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Americans and socialism
(lemmy.ml)
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this post was submitted on 17 Mar 2025
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Meanwhile, socialist Norway's wealth fund could maintain everyone's standard of living for 400 years if they stopped working right now.
In a democratic state, things like universal healthcare are also called "socialized medicine" because it is an example of the people owning the means of production in that particular industry.
That's why most countries are what we call "mixed economies", that mix elements of capitalism and socialism.
Norway mixes in a higher ratio of socialism to capitalism than most countries. But they don't export any more of capitalism's issues to the third world than other countries. It's something to emulate, not discredit.
No. "Socialized medicine" is not "people owning the means of production"
It is in a democratic state. Who else do you think owns it?
Pretty sure no one with universal healthcare calls it "socialized medicine". That's just a buzzword Americans use to scare each other.
It's not a means of producing anything other than health. Health is seen as a human right and it makes sense even in most western capitalist countries for it to be extended to everyone.
I'm Canadian. It's what the founder of our healthcare system, Tommy Douglas, called it.
And yeah, it's the people owning the means of producing health. Socialist healthcare.
Americans scare people with these references to brutal authoritarian dictatorships that call themselves "socialist" but the real cause of all these problems is that they weren't democratic, not that they socialized industries.
Anyways, maybe it's just my autism making me literal as fuck, but I think you guys need to clear that up. This is what the people owning the means of production looks like. It's always going to be adjacent to capitalism, whether it's a socialist industry in a capitalist country, or a socialist country in a capitalist world.
It is not Socialist. Social programs are not Socialism. Every economy is a mix of private and public property, that doesn’t make it mixed Capitalism and Socialism. Capitalism and Socialism are descriptors for economies at large, as you cannot remove entities from the context they are in. A worker cooperative is not a “socialist” part of a Capitalist economy, because it exists in the broader Capitalist machine and must use its tools.
What determines if a system is Capitalist or Socialist is if private property or public property is the primary aspect of a society, and which class has control. In Canada, Private Property is dominant, so Social Programs are used to support that.
By this absolutist logic, a socialist country is not a "socialist" part of a capitalist world, because it exists in the broader capitalist machine and must use its tools.
What is the point then? If you don't want to call anything "socialism" until the very last human on earth is socialist, fine, I will focus more on improving people's lives than haggling over definitions.
This isn't true, though. Socialism is a transitional status towards the goal of Communism, states that are pushing forwards on that goal, or "on the Socialist road," play a progressive role, while Capitalist countries take a regressive role. Socialist countries indeed exist in the context of a world economy dominated by Capitalism, but are moving against that.
I call many countries Socialist, like the PRC, Cuba, Laos, Vietnam, former USSR, etc.
"Tankie" is a person who cares more about whether a country flies the flag of socialism, regardless of their actions, and dismisses any criticisms about them as "western propaganda".
China is a capitalist country. They are more capitalist than the western countries you hate so much. Open your eyes. Stop believing Chinese propaganda.
“Tankie” is a caricature. The idea of a tankie is the ideal vision of a McCarthyian Communist. In reality, the overwhelming majority of people labeled as such don’t actually fit that label, it’s more of a way to cast an image of someone’s positions based on, say, support for AES countries, and twist that into the evil Commie Pinko that haunts the dreams of 1960s children in the US.
The PRC has a Socialist Market Economy. The vast majority of large firms are firmly in the public sector, while the small firms and self-employed make up the bulk of the private sector, along with cooperatives.
Interesting, thanks for the Canadian history lesson Perhaps that's where the Americans got their weird terminology from.
Who needs to do what? I'm not sure what I said that somehow gave you the impression I was an American.
My society pays for universal free healthcare, like everywhere in the civilized world.
How is democracy related to ownership?
A democracy is a state in which the government is owned and controlled by the people.
No wtf. Democracy is state that holds elections. Wtf is "owned and controlled by the people"? How are people supposed to control the government? The government is controlled by govt officials. Common people don't control shit. How can a government be owned by people? Is government even a property that can be owned? That doesn't make any sense.
Through elections.
That we elected.
Through democracy.
If I ask a friend to water my plants, do I no longer own the plants?
Umm, no. Elected politicians can do whatever tf they want. There's no legal mechanism to make them fulfill the promises they made during their campaign.
Not to mention that elected politicians aren't controlled by the people, most of the government positions aren't elected.
Democracy is when Government is owned by people. People own government through democracy. Great argument.
If you ask government to persecute people who break the law, do you no longer own people who break the law?
The next election is the mechanism that makes them fulfill the promises they've made during their campaign. If your politicians aren't afraid of losing the next election, you don't live in a real democracy, you probably live in a FPTP country, and you should fix that.
I don't know what country you are assuming counts as the entire world with this sentence, I'm going to assume America because it's usually Americans that do that.
But even then, what is wrong with me hiring someone to hire more people?
What is your counterargument other than "no"?
You can't own people, you never did, what are you trying to ask here?
What do YOU think the people owning the means of production looks like?
Why are you saying this? Who's the target audience of this bs? What makes you say that if it's demonstrably false? Elected politicians don't keep their promises, they just don't.
Is Trump scared to loose the next election?
