Socialism is superior to capitalism

Pure capatilsim where everything even the government and your health are for sale is coming to an end in America. One day people will understand men like Bernie Sanders are not evil: they are the men looking out for the average American. It's about balance. The free market is not for everything.

6 ways socialism is superior to capitalism

Eliminating competition as the basis for survival

Capitalism is premised first and foremost on competition between individuals. When Walmart said that they had 800 jobs in D.C., 24,000 workers showed up applying for those jobs. That meant that 23,200 of them did not get that job. They lost in the competition for jobs.


If you want to go to college, you’re competing to get accepted. If you want to get an apartment, you’re competing to get accepted, and if you don’t have enough money you can’t compete—you’ve lost the race before you started.


Why does an investor invest in a health insurance company? Not to cure sick people, but to maximize profits. So how does an insurance company, or a hospital, or a company that manufactures health care equipment maximize profits? They jack up prices, they reduce wages, and they cut services. In other words, the whole process of competition has the working class in competition with each other in a race to the bottom, and has the capitalists competing at workers’ expense.


The ending of competition between workers returns the human family to the condition under which human beings have lived for 95 percent of our existence. Human nature is not one of greed, or dog-eat-dog competition. That is learned. We know in indigenous societies, those societies which existed for tens of thousands of years before the origin of class society, there was no such thing as private property. There was shared, communal property. Socialism is the first step in returning human beings to the society in which our species developed based on solidarity, cooperation and interaction with each other based on equality.


2. No more recessions and depressions

There is another way that socialism is superior. Capitalist production leads every five or ten years to recession. In other words, when the capitalists can’t sell all the products that they’ve produced in order to maximize profit, they lay off millions and millions of workers. Look at what happened during the current economic crisis: 9 million families lost their homes after the biggest housing construction boom in history, which was between 1998 and 2007. Why did the 9 million families lose their homes? Because too many homes had been built, not in terms of meeting human need, but too many homes had been built than could be sold at a profit by the capitalists. That is the crisis of overproduction: an absurd, bizarre crisis that only exists under the process of capitalist competition.


Socialism ends depression and recession by rationally and democratically planning the economy on the basis of meeting human needs. Poor and working people will determine what is produced under what conditions—not the Walton family.


3. Scientific advancement belongs to all of society

Another reason socialism is superior: it ends “intellectual property rights.” Intellectual property rights are a form of thievery by one small sect of society over the rest of society.


Right now there are four companies competing with each other, all secretly, to make the perfect sleeping pill.


They’re all competing with each other so that, at the end of the day, the Food and Drug Administration can give one of them a patent that says, “You discovered this first. You get a 17-year long patent which means the exclusive right to sell that sleeping pill and inevitably jack up the price by 100 times over what it would be otherwise.” Think about all of the waste of energy, resources and talent that goes into that.


We have such high prices for medical equipment and drugs because of the exclusivity of patents.


Socialism is a more productive system because it eliminates intellectual property rights. The reason the Soviet Union could launch Sputnik and have the first space vehicle was that all of the scientists worked together. The property belonged to the people, through the agency of the state, not between different competing capitalist corporations.


4. Saving the planet from what will otherwise be certain destruction

There are many other reasons socialism is superior, but I want to come now to the part that the capitalists can never answer. Unless there is a planned economy without competition driving production, the environment will be completely destroyed. You cannot have a sustainable environment when every decision on what you do for energy, what you build, what resources and chemicals you use, are driven by the needs of private capitalist corporations. Unless that system is ended, there will be irreversible changes in the environment that will make life as we know it something of the past.


The only way to get real control over environmental damage is through a planned, people’s economy in which the workers themselves and through their elected representatives decide collectively what to build, what energy resources to use and how to build or produce any products in a way that both meets human needs and sustains the environment.


If they want to say, “The socialists are utopian dreamers,” we would say that the further habitation of planet Earth by human beings and others under the capitalist system— that’s a dream.


5. Guaranteeing social and economic rights

In a positive way, what do we say about socialism? In the Soviet Union, even with all its defects, when you got out of school, you got a job. That job paid you a wage with which you could live. Just think if every young person in the United States knew they were going to have a job, and you also knew you were going to be given an apartment or a house, and it was either going to be free, or it could never be more than a couple percentage points of your income.


Just think if you knew that childcare and health care were absolutely free. And that your education would be free at every level.


What we mean by socialism is that those rights, not corporate rights, become the dominant rights.


Just think what that would do if we socialized all the things that right now women are compelled to do in capitalist society with unpaid labor or under-valued labor—the raising of children, the maintenance of families, the housework and other work.


