What is Democratic Socialism???

[DogofWar1]

Consumer based economic policy.

[twa]

Thomas Sowell‏ @ThomasSowell Aug 16

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"Politics allows people to vote for the impossible, which may be one reason why politicians are often more popular than economists, who keep reminding people that there is no free lunch and that there are no 'solutions' but only trade-offs."

 

[No Excuses]

 

1 hour ago, Larry said:

 

Observing that you did not come remotely close to answering either of my questions. Unless I'm correctly reading that you are dividing the world into "capitalist" and "poor", then asserting that all trade between the two is caused by the former. 

 

The current global market system is pretty much driven by capitalist policies and countries. Feel free to cite examples of the great socialist wealth creators of this world.

 

 

[Going Commando]

3 hours ago, CousinsCowgirl84 said:

Socialism sucks. Bureaucrats take advantage of the system.

 

LOL, and you cite ERT as a positive example of a private business making public infrastructure better?  They're ****ing pirates.  They ripped off enormous amounts of public money on those expansions and renovations and now get to leech off tunnel users in perpetuity with ridiculous tolls and administrative fees and they are absolutely incompetent.  Contracting with them is one of the worst deals Virginia ever made.  They are the quintessential example of a ****ty private entity extracting rents from the economy to the detriment of everyone else.

 

Not only that, they ****ing stifle private enterprise by vastly increasing the operating cost of any small business who has to regularly cross the Elizabeth River.

[PeterMP]

16 minutes ago, No Excuses said:

 

 

The current global market system is pretty much driven by capitalist policies and countries. Feel free to cite examples of the great socialist wealth creators of this world.

 

 

 

A lot of things driving the current global market were the result of the non-capitalist policies and people and organizations not really driven by capitalistic principles or motivations.  Things like the internet didn't come from capitalism.  Yes, the US is in general a capitalist country, the military, the research they do, and their grant programs are decidedly not.  To give "capitalism" credit for such advancements seems like cheating.

 

If you look at things like the green revolution, that was mostly driven by non-capitalistic entities (yes, they were acting in heavily capitalists countries, but the people and organizations doing the underlying work were not driven by capitalism or capitalistic ideas.  Again, giving the credit for that economic growth to capitalism seems like cheating.)

[No Excuses]

11 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

 

A lot of things driving the current global market were the result of the non-capitalist policies and people and organizations not really driven by capitalistic principles or motivations.  Things like the internet didn't come from capitalism.  Yes, the US is in general a capitalist country, the military, the research they do, and their grant programs are decidedly not.  To give "capitalism" credit for such advancements seems like cheating.

 

If you look at things like the green revolution, that was mostly driven by non-capitalistic entities (yes, they were acting in heavily capitalists countries, but the people and organizations doing the underlying work were not driven by capitalism or capitalistic ideas.  Again, giving the credit for that economic growth to capitalism seems like cheating.)

 

The US government is able to fund basic science research at the levels it does largely thanks to the wealth generated in our capitalist economy and the taxes we are able to collect. We have a good system in place where the government funds things that private enterprise wouldn't. But a central part of our science and tech policy in this country is allowing private enterprise. We see it time and time again: the internet, the human genome project, NASA/SpaceX etc. 

 

Right now our system is the nightmare scenario of unchecked crony capitalism. The solution to this isn't full blown socialism.

[Renegade7]

12 hours ago, KAOSkins said:

You only see it as different because it's been going on so long.  Most roads used to be toll roads.  Most military used to be privately owned and most kids didn't used to go to school.  Granted you have to go back varying times in history to see a time before those varying things changed but they all have, and all of those changed in the last couple hundred years.

 

Kinda reminds me of dark ages, but pretty sure Rome funded it's own military and road building before then.  I jus have a hard time saying government took over this industries when they never should of been privately run to begin with.  There should be more toll roads, but run by government and not too expensive like some are now.

[Renegade7]

6 hours ago, Sacks 'n' Stuff said:

But why, other than that this is the way we are currently doing things? Why would healthcare not be a public service? Profitability should not be a factor affecting the number of people we're able to make well or keep from dying. There's no logic to that.

 

 

I'm not saying health care isn't a public service (I think it's a right, like many others).  I'm jus trying to differentiate between what is an actual market based private industry is and a public service.  Like I told @KAOSkinsstuff like military and roads should never have been private industry to begin with, they should've always been and should be something the government is responsible for, versus not trustin the free market with it.

