Hey kids: Don't be a sucker for socialism

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24 May 2016, 1:46 pm

AspE wrote:

Jacoby wrote:

AspE wrote:

The Constitution doesn't prevent a universal health care system.

And you can't underestimate the Soviet Union, their space program was superior to our (socialized) NASA.

It depends on how it was implemented but single payer would probably less problematic from a constitutional stand perspective than Obamacare's individual mandate that basically says the government can force you buy a service/good from a private entity. Their redefinition of the mandate as a tax was totally ridiculous when it was explicitly said it wasn't that when it was being passed. The 'medicare for all' idea would probably wouldn't be struck down by SCOTUS.

The ACA wasn't struck down by SCOTUS either. Doesn't matter what was said to get it passed. Not legally binding.

I don't believe it is a tax since it literally mandating you buy something from a private company, think the implications of what that could mean. Would it be legal to mandate that you buy American made products? Would it be legal to mandate what type of food you can by? Maybe only British tea! I think it is a gross misinterpretation of our government's power to tax, the court rejected their commerce clause argument but still upheld the law. It is what it now, I think the individual mandate should be repealed as it is unAmerican and doesn't even work for what it is intended to do.

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24 May 2016, 1:50 pm

Jacoby wrote:

We pay taxes all the time that go to contractors. The government hasn't manufactured guns, for instance, since the Civil War.

mr_bigmouth_502
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24 May 2016, 1:51 pm

BaalChatzaf wrote:

mr_bigmouth_502 wrote:

I've lived in a socialist country my whole life, and I wouldn't change a thing about that.

Canada is not socialist. Business firms and land can be privately owned and businesses run for profit. Canada is a welfare state, but it is not socialist.

Socialism != communism. You're thinking of communism. Canada is a socialist state, and so are most European countries, most notably Sweden.

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24 May 2016, 2:02 pm

AspE wrote:

Jacoby wrote:

We pay taxes all the time that go to contractors. The government hasn't manufactured guns, for instance, since the Civil War.

That's a contract between the government and private business which is fine but not the same as the government mandating that a private citizen buy from a private business is something entirely different. People bring car insurance but one you need a license to drive and two you don't have to drive so this is literally just a tax on living or inactivity which I completely oppose.

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24 May 2016, 4:07 pm

Jacoby wrote:

marshall wrote:

I have studied economics. I have heard of Mises and Austrian economics. It claims to be based on reason, yet it is just as flawed and ideological as Marxist economics. Both Austrian and Marxist economic theorists have come up with a few good points, but both employ a lot of strange mental gymnastics and logical fallacies and are more ideological than scientific.

Austrians do not believe in econometrics, they do not believe that economics is a hard science but rather a social science and that you can't make future models on human behavior and thus the futility of central economic planning. I imagine someone that has studied economics does not take kindly to one strain basically saying they're full of **** therefor the lack of respect in mainstream.

I think most economists agree that economics is not deterministic in a way that can be modeled in a 100% predictive way. I don't think Austrains are "full of s**t", but they still prescribe things. Maybe not as a whole, but followers of Mises support anarcho-capitalism and then try back that ideology by claiming to be intellectuals. I don't think the choice of economic system is truly a pragmatic issue but a moral issue. That's why ideology comes into play. I just don't like how economists on the right (whether Austrian or some brand of neo-classical) obfuscate their ideological bent. At least when you argue with a Marxist they don't claim to be "a-priori truth" or somehow outside the scope of moral prescription. They generally admit they have a prescriptive agenda.

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06 Jun 2016, 3:38 pm

everywhere Socialism goes trouble usually follows as seen in the following nations:

Zimbabwe(Mugabe)
Cambodia(Pol Pot)
USSR(Lenin,Stalin,etc)
Czechoslovakia(Gottwald)
East Germany(Olbricht,Honecker,etc)
North Korea(Kim Jung Un and company)

this list could go on forever!

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06 Jun 2016, 4:17 pm

Bushmaster wrote:

You forgot:

Sweden
Denmark
Norway
Finland

Democratic Socialism isn't socialism in the classic sense, it's a market economy that features high taxes and generous social services.

