Hey, Democrats, I've lived in a socialist country with income 'equality' and it sucks

[Hammock Parties]

Hey, Democrats, I've lived in a socialist country with income 'equality' and it was miserable

The Democratic Party’s lurch to socialism led to a presidential rebuke at the State of the Union on Tuesday night. From Sen. Bernie Sanders’s call for “Medicare-for-all,” to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s proposal of a “Green New Deal,” to Democratic presidential hopefuls’ hankering for stiff tax hikes, prominent members of the Democratic Party seem unwilling to miss any opportunity to advocate for greater government control of the economy.

Yet as Democrats justify grandiose proposals by decrying income inequality, many of us who immigrated to the United States from socialist countries see great irony. After all, unending income equality is what drove us to leave our native lands in the first place.

My family left post-Mao Communist China in the mid-1980s precisely because there was so much equality to go around. As a child, I lived in Guangzhou, the third largest city in China. Everyone in my city was equal in having no running hot water, no modern toilet facilities, no refrigerator, no washer, no dryer, and no color television.

Imagine a world without Whole Foods, Safeway and Walmart, or the plethora of products stocked on their shelves. Imagine no Vitamin Water, no Gatorade, no Starbucks, no Panera Bread, no candy bars and no sea salt potato chips. Now imagine instead being allotted food stamps from the government, indicating how much your family can eat.

There was abundant equality in the dearth of economic opportunities as well. The state told us where to live, where to work, what to buy, and for how much. Worse yet, my fellow citizens who lived in the countryside were even more impoverished.

When the state runs the economy and its citizens’ lives, there will be plenty of equality in scarcity, poverty and hopelessness.

After decades of totalitarian rule and grand socialist experiments, China had a meager per capita GDP of less than $200 in 1980. By comparison, America’s was $12,500 that year.

Around that time, China decided enough misery was enough. It embarked on historic economic reforms and opened up the country to the world. Liberalization introduced market prices, allowed for the return to household farming from collectivization, created Special Economic Zones in coastal areas that attracted foreign investment and promoted exports, exposed state-owned factory production to profit incentives, and opened up the market to private firms and entities.

As China began to dismantle bits and pieces of its command economy, Chinese citizens came face to face with the liberating effects of what the market made possible. There were many firsts.

For the first time, we could buy goods on the open market rather than using food stamps. For the first time, we could open up businesses instead of being confined to lifetime, government-assigned employment.

For the first time, we could have possessions that we had not seen before – clothing that was not gray and drab, electronics that exposed us to brand new images and music, goods that we coveted without even knowing it.

In the end, even Communist China did not want the kind of economic equality that existed during my childhood. Hence, the country opened up its economy, implemented bold reforms, and adopted capitalism, even though it retained many communist characteristics.

Over the past 40 years, China became the second largest economy in the world.

However, don’t for a minute forget the lesson that still applies: When the state runs the economy and its citizens’ lives, there will be plenty of equality in scarcity, poverty and hopelessness.

Today, this is a lesson that prominent Democrats seem eager to forget. Less than 30 years after the former Soviet Union collapsed and the United States emerged victorious from the Cold War, Americans increasingly find it necessary to debate the shortcomings and evils of socialism all over again.

It was left up to President Trump to declare on Tuesday night: “Here, in the United States, we are alarmed by new calls to adopt socialism in our country. America was founded on liberty and independence – and not government coercion, domination and control. We are born free, and we will stay free. Tonight, we renew our resolve that America will never be a socialist country.”

It is crazy that the leader of the free world had to state this. It is crazier still that he will have to deliver an even more robust defense of democratic capitalism in the run-up to the 2020 presidential election. Hopefully, the Democrats’ vision of economic equality will not prevail.

[Randallflagg]

Originally Posted by BucEyedPea

Both

There has been a good amount of indoctrination in the K-12 but especially at the university level. It's just gotten worse for the millennial generation. Just check out some of the textbooks to see it.