 

6 hours ago, Sacks 'n' Stuff said:

 

Now, I understand that there isn't a perfect solution with absolutely no problems.  You can point to negative consequences that absolutely would occur if there were a major transition like that in our healthcare system. But, the way we're doing it now isn't the answer. On almost every measure, we should be doing a better job of taking care of our citizens while at the same time, our healthcare costs grossly exceed every other country on the planet. 

 

I agree with Medicare for All because our country is too huge for a total takeover like NHS in UK.  

 

I started this thread to help establish some definitions, I haven't really changed any of my political stances since previous times we've talked a bout stuff like this since starting this thread. 

[TradeTheBeal!]

1 hour ago, CousinsCowgirl84 said:

 

 

No. Not cherry picking. Governments. Countries. Not a few programs in a capitalistic country. 

 

What you’re really asking for is an example of rigid adherence to dogma and ideological inflexibility producing a positive outcome.

 

Im afraid you won’t find one.

[PeterMP]

2 minutes ago, No Excuses said:

 

The US government is able to fund basic science research at the levels it does largely thanks to the wealth generated in our capitalist economy. We have a good system in place where the government funds things that private enterprise wouldn't. But a central part of our science and tech policy in this country is allowing private enterprise. We see it time and time again: the internet, the human genome project, NASA/SpaceX etc. 

 

The flip side of that is without a capitalistic economy, where non-capitalistic entities don't have to compete for capitalist ones for means of production, research would likely be much cheaper.

 

(Just in general, you are starting with an assertion, that the US is rich because it is capitalist- and not say, it is rich because it has a lot of natural resources that it has been able to take advantage of historically, and then giving credit for everything else based on it being capitalist.  Without ever proving the initial assertion.)

 

One important thing that needs to be noted here.  Socialism is the government owning the means of production.  It isn't that nobody owns any private property or wealth accumulation isn't possible.  There are government research facilities that work based on a "grant" like system.  If you want time to use them, you write a grant.  The grants get scored and the people that have the best grants get time.  The people that get time are more likely to push their research forward and get promoted (and make more money).  That's a socialistic system.  It advances technology which benefits everybody.  The people that are doing the best work (ideally) get the most benefit, but the government owns the actual facilities.

[Renegade7]

4 hours ago, TheGreatBuzz said:

It's funny the way people view the VA.  I prefer to use the VA as the perfect example of why I DON'T want government run health care. 

I'm semi familiar with it because people I know that we're prior military, but it comes across as lack resources and the epitome of inefficient.  The VA in Hampton Roads has an appointment waiting listing that is completely unjustifiable considering Hampton roads has the highest concentration of military bases in the world, they know there's a **** ton of military there, what the he'll are they doing about it?

 

To confirm, isn't tricare not meant to be used outside of the VA system and most cases can't be?  I'd rather yall have Medicare and go where you want.

 

[PeterMP]

Just in terms of research funding.  The Soviet Union did a ton of research.  China does a ton of research.

 

We have NASA because of the Soviet Union.  It isn't hard to argue that lot of our military spending wasn't driven because the US was rich and had money to spend, it was because of the Soviet Union (and now China).

[No Excuses]

1 minute ago, PeterMP said:

 

The flip side of that is without a capitalistic economy, where non-capitalistic entities don't have to compete for capitalist ones for means of production, research would likely be much cheaper.

 

(Just in general, you are starting with an assertion, that the US is rich because it is capitalist- and not say, it is rich because it has a lot of natural resources that it has been able to take advantage of historically, and then giving credit for everything else based on it being capitalist.  Without ever proving the initial assertion.)

 

One important thing that needs to be noted here.  Socialism is the government owning the means of production.  It isn't that nobody owns any private property or wealth accumulation isn't possible.  There are government research facilities that work based on a "grant" like system.  If you want time to use them, you write a grant.  The grants get scored and the people that have the best grants get time.  The people that get time are more likely to push their research forward and get promoted (and make more money).  That's a socialistic system.  It advances technology which benefits everybody.  The people that are doing the best work (ideally) get the most benefit, but the government owns the actual facilities.

 

I am not arguing for unfettered capitalism. We collect taxes for a reason and I think taxes for a certain class of the population should be much higher. I am all for funding healthcare, education and research. At least for research, the US has a really good system in place that allows for entrepreneurship, economic growth and widespread distribution of technology. There is zero reason to advocate for sweeping changes to systems that are working.

