Christofoo Review
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Socialism ... and I care because...?
Sun, 09/27/2009 - 22:31 | 
chris
It seems like every year there is one particular word or short phrase that gets really worn out. For 2009, that word is "socialism."
Here are some of the things people are saying:
On the other hand, there's this one, my personal favorite:
After all, what's the problem with socialism? What makes big government worse than big business?
Many Americans are willing to forget all the nasty things that capitalism gave birth to, and willing to assume that socialism is fundamentally evil because there is a word-association between socialism and communism.
There's no rule that says we can't use the best of each system. Here's how I envision a healthy balance:
- Compensation is primarily based on market forces. (i.e. capitalism)
- Government regulates market forces to minimize fraud and prevent monopolies.
- Government regulates market forces to protect environmental balance.
- Government puts safety nets in place for the people, sufficient to prevent starvation, homelessness and to guard a minimum level of health and to minimize effects of disasters. It is difficult to prevent people from "leaching" off these types of systems, and effort should be made to motivate and empower beneficiaries to leave the system, but even when there is some leaching, these systems are still worth it.
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Coorpratism!
I understand some of your points here. What I think could be evaluated further is how Corporatism is different from Capitalism.
What do I mean by Corporatism? Well, I essentially see it as corporations that are global entities that exploit resources from any part of the world they can. I really think elements of this existed in the founding of America, and have grown much, much bigger today.
Exploited resources included then and now: slave labor, child labor, under-paid labor, conquering new territories to seize lands, natural resources, and so forth. In all honesty, this has played a role in every system that I am aware of, but I am no expert.
Capitalism is spoken of as if it did this honestly, and with fairness. Maybe it was with Mom and Pap stores, very small personal businesses. But, now we have a shrinking amount of those. People could just claim land, and say, "I found this valuable resource here, I am lucky". Now, you must buy it and battle the forces that be to use it to make money. So, corporations have resources to make those battles.
We the people establish a government to pool resources to protect lands, and people for exploitation. So, Corporations seek out countries, new territories, that do not prevent their exploitations.
Without exploitations, how is true, non-abusive, capitalism established? The government does have that role, as you say to prevent exploitation domestically, and internationally. But, America and its people are spread thin with all the issues. The final thought is this, the government must check the means of the market. We must properly prevent exploitation. The market does not obtain resources without abuse in some sector. It never has!