6. A new stage of human history

We don’t have a blueprint for what families look like in post-capitalist society, or interpersonal relationships, but we do know that only socialism lays the foundations so that we can enter a stage of history which Karl Marx called “human history.” What he meant is that we are actually living in pre-human history right now because our existence is not guaranteed, our lives are not guaranteed, our food is not guaranteed, our education is not guaranteed. People in capitalist society live their lives under the control or at the mercy of the productive forces that are dominated in turn by market forces. Marx believed that the advent of socialist and communist society put people in control of the productive forces rather than having their lives driven by social and economic forces that they did not control.


By implication, then, only under the conditions of socialism does the real history of a fully human society begin.


Before then other economic and political forces are dictating how human beings function, and within that system they’re competing with each other for limited resources.


Socialism is the beginning of human history, where human beings can really shape their own destiny, really become self-determining as individuals, as families, as collective neighborhoods and communities, because the essentials of life have been guaranteed.


Society has developed to such a point that only by liberating the means by which the wealth of society is created from the possession of capitalist owners, by dramatically reshaping the economic foundations of society, can all these rights be realized. That will require a fight, a revolution, but it will be humanity’s last fight for basic survival.

 

LOL!

Socialism was created and administered as the FALSE antithesis to capitalism by the same central bankers, to give themselves even MORE power over the people and ultimately enslave them.

When I read shit like this, I lose any respect I may have once had for a person

Socialism, even if it were a genuine, grassroots movement, cannot, and will never work simply because of the fact that power corrupts.

Socialism is merely monopoly capitalism for the elite. This is why America is moving away from free market capitalism and more towards crony capitalism and socialism.... yes, even under the actor Trump.

Socialism is and always will be the ideal tool for the elite few to control the masses by stealing the wealth of the people and using that wealth to enslave them while increasing the size and scope of the almighty state.

Why would you trust the few in control of such a system to use it in favor of the masses as they always claim but never do?

You, sir, are a dupe!

 

I totally agree with PR. I have worked for everything I have. It will be a cold day in hell when I work to support some slacker.

 

You already work everyday to support slackers, not just one slacker but the rich multitude who sit in their high rise swimming pools, never paying taxes, laughing at the little man in his proper place beneath their feet.

 

You really need to stop reading conspiracy sites exclusively.

 

Consider that there are people, who can't work. Consider that there are people who aren't allowed to work. You could've been one of them, with poor luck. What would you have done then? In a system without safety nets? Please don't tell me that you would've simply gone out to find another job. Over the past 10 years now, we've witnessed a scenario where there are no extra new jobs just ripe for the picking, because they were either outsourced to Asia, or the employers rather hire immigrant labor because of the ease of exploiting them.

While some aspects of capitalism are needed just to produce the money, it all has to be controlled by socialist principles, to ensure that the average guys rights are guaranteed and everybody gets their equal share. Every society that has failed to guarantee the well-being of its individual members has always imploded. Europe is now seeing a resurgence in the popularity of the political far right, because of the austerity measures demanded by the central banks due to some countries ailing economies. This angers many common folks, who feel that they're being cheated by the big guys. Last time this happened, in Germany in the 1930's, the Nazis seized power with the help of the disgruntled, disillusioned German voters, and 6 million jews died as a result.

It's not about rewarding someone for being lazy. It's about maintaining peace in society by ensuring, trough humane standards of living, that nobody has any real reason to lose their shit and take to the streets with torches and pitch forks. Money calms the nerves.

 

I’ve read excerpts and chapters of Marx’s writings. He has a very seductive writing style that has seduced millions of people into believing the world owes them something.

 

Capitalism has safety nets. Don't act like that idea is exclusive to socialism.

 

People should travel the world more. Nothing like a first hand look at how people live under various schemes.
Competition is key for excellence. Ownership is key for caring and upkeep. Resource distribution by contribution assures growth and advancement. These truths are proven and self-evident! Observe children growing up and what spurs them to achievement and excellence...

 

Witness the the starving, pitiful masses of victimized humanity as they struggle to make their way from evil capitalist lands to socialist utopias. Not.

 

Depends on what kind of capitalism you're talking. Capitalism per se doesn't necessarily include safety nets. When you add safety nets, you're getting into a mixed economy, which can vary in the degree and kind of social programs provided. Most western industrial countries go farther than the U.S. in providing state support for medical care.

The world doesn't owe anybody anything, but from a moral standpoint we may owe something to each other. If we believe, as I do, that we should love our neighbor, we might want to help a neighbor in need to survive instead of letting them die on the street. I take to heart the Christian parable of the Good Samaritan and the passage in Matthew 25: 40 :‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’ The welfare queen slacker Ayn Rand wouldn't approve, but she had a defective conscience and was wiling to feed from the public teat while condemning others who did so.