 

What you outline for science and technology today is basically China. The Chinese tech sector has a bunch of "private" entities but the government essentially controls all of them. China right now is a dystopian nightmare of what happens when the government owns the means of production, especially for modern technology. It is kind of mind boggling that anyone in the US would want this after seeing the pseudo-authoritarian tendencies of our current President.

[Renegade7]

1 hour ago, stevemcqueen1 said:

 

LOL, and you cite ERT as a positive example of a private business making public infrastructure better?  They're ****ing pirates.  They ripped off enormous amounts of public money on those expansions and renovations and now get to leech off tunnel users in perpetuity with ridiculous tolls and administrative fees and they are absolutely incompetent.  Contracting with them is one of the worst deals Virginia ever made.  They are the quintessential example of a ****ty private entity extracting rents from the economy to the detriment of everyone else.

 

Not only that, they ****ing stifle private enterprise by vastly increasing the operating cost of any small business who has to regularly cross the Elizabeth River.

Tell 'me again, I don't think they heard you. 

 

I put up with it to get the midown expansion, but they are quick to add fees and sell your debt to the highest bidder without telling you.  They making it even harder for Ptown to compete economically, especially downtown, and now gonna bleed them dry for HRBT expansion. 

 

I've said before, if they are going to let ERT treat Ptown like a cash cow for the rest of Hampton Roads infrastructure projects, they need tolls on MMT and HRBT to be fair.  Them being private and obviously not giving a **** about anything but profit is only half the problem.  I wish it was vdot or HRT running the tolls instead, ERT are bunch of savages.

 

If there's any industry the government should take away from private sector it's toll roads.

[CousinsCowgirl84]

25 minutes ago, TryTheBeal! said:

 

What you’re really asking for is an example of rigid adherence to dogma and ideological inflexibility producing a positive outcome.

 

Im afraid you won’t find one.

 

Nope, just an example of a country that has been successful while being mostly socialist. If you want a mostly capitalistic country with some facets of socialism, welcome to the united states.

[PeterMP]

Just now, No Excuses said:

 

I am not arguing for unfettered capitalism. We collect taxes for a reason and I think taxes for a certain class of the population should be much higher. I am all for funding healthcare, education and research. At least for research, the US has a really good system in place that allows for entrepreneurship, economic growth and widespread distribution of technology. There is zero reason to advocate for sweeping changes to systems that are working.

 

What you outline for science and technology today is basically China. The Chinese tech sector has a bunch of "private" entities but the government essentially controls all of them. China right now is a dystopian nightmare of what happens when the government owns the means of production, especially for modern technology. It is kind of mind boggling that anyone in the US would want this after seeing the pseudo-authoritarian tendencies of our current President.

 

What you see in China is (and saw in the Soviet Union) is a lack of good competition for ideas in terms of who can run the country and how to do it.  That doesn't have much to do with their economic system, but their political system (e.g. it isn't a democracy).  The Soviet Union (and I suspect over time China) failed not because of their lack of advances in research or technology, but because of poor political leadership because there isn't competition for political ideas (and there is plenty of corruption and nepotism).  That isn't something that is necessarily inherent to socialism.

 

I think in a good socialist system, we'd have even more checks in place and you'd have even fewer issues with a Trump like President in terms of economic policy and what he can do (e.g. sanctions and using his position to generate more wealth for himself).  We couldn't leave our government the same and be a socialist country because our government wasn't designed to control the means of production.  It was designed to minimize interference with the actions of private entities (which worked fine when crossing the Atlantic and Pacific were difficult and there was plenty of space for people to spread out and everybody could do their own thing, but which works less well in the modern world, which is why we have issues with the government having to do things that it isn't really well situated to do (e.g. air and water quality laws).

[Renegade7]

@PeterMP are you sure getting rid of private ownership isn't a primary aspect of socialism? Literally ever definition I've found including pages in OP have that right up there with government controlling means of production.

9 hours ago, Destino said:

Socialism hasn’t proven nearly as effective at eradicating poverty as it has at eradicating democracy.  

Yep, ideology versus human nature has basically forced every country that went all in on socialism to have to stop anyone getting elected that could stop it. Capitalism doesn't go down nicely, that's how you end up with a socialist state, it's only way to enforce it.