Occasional Cortex's Green New Deal is right out of our Marxist-dominated universities. She was an economics major, as I recall, at BU. Look at her ideas there.

Now there's conferences for grievous studies such as "white privilege" for teachers. I forget where I read it but some socialist was calling for more teachers for the public schools.

It's all about a battle of ideas.

Indeed. And, in the next 30 or so years - it WILL infect this country and take it down. It will make the former USSR look like a Sunday school picnic.

[B_Ambuehl]

The problem with a welfare state is spending must continually increase because number of people in it will continually increase & it becomes less efficient over time as all government controlled entities do. When the economy stops growing it implodes. Welfare spending adjusted for inflation is about 10x what it was in the 60's yet the numbers of poor remain the same. See attachment.

Those "thriving" Nordic countries are already starting to show some of the downfalls of "democratic" socialism. For example:

1. Sweden's welfare state is already under danger of imploding due to high taxes and migration. In 2017 economic growth was practically nil despite negative interest rates. Migration and crime are quickly becoming problems:

https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/09/05...welfare-state/

2. Scandinavians in america do better than scandinavians in scandinavia. There's something to be said for the work ethic. Danish Americans have 55 percent higher living standard than Danes. Swedish Americans have a 53 percent higher living standard than Swedes. Even though Norwegian Americans lack the oil wealth of Norway, they have a 3 percent higher living standard than their cousins overseas. The poverty rate of swedish americans is lower than native swedes.

2. Wealth inequality is still nearly as bad than america. In the United States, the top 1% owns roughly 35% of all the wealth. In Sweden, the top 1% controls roughly 25-40% of total wealth. The share of the richest Swedes who inherited their wealth is around, 2/3, with only a third being entrepreneurs. In America, the majority of wealth is self-made, while in Sweden, it’s generational.

3. College debt is nearly as bad despite free college. In 2013, average college debt among graduating students was $19,000 in Sweden, compared to $24,800 in America. It’s presumably room and board responsible for debt in Sweden. An American college graduate earns 65% more than a high school graduate, while in Sweden, college graduates earn only 25% more. Denmark has only one-third the engineers as the OECD average because everyone goofs off and studies easy liberal arts stuff.

4. People have grown lazy. Despite being one of the healthiest nations in the world, in the early 2000s, 10% of Sweden’s entire workforce was on paid sick leave at any given time. The average number of sick leaves taken per Swede per year more than doubled when the government increased the percentage of salary they’d pay from 75% to 80%.

In Denmark, roughly 9 percent of the workforce (in 2012) was on disability, 33,500 of them under the age of 40, and in Norway last year, while the unemployment was below 3%, 20% of the working age population was on either unemployment or sick leave benefits. All of these countries lack the sick populations to justify such figures.

5. Additionally, those countries have become more pro-business than the U.S. was before Trump. Their corporate tax rate averages 24% (Under Obama ours was 39%). From 1975-95, Sweden’s GDP growth was half that of all other OECD countries, and a full percentage point lower than the EU-15 countries. In the 90s they became more business friendly and more than one out of every five government employees lost their job.

America has more challenges then any of those countries. We have massive unsustainable government debt, massive unsustainable unfunded retirement debt on both a state and local level, massive number of baby boomers reaching retirement, and massive unsustainable corporate bond debt. We've had 20+ years of nearly unfettered migration, a massive imbalance between low skill population numbers and high skill population number (only 30% of americans have a college degree) and the robots and automation are quickly coming and wiping out unskilled jobs. As of today we have over 50k+ illegal immigrants crossing our border each month.

Macro trends group expects 40 million permanent job losses due to automation, computers, and robots. That's 1 out of every 4 current jobs, gone, replaced by higher skill technology jobs that require IQ and education, something the low skill work force doesn't have.

https://www.bain.com/insights/labor-...nd-inequality/

And add on top of all that mexico just elected a socialist president. What happens when all that comes to a head? Democrats will probably get their welfare state and guaranteed basic income, but it will quickly become unsustainable.

