Why are most democracies today socialist?

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Both left wing and right wing governments suffer from the same problems of Corruption, Collusion and Protectionism.

This is why it is ironic when people lecture others on their respective systems.

I find it difficult to accept the basic assumption of the original post in this thread.

It's certainly the case that the governments in some South American democracies (eg Argentina, Bolivia and Ecuador) have been of a decidedly 'Socialist' nature in recent years. But the trend in most other countries has been emphatically to the Right, at least as far as the balance of economic power is concerned. The apparent enthusiasm of the EU authorities for the highly secretive and contentious TiSA and TTIP treaties is a case in point.

In the UK there was a serious move towards public ownership of numerous key service industries when the Labour government of Clement Attlee was elected in 1945. Until the early 1980s we had a 'mixed economy' which functioned pretty well despite its increasingly vociferous critics.

Since Margaret Thatcher's Conservative government was elected in 1979, all this has been dismantled. The Gas, Electricity and Water industries have been privatised, along with the Railways, Buses, Airlines, Telecommunications, Postal services, Coal, Oil and more. The legendary National Health service has also been semi-privatised.

How any of this adds up to 'socialism' is beyond me. The discourse has shifted so far to the right in these areas, that even to call for more regulation of these industries, never mind public ownership, is sometimes denounced as 'Marxist'. The Labour Party, which was effectively turned into a lightweight version of the Conservative Party (or into a sort of imitation of the US Democrats) in the 1990s, is now virtually unfit for purpose.

The reason the U.S. isn't a European-style social democracy is that our culture is more consumer-driven, demonstrated most notably by our materialism and general aversion to taxes.

It's quite simple.

The people of the EU countries spent most of their history if fiefdom, serfdom, and/or peasant class, while the upper classes kept all the wealth and food to themselves... And POWER too.

Then when the 1800s came around, the wealthy became even wealthier through industrialization as working condition became worse. Then the massive continent wide revolution of 1848 happened where the poor (which was nearly anyone who wasn't rich) rose up together for some odd reason. This nearly toppled the established system of power and wealth. So they gave them the right to unionized and gradually the right to vote. But the progress stalled.

The establishment decided to build the massive empires on the backs of the lower classes.
They fought 145 years of major war after war in Europe and around the world, culminating with WWI and WWII.
With WWI, the great depression and WWII in quick successions it shattered the political and wealth establishment.

In the late 1940s the people rose up and rebuilt their countries into social democracies.

This means they get healthcare they can afford by paying a tax which in the end is cheaper than paying the free market price that us Americans pay.
Seriously Healthcare is the biggest expensive for every American who isn't in college.

They get full pensions from the government (most countries) without having to worry about the company going under losing their pensions and/or having to investing 401k style retirements that Americans have to do.
Americans are struggling this day in age to cope with retirement as costs keep going up through the roof, thus many are forced to move into their kids houses and/or skimp on stuff they need.


They get other benefits which are services provided below market costs, while Americans have to bear the full market costs.
This includes daycare in most countries now, which is due to the cost of daycare on the free market being so damn expensive.

The free market prices for stuff have gotten too damn expensive, thus pooling the resources of the taxpayer allows for better and cheaper pricing.

In the US there are some socialist principles applied, but almost all representative democracies such as the US are more capitalist than socialist. True socialism would be if we took all the of wealth produced and split it equally among everyone. You and I would have the same amount of money as Bill Gates or Donald Trump. What happens is that our representatives try to make poor people happy by enacting some socialist policies but also try to have policies to help business thrives to try to make as many people happy as possible.

Socialism requires an extremely transparent political arena and government.

Parliamentarism is anything but that. It's false advertising and suffers from the same left-right paradigm that you get in the U.S with Democrats and Republicans.

Mandates are a nice way to excuse away promises, because things can "accidentally get lost in negotiation" so to speak.

The prevailing party is just the one with the most mandates, it still has to negotiate with the other parties.

In Norway, right now the Right-party got the most votes, so they have the most mandates. That means the prime minister is elected from that party, but except from that, they have to negotiate with the others and cast their vote for each case that is up for discussion. If the other left-parties agree on certain issues, they can pool their votes across parties and squash out the right on a given case.

Of course, all this is subject to the prospect of corruption and lobbying as well.

The progress party is also a right-party and they ended up with a lot of mandates. They promised to lower the immigration, but nothing has been done. Absolute silence. People are angry, because they voted for parties that promised to reduce the immigration, for obvious reasons, since a lot of immigrants are instant welfare clients and thereby reduce the standard of the welfare state. That is not "xenophobic", it's taking into account that a lot of them come from war torn countries and might not be able to work due to PTSD or other trauma, be it mental or physical. Then of course you have opportunists who don't want to work at all, as well as fortune seekers and ISIS, which are probably represented quite a bit in the recent influx of migrants from over the Russian border, considering how many peaceful countries they have crossed, that they could have settled down in, but went for the welfare state all up north.