 

I have travelled a lot, and have lived abroad for most of my adult life.
I spent a year in Denmark and three years in China (two in small town china).

Socialism isn't what you think it is.

Competition is fine-- if you had read the OP carefully, you would see he is talking about competition AS A BASIS FOR SURVIVAL. It's not the winning and losing that socialists oppose, it's the fact that the 'losers' of society are pushed to the bottom where they come to believe they are worthless, which in turn exacerbates social issues, crime, etc.

"Ownership is key for caring and upkeep." YES, EXACTLY! Which is why the people who work for businesses OWNED BY OTHER PEOPLE (capitalism) are not as invested in their jobs as those who at least partially own the business for which they work by law (socialism).

"Resource distribution by contribution assures growth and advancement." This is EXACTLY what socialism is about. Instead of letting the market reward trust fund babies who just need to sit and watch their inheritance grow, predatory bankers, corporate overlords who exploit their workers... hard work, regardless of how society regards it, would be rewarded. Janitors work hard, teachers work hard, farmers work hard-- but they get paid shit wages or are crushed by bigger companies. This wouldn't happen in a socialist society.

"Observe children growing up and what spurs them to achievement and excellence...". It isn't the pursuit of money/external rewards. What spurs children to achieve is the feeling that what they are doing is worthwhile. Very few people who are motivated by the pursuit of status, superiority, etc... are truly happy.

 

Wikipedias definition of socialism:

That is, every member of the population gets an equal say and an equal slice of the pie. And is actually impossible for any event where the decision takes longer than the production, distribution or exchange; which would actually be most processes

Socialism and Marxism, you are talking about concepts that have never existed, never been put to the test in reality, and in fact are impossible to do so.

Just on the first point in the article: just exactly how do you think socialism would eliminate competition? In your Walmart example, under pure socialism, all those 800 Walmart jobs are assigned by the community as a whole, that community includes those 23,200 workers that dont get the job. But they shouldnt care because they get an equal slice of everything anyway, that is, the get the same as the 800 that get the job

I believe thats pretty much what it comes down to, Marx's writing style, I believe his plan, 2nd half of his life anyway, living in the UK a capitalist first world country and make money off all the suckers that fell for the shit he wrote first half of his life

Exactly

 

We are absolutely obliged to care for our fellow citizens! And we recognize society would be shit if we didn't.

The question is how. Jesus doesn't teach for us to "give" at the point of a gun to some third party who will distribute it according to their whims while taking some for themselves. Where's the scripture on that?

No, He teaches we help directly. That's what the parable you quote espouses. It has to be done of our own will, from our own hearts, on our own terms in order for it to count per the way He taught.

I don't know enough about Ayn Rand to comment. I heard Atlas Shrugged was a good book to read, but I haven't.

 

Not competition.
Competition as a basis for survival.

They should care because people want to support things that they believe in.

And seriously... you're using WALMART to prove that socialism could never work?
What exactly does one of the biggest capitalist corporations in the entire world have to do with socialism?
Why do you think that people will need to compete for jobs in a store that they own?
Anyone who owns the store can work in the store whenever they want... they can work out a schedule.

They will do it because they care about their community and want it to succeed... and they aren't only interested in what's in it for them-- that is a capitalist mentality.

 

I was about to reply to the OP, but you beat me to it.

I think that the UK offers a good example of a balance between socialism and capitalism, clearly illustrating the advantages and the pitfalls in both systems.

We have a national health system, but with an apparent pit of funding, no one sees it as a business. While it works to save us when we suffer an aneurysm, it hemorrhages money. Attempts to privatize parts of the services have made companies rich and the services worse.

We allowed social housing to run under private developers and Grenfel Tower killed nearly 100 people.

A country needs capitalism to grow and develop, but it needs a strong ELECTED government to control it all and take care of the voters who put them into power.

It will never be an easy task.!!!!!!

 

Competition is fine-- ..., it's the fact that the 'losers' of society are pushed to the bottom where they come to believe they are worthless, which in turn exacerbates social issues, crime, etc.


There's always been and going to be winners and losers in nature. There's no avoiding that. And with people, most low performers recognize that they are such. A way of effectively dealing with that is paramount. However, a socialist system is no more effective than a capitalist in this regard. What they need is to feel self-worth, not handed goodies. The latter might make the rest of us feel better but doesn't address their feelings.