It's perfectly fine, but unrelated to the question at hand. You don't hire politicians.
"No" is actually a stronger argument than yours bc you're making a positive statement here and the burden of proof is on you.
I dunno. I guess your initial analogy was shit that explained nothing. Don't use analogies then.
So not Norway, or any Western capitalist pseudo democracy.
Yes Norway, or any other country with proportional representation, but not FPTP democracies.
How else do you think the people can own the means of production?
No. They are capitalist.
By that logic, socialism cannot exist until the entire planet is socialist.
Close. Communism cannot exist until the entire planet is Socialist, but Socialism can be determined at a country level.
This seems needlessly arbitrary and reductive. Socialism exists all around us, it isn't defined by a country's borders.
I don't know what this means, Socialism is not a gas.
No, socialism is when the people own the means of production. That doesn't require national borders, nor do I take your trolling response to be a positive indicator of arguing in good faith.
The post I wrote here goes over why that doesn't actually apply. The reason we consider countries to be relative barriers (until Communism is achieved and thus this becomes irrelevant) is because there is a degree of genuine sovereignty in countries regarding their economics. A publicly owned structure in Mexico is owned by Mexican citizens, not US citizens. Once the world is Socialist, this will begin to blur and break down towards Communism, but we aren't there yet.
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I'm not sure how that link is supposed to refute anything? It says basically what the comment above says without using the phrase "mixed economies".
If you meant the power structure and public/private balance is heavily capitalist for Nordic countries then you'd probably want to post something else supporting that statement.
Hey, I'm the author of that post! I don't see how my post says the same thing at all, it very much talks about which aspect, private or public, has power in society is what determines the nature of its economy.
Social programs are not Socialism. Every economy is a mix of private and public property, that doesn't make it mixed Capitalism and Socialism. Capitalism and Socialism are descriptors for economies at large, as you cannot remove entities from the context they are in. A worker cooperative is not a "socialist" part of a Capitalist economy, because it exists in the broader Capitalist machine and must use its tools.
What determines if a system is Capitalist or Socialist is if private property or public property is the primary aspect of a society, and which class has control. In Norway, Private Property is dominant, so Social Programs are used to support that.
But in another comment you referred to the USSR as "the world's first socialist state", yet it existed in the broader global capitalist machine. You have contradicted yourself. Which is it? Can socialism exist in a world with capitalism, or not?
Socialism can, Communism cannot. Socialism is a gradual process towards Communism. A worker cooperative does not endanger the Capitalist system nor move agaInst it, but Socialist countries and economies working towards Communism do.
Communism, however, must be global.
This was the lie that Lenin told the Soviet to quell their questions about "why aren't we doing any of the things Marx said we have to do?"
Marx used socialism and communism as synonyms.
You sure about that? A bunch of people choosing to not give money to capitalists "does not endanger the capitalist system"? Think about that.
Lenin and the Bolsheviks did follow the general process Marx described, though. Can you elaborate on what you mean, here? Further, Marx used Socialism and Communism interchangeably, but referred to Communism in stages, such as Lower-Stage Communism and Upper-Stage Communism. Lenin simplified this to Socialism and Communism, and over time we have come to understand that we can go further and break these up into even more stages.
Marx wasn't around for the establishment of Socialism, his analysis was focused on Capitalism and how we may overcome it, not a prophetic view for how society must work. This isn't a knock on Marx, rather, by contextualizing his ideas we can avoid dogmatism.
As for cooperatives in a Capitalist system, no, not really. What you are describing is Utopianism, ie the idea that you can think of an ideal society and adopt it directly. The data surrounding cooperatives don't appear to indicate any danger to large firms and other Capitalist entities dominating markets.
Can I see that data?
Since I'm sure you're arguing in good faith here and have actually looked at some data, and you're not just making things up.
There's small but sustained growth in small firms, but these are nowhere near scaling to the level of large corporations and firms, indicating an inability to overtake them. Rather, they seem to be "filling in the cracks," overtaking small sectors while leaving areas dominated by large firms untouched. This is why public ownership actually has a path to control these large firms.
Socialized medicine is always cheaper than capitalist medicine. It's inherently more cost effective for people to pool their money together. It isn't paid for by some rich miner buying mining rights in some other country.
Hmmm, interesting. But what if we gave it all to one guy?
Its so fucking dumb, you wouldn’t believe it! If he isn’t retarded and have an Elon Musk moment then he would and this is making me genuinely sick contribute to society, theoretically making a net plus to society
Whenever people say this they neglect to point out that all the money came from selling oil.
They forget to point out that only dumbfuck yanks would consider Norway to be socialist, so the comment, in a meme community, is misleading from the get-go.
Norway funds its safety nets off of super-exploitation of the Global South, ie Imperialism. It is firmly Capitalist and in no way Socialist, private property is the primary driving aspect of Norway's economy, the higher standard of living comes from acting as a Landlord in country form.
Norway is a capitalist country. It us an OECD hanger-on to the US-led imperialist world order.
Norway isn't socialist. And by "everyone" you mean just Norwegians, even though Norway's wealth was built on the backs of people in the global South.
Not to mention that Norway's public wealth is being claimed by the capitalist class, just like in every western country