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06 Jun 2016, 5:03 pm

Bushmaster wrote:

Those are all totalitarian communist regimes, hardly democratic socialist governments.

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06 Jun 2016, 5:19 pm

Bushmaster wrote:

And add the most recent conspicuous example: Venezuela.

Venezuela should be one of the wealthiest countries in South America, but the socialist Chavez destroyed the economy and now parts of the country are on the brink of starvation. (And somehow, mysteriously, Chavez's daughter is now a multi-millionaire.)

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AspE
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06 Jun 2016, 6:49 pm

Darmok wrote:

Venezuela should be one of the wealthiest countries in South America, but the socialist Chavez destroyed the economy and now parts of the country are on the brink of starvation. (And somehow, mysteriously, Chavez's daughter is now a multi-millionaire.)

Can you explain what happened to the economy of Venezuela? Besides that "Chavez was a socialist and ruined everything"?

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06 Jun 2016, 8:56 pm

So I'm reading this article...

"Oh look, another conservative who think Orwell was on his side."

Orwell was an ardent Socialist (the full-on, capital "s", Marxist kind) and wrote 1984 to criticize Stalinism specifically. It takes literally a few minutes to find this out, so I'm not sure whether the writer of the article is ignorant, dishonest or both.

There's more wrong here, but I don't want to wade through ten pages of replies to try and get more involved than this.

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luan78zao
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06 Jun 2016, 10:55 pm

AspE wrote:

You forgot:
Sweden
Denmark
Norway
Finland
Democratic Socialism isn't socialism in the classic sense, it's a market economy that features high taxes and generous social services.

Danish PM says you should stop calling them socialist.

http://www.the-american-interest.com/20 ... that-word/

Sweden and Denmark have been slashing their welfare states.

http://www.thelocal.se/20140121/swedens ... in-nordics

Everybody reading this lives in a mixed economy, comprising a combination of freedom and government controls. The US is no longer the freest large economy; it's become notably easier to do business in Canada or Australia, say, than in the States. However, we are coasting on the capital accumulated during the decades that we were the freest, or nearly so. That is why the Nordic welfare paradises, if individually transplanted to the US, would be among the poorer states. In fact every European country would, with the exception of money-haven Switzerland.

https://fee.org/articles/most-of-europe ... ed-states/

http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicd ... rlifeindex

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marshall
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06 Jun 2016, 11:38 pm

luan78zao wrote:

That is why the Nordic welfare paradises, if individually transplanted to the US, would be among the poorer states. In fact every European country would, with the exception of money-haven Switzerland.

That depends on how you measure wealth. A better index would be the amount of people dying on the streets being less. Not that people like you give a s**t.

AspE
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07 Jun 2016, 8:11 am

Economic freedom does not translate into prosperity, except for billionaire hedge fund managers. It actually caused the Great Recession.

marshall
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07 Jun 2016, 10:25 am

AspE wrote:

Darmok wrote:

Can you explain what happened to the economy of Venezuela? Besides that "Chavez was a socialist and ruined everything"?

Oil prices fell.

marshall
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07 Jun 2016, 10:44 am

AspE wrote:

Economic freedom does not translate into prosperity, except for billionaire hedge fund managers. It actually caused the Great Recession.

The biggest problem is the rich keep getting richer while the poor get poorer. It is this way by design.

All the talk they give you about increased "efficiency" is a lie. People automatically assume "efficiency" is a good thing. It would be a good thing if we were talking about energy or tangible resources, but we are talking about money. Money is not an innate tangible resource. It is merely a vehicle of trade. Money is never consumed to disappear in a black hole. Money has to go to people who are going to spend it again.

"Efficiency" essentially means paying people less, so the pipeline from the consumers to the capital owners has less "leakage". This means less money paid out to people who are not capital owners. Hence, the disappearance of the middle class at the expense of the capital owners.

With no intervention, the process will continue indefinitely until the vast majority of people are destitute. America will start looking a lot like India. That is the plan. They expect people to just swallow it while they continue to spew their lies about a "trickle down" that never comes.

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