Capitalism vs Communism.

[Aristus]

The fanatical disciples of the free market live in mortal terror of the United States morphing into the Soviet Union.

In the Soviet Union, a tiny fraction of the population lived in privileged luxury and comfort, free from the terrors of an out-of-control police state, while the majority of the population lived a hand-to-mouth existence, always at risk for starving or freezing to death, while murderous police gangs roamed the streets, shooting citizens with impunity.

Which is pretty much the system we already have here right now.

So what is it the Ayn Rand types are afraid of again?...

[comradebillyboy]

1. There is a reason why every socialist state in Europe

went to a market economy as soon as the Soviet Union collapsed. There is a reason why China adopted a form of state capitalism under the rule of the Chinese Communist Party. The Soviets and Chinese executed millions of capitalists yet capitalism persisted. Socialism just hasn't worked out very well for the people of those countries.

Socialism has been rejected because of poor performance.

[rampartc]

7. and the last time a socialist economy needed a $2T bailout?

the failed system is american style capitalism.

[comradebillyboy]

23. The last successful socialist state

was what?

[Voltaire2]

34. Norway?

define 'socialist state'.

[comradebillyboy]

39. Norway has a free market economy

Socialism is a political, social, and economic philosophy encompassing a range of economic and social systems characterised by social ownership of the means of production and workers' self-management of enterprises.

That’s pretty much what Marx and Engels came up with in the 19th century. If you’re looking for a country that matches this definition, your search won’t take you to northern Europe. The simple fact is that Scandinavian countries are not, by any reasonable definition, socialist.

In 2015, in fact, the Prime Minister of Denmark, in a lecture at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, addressed the issue directly.

"I know that some people in the US associate the Nordic model with some sort of socialism. Therefore, I would like to make one thing clear. Denmark is far from a socialist planned economy. Denmark is a market economy."

https://www.lifeinnorway.net/scandinavian-socialism/

[Voltaire2]

42. norway's energy sector is almost entirely state owned.

Denmark, fyi, is not Norway.

[hunter]

41. Pick ANY functional state in the modern world. They are all socialist states in some ways...

... and capitalist in others.

Mixed economies work.

Purely Libertarian, Socialist, and Communist societies don't work.

Pretty much all the "isms" are bullshit, including nationalism and patriotism.

Human progress is made most rapidly by people who can work peacefully for the greater good with other people who may not share similar religions, cultures, languages, skin color, gender, sexuality, etc.., by people who CELEBRATE our human diversity.

At the same time we have to recognize that some cultures are destructive and do our best to bring them into the light, ideally by kindness, but otherwise by resilience and strength.

[Demsrule86]

24. We need capitalism with regulation...communism would never work and has never worked anywhere.

In fact, Marx said it would never work in the real world.

[quaker bill]

43. It is good then that no one is proposing it

no one is proposing it. No plan to do this exists.

[Turin_C3PO]

15. The answer is highly regulated capitalism

with a generous safety net and things like guaranteed vacation time, maternity leave, higher minimum wage, etc. I think Scandinavia has a pretty good system worked out. Not sure if it could work in the United States but we’d be wise to move in that direction.

[Bettie]

37. Yep, a combo of socialism and capitalism

with robust regulation to ensure that neither abuses the people who live under the system.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

2. SRSLY?

In the Soviet Union, a tiny fraction of the population lived in privileged luxury and comfort, free from the terrors of an out-of-control police state, while the majority of the population lived a hand-to-mouth existence, always at risk for starving or freezing to death, while murderous police gangs roamed the streets, shooting citizens with impunity.

Which is pretty much the system we already have here right now.

[Aristus]

3. Members of the Poliburo had vacation homes, limousines, and plenty of good food to eat.

Real proletariats there...

[Aristus]

6. It doesn't have to.

We're living the way we would under the Soviet system anyway.

Right around the time detente happened in the early '70's, we devalued the dollar, and started busting the unions. The 1950's dream of broad-based economic prosperity, however much it differed from the reality, became unattainable by that point.

[Aristus]

11. That's what I'm hoping.

n/t

[Klaralven]

17. We did pass through a one-way door in the '70s.

US' supply of cheap resources were running out. The Texas, Oklahoma and California conventional oil fields were drying up. The Iron Range in Minnesota was played out, as were the great copper mines of Montana and Arizona.

We had used up a lot of those resources as arms supplier to the winning sides of WW I&II. We emerged from WW II with the planets only large, intact industrial base, and we had acquired most of the globe's gold supply at Fort Knox. We lived well on our winnings for thirty years, but by the mid '70s we had used up our advantages.

Since then we've been battling to hold off more intelligent, harder working, and more disciplined competitors in Japan, the Asian Tigers, and China.

[Turin_C3PO]

33. Not more intelligent.

Humans are humans everywhere. No one ethnic group is smarter than another.

[Demsrule86]

26. No we are not living under the Soviet system. The economic system is one giant grift for one man

Putin...you will never convince me or most Americans that communism could ever work or would be desirable. And saying that both capitalism and communism are 'bad' sure doesn't make me want to try communism...into the pot from the frying pan...don't you think?

[Aristus]

27. Absolutely.

I believe absolutely that a government serves its people best with a balanced combination of public and private endeavor.

But try convincing the GOP of that.

[The Magistrate]

5. One Is Reminded, Sir, Of An Old Soviet Era Jest

"Capitalism is the exploitation of man by man. Communism is just the opposite."