[No Excuses]

8 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

 

What you see in China is (and saw in the Soviet Union) is a lack of good competition for ideas in terms of who can run the country and how to do it.  That doesn't have much to do with their economic system, but their political system (e.g. it isn't a democracy).  The Soviet Union (and I suspect over time China) failed not because of their lack of advances in research or technology, but because of poor political leadership because there isn't competition for political ideas (and there is plenty of corruption and nepotism).  That isn't something that is necessarily inherent to socialism.

 

I think in a good socialist system, we'd have even more checks in place and you'd have even fewer issues with a Trump like President in terms of economic policy and what he can do (e.g. sanctions and using his position to generate more wealth for himself).  We couldn't leave our government the same and be a socialist country because our government wasn't designed to control the means of production.  It was designed to minimize interference with the actions of private entities (which worked fine when crossing the Atlantic and Pacific were difficult and there was plenty of space for people to spread out and everybody could do their own thing, but which works less well in the modern world, which is why we have issues with the government having to do things that it isn't really well situated to do (e.g. air and water quality laws).

 

These are all nice hypotheticals but we have no real world examples of a country establishing a socialist/anti-capitalist system that wasn't also a totalitarian hellhole. 

 

The US seems like a fundamentally bad place to experiment with a system like this for a variety of reasons (as you mention, our government isn't designed to do this).

[Renegade7]

7 hours ago, Sacks 'n' Stuff said:

It's not true. There are plenty of examples of both good and bad implementation / results. I could say the same for capitalism.

 

Socialism, capitalism, progressivism, conservatism... none of them are inherently good or evil. Just like Joe Gibbs can coach with love and Bill Belichick can be an emotionless robot but they can both win multiple Super Bowls. There isn't one right way to do things. It's the people themselves and the way they work within their philosophy that determines success or failure.

 

I may not agree with full on socialism or conservatism, but I've always felt the wise thing to do is to look at what makes and works from multiple ideologies.  You're right,  human nature getting involved basically causes  going all in on any single ideology has a tendency to backfire.

[PeterMP]

19 minutes ago, Renegade7 said:

@PeterMP are you sure getting rid of private ownership isn't a primary aspect of socialism? Literally ever definition I've found including pages in OP have that right up there with government controlling means of production.

 

I believe that's generally considered the difference between socialism and communism (at least to my understanding).  In a communist society there is no private ownership.  In a socialist country, you can have private ownership, but the means of production are controlled by the government.

 

http://www.differencebetween.net/business/difference-between-socialism-and-communism-2/

 

"Socialism supports the view that the goods and services produced should be dispensed based on the productivity of an individual. In contrast, communism believes that the wealth should be shared by the masses based on the needs of the individual."

 

"There are two kinds of properties in socialism: (1) personal property that an individual can own and enjoy; and (2) industrial property that is dedicated for the use of producing society’s goods. Individuals, for example, can keep their digital cameras but cannot retain a factory that produces digital cameras. While personal properties can be kept, socialists make sure, however, that no private property will be used as an instrument for oppression and exploitation. In comparison, communism treats all goods and services as public property to be used and enjoyed by the entire populace."

 

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/do-you-know-the-difference-between-a-communist-and-a-socialist-a6708086.html

 

"Simplifying Quill's explanation: “In a communist country, the government answers those questions. There's no private business. There's no private property. The government decides.”

 

"In a capitalist society, the people make those decisions. The businesses, the market decides how much products will cost, how many there are, where it will be made.”

 

“In the socialist system, there's a mix of both. The government operates the system to help all, but there is opportunity for private property and private wealth. That's generally how we talk about it.”"

27 minutes ago, CousinsCowgirl84 said:

 

Nope, just an example of a country that has been successful while being mostly socialist. If you want a mostly capitalistic country with some facets of socialism, welcome to the united states.

 

Or maybe the US is a socialist country with some facets of capitalism.

 

In 2011, government spending was 41% of US GDP, and the US federal government is not the only non-capitalist entity operating in the US.

[PeterMP]

1 hour ago, No Excuses said:

 

These are all nice hypotheticals but we have no real world examples of a country establishing a socialist/anti-capitalist system that wasn't also a totalitarian hellhole. 

 

The US seems like a fundamentally bad place to experiment with a system like this for a variety of reasons (as you mention, our government isn't designed to do this).

 

First, this is gets at how define whether a country is socialist or not.  This is the same trap that @CousinsCowgirl84 fell into.  The US is not really a capitalistic country.  I'm not sure it is even mostly a capitalistic country.  And most people don't want to go back to when it more clearly was.  And there are certainly successful countries that are more socialist then we are.  Any child labor laws is socialist.  The government is controlling the means of production.