[Loneiguana]

Originally Posted by NJChiefsFan27

Why does the right ignore the various thriving Nordic countries when the discussion of socialism pops up and instead choose to fixate on authoritarian countries that no liberals want to emulate?

It's almost like you guys are being intentionally dishonest or something.

Because SOCIALISM BAD. That's as far as the thought process goes. The Republican mind is broken and unable to comprehend nuance, like the difference between autocratic socialism and democratic socialism.

But more than than that, the debate has to be what socialistic elements we need in society and what does and does not fit into a free market. Right now the US has some basic dogmatic beliefs that everything is fixed in the market and if you don't believe that then you're "socialist" (which means the same thing as "communist" to certain people).

Meanwhile, socialist aspects of American have been around since the founding fathers, who thought public libraries were a cornerstone of our democracy. Public roads, infrastructure, police, fire, defense, food safety, product safety, CDC, Federal police, Social Security... ect ect all exist. CC, TVA, Rural Electrification, and WPA are all socialism.

[B_Ambuehl]

This is a good paper on the challenges of Swedens welfare model. Use google translate to read it:

https://timbro.se/valfard/spelregler...llbar-valfard/

[Prison Bitch]

Originally Posted by B_Ambuehl

This is a good paper on the challenges of Swedens welfare model. Use google translate to read it:

https://timbro.se/valfard/spelregler...llbar-valfard/

Not one black or Hispanic person will ever read that.

I read your entire post above. I agreed with nearly all of it. But you just don’t get it. The “POC” believe wealth is hoarded by white Americans and they want it and they want to hire agents (call them Agent Kamala or Agent Warren) to go get it.

You obv think: “How can you be so reductionist? Humans are deeper thinkers than that!” And I’ll just post polling data.

[cosmo20002]

Originally Posted by Randallflagg

Indeed. This country has been throwing these ideas of "socialism" for many years now - it has been ingrained into our children by their "teachers" from an early age.

I always love the pat "answer" when the question is posed to the fascist left about socialism not working - "WELL- IT WORKS IN ICELAND!!!!!"

That have yet to be able to make the connection that Iceland has a population of (roughly) 500,000 people and immigration is strictly enforced - outsiders need not apply.

But it will be here. It is coming, like a hell bound train. It is coming.

So...not coming.

[cosmo20002]

Originally Posted by Randallflagg

Indeed. And, in the next 30 or so years - it WILL infect this country and take it down. It will make the former USSR look like a Sunday school picnic.

The old man is hysterical.

[NJChiefsFan27]

Originally Posted by morphius

because even they don't call what they have as socialism. It still relies on capitalism to keep the money flowing.

So you're saying we should keep our same capitalistic system and implement single payer healthcare, free college, etc. within that economic framework?

How is that any different than what the Bernie Sanders wing of the Democratic party has been asking for?

[Randallflagg]

"Socialism is OK - until you run out of other peoples' money" - Margaret Thatcher

[NJChiefsFan27]

Originally Posted by Randallflagg

"Socialism is OK - until you run out of other peoples' money" - Margaret Thatcher

"I'm a braindead Boomer that has consumed dangerous levels of cold war propaganda." - Randallflagg

[ClevelandBronco]

I can't be bothered. Pay me my old age stipend. Cure my diseases. Go broke. No longer my problem. You want it? it's yours.

[Frazod]

I guess NJDoucheBag just got out of rehab.

[IowaHawkeyeChief]

Originally Posted by RodeoPants2

Sam Darnold and Patrick Mahomes both threw passes! How can we tell them apart!

Like you care about football... post in the lounge dork.

[NJChiefsFan27]

Originally Posted by Frazod

I guess NJDoucheBag just got out of rehab.

Honestly, If you took a break from this cesspool once in a while you would probably be a lot happier.

[Frazod]

Originally Posted by NJChiefsFan27

Honestly, If you took a break from this cesspool once in a while you would probably be a lot happier.

Yeah, joy is practically oozing from your posts.