault, and it's beyond their control. That knowledge, of course, makes things even worse. They can see others with far greater opportunity. They can see that 'people like them' are held back by circumstances. They can see good people around them working hard but getting nowhere much because of their circumstances. That robs them of hope, and once hope is gone incentive is much reduced, and escape becomes extremely unlikely!

Add to that the same experience by the same community for generation upon generation, and you have a whole community devoid of hope, and a downward spiral where there is no incentive and therefore often little effort. Some people do manage to break that vicious circle for themselves occasionally, but it will never be enough to actually make a difference to that community itself.

The idea of people being 'free to succeed for themselves' (one I wholeheartedly endorse) only actually applies if they start of with hope, incentive and opportunity. Too many people in society simple don't, and that needs to be addressed before the whole system can work as it should. It's not enough to say 'work hard and you will do well, or at least OK' if kids grow up knowing that their chances of success are slim, and seeing almost everyone around them working immensely hard but still struggling to make ends meet, and it's even worse if the people who seem to be 'doing best for themselves' are those who have turned to crime! You have to actually get in there and begin to address some of the problems within those parts of society - that costs money, of course, and takes time, but it is in the long term interests of everyone (so well worth doing).

 

Not sure I agree; in Britain it seems it's the wealthy who get all the tax breaks-and even then they want to move their money offshore.

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2012/apr/10/osborne-tax-cut-rich-poor

 

Nonsense. You're suggesting that poverty is a lifestyle choice, or the result of poor decision making? Am I hearing the conservative mantra of 'personal responsibility'?