Reich - The Answer Isn't Socialism; It's Capitalism that Better Spreads the Benefits ...

[ProSense]

4. Fascinating read

Summary:

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But more Keynesian stimulus won’t help solve the more fundamental problem...it can’t be a permanent solution...During the Depression decade of the 1930s, the nation reorganized itself so that the gains from growth were far more broadly distributed. The National Labor Relations Act of 1935 recognized unions’ rights to collectively bargain...Social Security, unemployment insurance, and worker’s compensation spread a broad safety net. The forty-hour workweek with time-and-a-half for overtime also helped share the work and spread the gains, as did a minimum wage. In 1965, Medicare and Medicaid broadened access to health care. And a progressive income tax, reaching well over 70 percent on the highest incomes, also helped ensure that the gains were spread fairly.

This time, though, the nation has taken no similar steps. Quite the contrary: A resurgent right insists on even more tax breaks for corporations and the rich, massive cuts in public spending that will destroy what’s left of our safety nets, including Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid, fewer rights for organized labor, more deregulation of labor markets, and a lower (or no) minimum wage.

This is, quite simply, nuts.

And this is why a second Obama administration, should there be one, must focus its attention on more broadly distributing the gains from growth. This doesn’t mean “redistributing” from rich to poor, as in a zero-sum game. It doesn’t mean socialism. The rich will do far better with a smaller share of a robust, growing economy than they’re doing with a large share of an economy that’s barely moving forward.

This will require real tax reform...a larger Earned Income Tax Credit... Medicare for all...limiting executive salaries and empowering workers to get a larger share of corporate profits. The Employee Free Choice Act should be an explicit part of the second-term agenda...We don’t need socialism. We need a capitalism that works for the vast majority. The productivity revolution should be making our lives better — not poorer and more insecure. And it will do that when we have the political will to spread its benefits.

Excellent contrast between the solutions of the FDR era and where we are now after decades of eroding those reforms.

Hey, it's not socialism, it's American capitalism at its best.

Still, what's not to love about socialism:

Socialist Hellhole Blogging
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/08/19/socialist-hellhole-blogging/