The standard is falling, also with the phasing out of the petroleum industry. So I don't know how long the Scandinavian countries will retain their status as utopian welfare states as we, and Sweden in particular, are already experiencing the gradual slow collapse of the welfare state. Sweden is the rape capital of Europe and Swedes are evicted from communal apartments to house migrants. They are literally thrown out of the homes they've been renting. One guy had rented the place for 40 years but had to make way for the incoming class A citizens.

But now, a lot of migrants are actually returning, because it turns out our countries can not offer the lifestyle they saw on Kardashians as well as a personal blonde sex-slave, which the people smugglers advertised.

Politics noun- A strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles. - Ambrose Bierce The Devil's Dictionary

End of British Steel



Manufacturers of British steel plants are being put out of work due to China’s overproduction of steel,

consumer appeal for American economies to heighten their demand for growth.


China is selling off steel cheap to America and of course they have gladly taken it. Rightly so.

I think it was a con deal for us by the Tories, owing to the state of Chinas poorly run factories.

The fact the chancellor knew, that Tata would be working on the new high speed rail and would be no

disservice to him if he put the workers out of pocket on the front lines of this mega operation, such was the

grand scheme and feel of it.

Everything that British Steel and other U.K manufacturing firms owe to is being washed out by a wealthy

raging sea of Left wingers hijacking our industries.

Thatcher did us out with the coal back in the mid eighties to drop oil and coal prices when it was

a recognisable consumption that other countries would pay to trade with us and, not as a third party nation.

However, the misguidance became a long standing energy bill and her hatred for the coal unions

that became more of a frequent test when she was in power served to our belief that we would win and not

belong to an international success rate being imposed on our tariffs and interests.

She mocked the coal industry now Cameron and Osborne are doing the same only with a heftier appetite

for all things worldly and good within the Euro zone. Most of which some people seem to say and to

preside that we would be far better out.

You can’t win a trade agreement based on ill consumption of E.U laws, human rights and deregulation.

People can save this country by owing up to all the hard work they’ve put into ensuring a better welfare

state and healthier commercial franchise for us all. (which doesn’t involve undercutting the poor and

reducing the tax on our state), by paying for ridiculous commuting transport, only readily available to the

rich and charging for carrier bags, forcing supermarkets to underpay their farmers for the produce they sell.

Now, there may even be a sugar tax, again targeted to oh ‘reduce obesity’, but what about the nutrition and

care that gets donated to food banks?

Its so evident that the new town sheriffs of our counties are in reality cowboys working at such a revenue speed that

even our own tariffs won’t match up to it.

If councils had an option to supply the needy with walk in centres, support and advice for all, then we

wouldn’t feel like our housing needs were primarily sought after by the governments pictorial landscape

which they are blinded by promotional vision and nothing more.

I live on one of the few remaining greenbelt lands in Hampshire and I’m seeing new housing and town

schemes being jotted up to ‘rake in’ more demand through festive periods through the towns own heritage.

(There aren’t even enough care homes and doctors surgeries).

I actually pity the strikes, a real doctor nurse or surgeon, wouldn’t actively befriend a patient with news that

They can’t be treated because their finds tell them not to.. Its not Armageddon. It’s the N.H.S.

I believe we need to stop playing house to the Tories and become the real vision and initiative our

Islands intuitively seek. The only burden is perhaps the care people are ’putting in’ , are being met

with further abject concern for more rapid access in our surgeries and hospitals.

I’m seeing a growing waiting list in my surgery of between two weeks to a whole month.

What’s the point of dialling a 111 number? Ring out of hours, get seen. Pronto.

We could use more beds and equipment, I mean what are they all moaning about?

How do you think all our nurses and doctors coped in war times?

Surgical expertise was scarce and so were bandages.

Nobody waited for the encore.

Obesity cripples the NHS, and so does cosmetic surgery, but the real factors are not about turning away

people but reducing staff intake. They are teaching us to learn Resus in our own homes now.

What if you’re old and crippled? Saving a life may not save yours.

All in all, I’d like to see a wealthier independent state that’s run by a separate body of public commissioners

similar to AQA or the like and not the rip off government we see today.

I’m afraid that as long as people are resorting to letting them lead Westminster politics, young lawyers and

M.Ps are going to be saddled.

Which is also why I hope America retains a ‘people person’ in their democrat policies at this time.