 

So the other part of this is just declare the US is capitalistic society and so capitalism is good would seem to be to be flawed.  We've moved far from being truly capitalistic and most people consider most of that movement a positive.

 

The second thing that is important to note here, is that the countries that have been socialist have also been communist, and they were totalitarian hell holes before they tried socialism.  There are plenty of hell holes out there that practice "capitalism".  Through history, hell holes tend to stay hell holes.

[Sacks 'n' Stuff]

1 hour ago, TryTheBeal! said:

What you’re really asking for is an example of rigid adherence to dogma and ideological inflexibility producing a positive outcome.

 

Im afraid you won’t find one.

This is probably the best political post I've ever seen in my life.

[Renegade7]

14 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

 

I believe that's generally considered the difference between socialism and communism (at least to my understanding).  In a communist society there is no private ownership.  In a socialist country, you can have private ownership, but the means of production are controlled by the government.

 

 

I can see that, but still wholly unacceptable in this country. Links in my OP show Democratic Socialism is totally in favor of taking over means of production, so even if I can keep my digital camera, that's beyond too far something I would support in this country.  Do you agree or disagree?

 

14 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

Or maybe the US is a socialist country with some facets of capitalism.

 

In 2011, government spending was 41% of US GDP, and the US federal government is not the only non-capitalist entity operating in the US.

 

This does not shock me at all and another reason why I support a larger federal government as opposed to a smaller weaker one.  I don't see federal government being classified as remotely socialist, so much of what they doing is supplamental to the economy, like contractors in DMV.  I'd be fine labeling us just outside a mixed economy, having USPS is not the same as taking I've health care industry, think you'd have to call us mixed economy after that like countries in Europe do.

[Renegade7]

21 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

 

 There are plenty of hell holes out there that practice "capitalism".  Through history, hell holes tend to stay hell holes.

 

Can you please expand on this? I'm trying to gauge the context of this comment, outside of defining staying a hell hole, I don't see how this remotely true.  China, despite being a punching bag between opium wars and end of ww2, has an exploding middle class right now.  

 

Two concerns here: 

 

1. We become China where the economy is free enough that it becomes  authoritarian and socialist with little resistance

 

2. US goes through a nasty transiton to socialism that sets the hyperpartisanship in this country on fire and triggers enough instibilty in global economy a recession or worse happens  (which given our voting history could cause a serious swing to the right)

 

The belief that socialism doesn't work because no one is doing it right is a hill I hope some don't choose to die on.

[PeterMP]

1 hour ago, Renegade7 said:

 

I can see that, but still wholly unacceptable in this country. Links in my OP show Democratic Socialism is totally in favor of taking over means of production, so even if I can keep my digital camera, that's beyond too far something I would support in this country.  Do you agree or disagree?

 

 

This does not shock me at all and another reason why I support a larger federal government as opposed to a smaller weaker one.  I don't see federal government being classified as remotely socialist, so much of what they doing is supplamental to the economy, like contractors in DMV.  I'd be fine labeling us just outside a mixed economy, having USPS is not the same as taking I've health care industry, think you'd have to call us mixed economy after that like countries in Europe do.

 

In terms of what Democratic socialists want, I'd warn against painting with a broad brush.  I seriously doubt that Bernie Sanders is for the government taking over all means of production.  I seriously doubt that Bernie Sanders is against me having a private garden in my back yard, just like I doubt the politicians that say they support a free market or capitalism are against child labor laws.

 

Interesting (potentially only to me) is that Sanders two big pushes aren't actually very related to democratic socialism:

 

free college for all- the government (through state university systems and community colleges and government regulations/funding) already control much of the means of the production, and I don't hear him actually calling for making non-state places of higher education illegal (public or private).  And I can be for having public higher education facilities (e.g. state schools) and not be for free college for all.  Just because the state controls the means of production doesn't mean access to everybody has to be free.

 

medicare for all- again, in a medicare for all system, the government isn't claiming any more of the means of production for health care.  Government regulations already heavily control the healthcare market in this country.  Sanders medicare for all doesn't really move the needle very much.  To my knowledge, he's not advocating opening up more government run health care facilities (and I'd support that before going to Medicare for all).

 

If Sanders is actually for the state taking over the means of production, I've missed it in terms of what he discusses when he discussed public policy.