You don't have to outrun the bear to survive, just the person you're out hiking with. That old joke illustrates that nature is about competition thus innate inequities and perceived unfairness.




"Ownership is key for caring and upkeep." YES, EXACTLY! Which is why the people who work for businesses OWNED BY OTHER PEOPLE (capitalism) are not as invested in their jobs as those who at least partially own the business for which they work by law (socialism).


The most invested is self-employed, owning one's own business. Working for another's business, one can get stock options to provide some ownership. ESOP companies distribute ownership across all employees.

Government owned business will always be somebody else's problem, and people will rarely take initiative beyond their job descriptions.




"Resource distribution by contribution assures growth and advancement." This is EXACTLY what socialism is about. Instead of letting the market reward trust fund babies who just need to sit and watch their inheritance grow, predatory bankers, corporate overlords who exploit their workers... hard work, regardless of how society regards it, would be rewarded. Janitors work hard, teachers work hard, farmers work hard-- but they get paid shit wages or are crushed by bigger companies. This wouldn't happen in a socialist society.


Your argument falls under competition and ignores the initial premise regarding resource distribution by contribution. What that means is you get paid according to the value you add to society.
That's measured by what others are willing to give up for it. If you want something done, you're gonna shop around and find the best deal, no? You don't want to give up any more than you have to of your own precious resources, and neither does anyone else.

When you extend that logic to occupations, that's how wages are determined. How "hard" one works does not enter the equation. Witness "John Henry". Bottom line is producing something people want. It's not about working hard, but working smart.
How "hard" do entertainment/sports stars work for the amount they get paid? If you want to talk "unfairness", why not go there instead of attacking people who were fortunate enough to have parents who loved them enough to leave them some of the fruits of their contribution to society? I totally get the jealousy aspect, I wish I were left something like that, but I'm not going to bemoan those who were. Instead, I'll strive to further my children by working with their well-being in mind.




"Observe children growing up and what spurs them to achievement and excellence...". It isn't the pursuit of money/external rewards. What spurs children to achieve is the feeling that what they are doing is worthwhile. Very few people who are motivated by the pursuit of status, superiority, etc... are truly happy.


Exactly. And nothing quite rivals the paycheck as a sign of what we're doing is worthwhile. I mean, the 'ol pat on the back is encouraging, the accolades really help one's morale, but at the end of the day, when it comes to get a nice comfy rest and some good food in our belly... maybe a bit of stress relieving fun/entertainment...

Money doesn't provide happiness, but we need enough to satisfy whatever we consider our base level of accommodation in order to be happy and feel worthwhile.

 

Your logical fallacy is appeal to nature

The government doesn't own the business.
The people own the business.

Capitalist society and socialist society define 'value' differently.
If you want to prove that socialism doesn't work, you should try using examples from socialist society, not examples from capitalist society.

You also need to stop talking about what you think I want, why I want it, etc... socialist society has nothing to do with how you, I or anyone else thinks and acts in a capitalist society.

You aren't going to win this argument by merely explaining how capitalist society works.
Of course, it's not like there are any rules here so maybe you won't even know if you're winning or not.

Oh, sort of like this:

The Just-World Fallacy

And this:

Your logical fallacy is ad hominem

I'm not jealous of these people.
Believe it or not, it is possible for me to recognize that a situation is unfair without wishing it was unfair in my favor.

Also, I can't believe you are opposed to 'handouts' because you think they make people lazy, and yet think that trust fund babies are perfectly okay.

A paycheck doesn't mean anything other than you are receiving money.

There are also studies that suggest receiving a paycheck can make you feel like your work is LESS worthwhile:

Why extrinsic rewards are so bad for motivation - Creative Music Education

The logic here being that everyone on some level believes that if something is worth doing, we don't need to be bribed with a paycheck in order to do it.

 

Fine, go spend your time doing things which make you feel good and if you end up not being able to make ends meet please don't appeal to others that you're disadvantaged or whatever and deserve a handout. If you're gonna preach it, own it.

Teach a man to fish...

Socialism benefits two groups, those in charge, and those getting a free ride. All others pay the cost. Essentially slaves to those who benefit. Society's overall production suffers because individual motivation to produce is minimal.

You lived in Denmark? Was anybody applauding the 70% tax rate?
The people I've known from there were pretty disgusted by it. But they were working class, not elite governing class nor vagabond class.

One's level of appreciation for the system depends on their status within it.

 

"They will do it be because they care about their community and want it to succeed".

Everyone cares equally. Even though they get paid the same anyway. A magical la la land.

How friggin ridiculous. As I said, its just a thought experiment, Socialism would be impossible to implement in the first place