[Irish_Dem]

8. Greed and corruption the human norm no matter what political system?

[Aristus]

9. My point exactly.

n/t

[Irish_Dem]

12. The world is ruled by ruthless wealthy oligarchs and corrupt politicians.

In the US, the good guys are allowed into the WH every 8 years to clean up the GOP mess.
Just to make sure the people don't catch on to the game.

[Irish_Dem]

14. Are humans inherently good or evil? Rosseau vs Locke

I used to think most people were a combination of good and evil.
And that pure goodness or pure evil were in the minority.

But in the last 4 years I have learned the pure evil is much more prevalent than I realized.

[Turin_C3PO]

16. From my studies,

I’d say people are good when it comes to individual and “tribal” relationships. We tend to be kind, generous, etc. in those conditions. But we adopt a different mindset to those outside our tribe. We are more ruthless with outsiders.

[Irish_Dem]

18. But the GOP is fine with killing a half a million Americans.

Members of their own tribe.

But of course, the GOP probably sees Americans as outsiders, not part of their tribe.

[Irish_Dem]

21. It is a dark, dangerous time now. I hope the expansive period is on the way.

The corruption, greed and evil is overwhelming. And almost unbearable to sensitive souls who see things too clearly at times.

I have long felt the 21st century will bring good news for the human species. But this century has certainly started on a horrific note.

[Turin_C3PO]

35. I don't believe that.

There’s less violence, world wide, now than there has ever been. Less violence in the US especially. We have our problems but no one era is more enlightened than another.

[TheBlackAdder]

20. Soviet and Chinese Communism are not what Karl Marx wrote about, but totalitarian perversions.

.

Unbridled Capitalism and Communism are equally as destructive to a society.

The RWers love to quote Adam Smith (Father of Capitalism) when he discussed what we refer to as the "Invisible Hand of Government", however, they seem to ignore him a couple of chapters away when he states that for a capitalist country to thrive, there must be an aggressive tiered tax structure that heavily taxes the wealthy. New Republicans conveniently overlook this because it doesn't play in well with the self-affecting nature of greedy sociopaths.

.

[Aristus]

25. I agree.

Marxism isn't anything like the actuality of Leninisn-Stalinism.

Maybe I should have put quotes around the "Communism" in the OP.

Right-wingers don't have a clue what Marxism is. They've just been trained by nearly a century of anti-Communist howling to believe that anything they disapprove of must be Communism.

[Demsrule86]

28. Marxism, Communism... doesn't exist anywhere.

[Aristus]

29. Nomadic hunter-gatherer societies had probably the closest antecedent to true Marxism.

Usually until colonial powers came along and "civilized" them with, among other things, the concept of private property.

[TheBlackAdder]

30. Neither does Libertarianism, but that won't stop those fools from professing it as legitimate. 😂

[Voltaire2]

32. well except of course in China, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Cuba, North Korea

all of which are still marxist-leninist states, and combined account for around 20% of the world's population.

Also there are a lot of states that have some form of democratic socialism, I guess we won't count those either.

[lindysalsagal]

31. Thankyou.

We're confusing a philosophical descriptor and an organizational construct in the same straw man argument:

Neither is valid.

Economics are never binary choices, and russia was never communist, just like we were never purely capitalist.

Instead of wasting energy on false equivalencies, spend some time examining modern Canada since their independence. I'm not privy to any special knowledge, but I have many canadian friends, and they lean more towards centralized government with more social supports while still retaining provincial independence culturally.

And all of the old constructs are irrelevant now that we've outsourced manufacturing and energy. They also ignored the impact on the environment. Everything, healthcare, science, tech, all has to be re-imagined and it's all interdependent.

Don't be fooled into thinking the future is a simple choice.

[WyattKansas]

36. I have noticed for over a decade now that the U.S. is becoming...

What we used to see on the news about Eastern European and the Soviet Union when it came to what people there could actually afford and what was actually available for purchase in the 1980s.

Think about it... We used to have multiple choices from multiple big stores to small stores readily available in most places in the country. Now we have 'the Walmart!' in larger communities across the country that most people must travel to get everything. And when people get to that Walmart, they are at the mercy to the cheap crap they import from other countries and are limited to what they have in stock, which is based on the Vulture Capitalism model of 'take what we have or do without.' Only in big urban areas will people actually find multiple choices and alternatives to Walmart, but they have still been affected by the extremist Vulture Capitalism model shading those businesses as well. I have often wondered if other people have noticed that the United States is getting like what we used to see on tv about the Soviet Union when it comes to what people are allowed to actually purchase.

Until this country eliminates it's 'deregulation' dogma and corrects it's Vulture Capitalism policies the country has been operating on for decades, nothing will improve and it will only continue getting worse. FDR saved capitalism from itself by regulating it and the Democratic Party must beat the Republican Party over the head with what it has done in erasing what FDR did for the country.

[Cosmocat]

38. This is not even remotely what this country is struggling with

There is an increasingly half hearted attempt to pidgeon hole it into an economic discussion, and WE tend to think along those lines, but that is not what the other 2/3 of the country are focused on.

Even when they do, it is proxy for what is driving us over a cliff - culture.

1/3 of the county full on could give a shit at this point about economics, they just cling to their long held focus on that which might hold back "others" even if it holds them back, and the "middle" 1/3 goes along with it for similar reasons.

[Crunchy Frog]

40. It's just a manufactured bogeyman to manipulate the rubes with.

It's not a real, good faith argument (which the RW is not capable of).