Socialism is Incompatible with American Values

With socialist candidates like Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez at the forefront of American politics, the nation must ask itself: can the United States be a socialist country?

The answer is simple: no.

  The left purposely ignores every single failure of Socialism, suffering a severe case of historical amnesia. 

But guess what? We remember. 

Socialism is a stepping stone to Communism. Karl Marx, famous for The Communist Manifesto, didn’t even differentiate clear distinctions between Socialism and Communism because they are so similar.

During the Industrial Revolution, when labor laws were either non-existent or loosely enforced, workdays were 16 hours with grotesque conditions. So naturally, Marx and other ‘political scientists’ were eager to critique the failures of Capitalism, which they believed caused the situation at hand. However by the end of the 19th century things had dramatically changed, except these ideologies stuck around. 

By advocating for government ownership of the means of production, planning and income distribution, modern day socialists live in a utopian bubble in which no government has ever taken advantage of these tenets. In a socialist society, the government utilizes what were once public resources to ideally benefit the interest of the general public, thereby eliminating classes and competition, and wiping clear any remanences of a free market despite the success of a free market economy. What makes Socialism and Communism different is the degrees to which they are implemented. Under Communism, there is no private property ownership. The government controls everything, including housing. Under Socialism, there is still opportunity for private ownership such as your house, but the primary means of generating wealth is controlled and owned by the government. 

No country has ever achieved a pure socialist or communist state, as the government becomes too powerful and soon becomes just another dictatorship. Liberals purposely fail to mention that nations who’ve succumbed to socialist and communist policies lost their free speech, their right to bear arms, free press, free assembly, and imprisonment without cause; aka every single right that makes America, America.  Further, leftist mouthpieces fail to look to basic economic principles when spouting these insane proposals. There’s a little thing called ‘supply and demand’. In a free market, the supply of a product is determined by how much of it is demanded, which then regulates price. If there’s a surplus, the price drops, and if there’s a shortage, the price rises. In a socialist nation, the government sets the supply of a good. However, they can’t regulate demand since different people want different things. An example would be China’s “Great Leap Forward”. Since the government controlled all aspects of the economy, they thought that producing iron and steel would best revitalize the economy. However, while doing this, the government pulled people away from food production labor, which led to mass starvation and death because no one was harvesting due to poor resource allocation by the government.

In the 1920’s, peasants in the Soviet Union supported socialist policies. They hoped these policies would help to pull them up by the bootstraps and find an equal place in society and the economy. They were lied to. The socialist economy of the U.S.S.R came to a halt in 1921 when peasants were shocked that their land was also being confiscated by the government. Then, Stalin began ‘five-year plans’ that collectivized agriculture. This was done so that the government would have control over what was produced. This led to a severe famine in Ukraine, causing widespread death. 

The government was supposed to protect the very people that were most hurt. The government promised that under their control, life would be better. Who was fooling who here? 

Liberals are so disillusioned by so called ‘progressive’ promises, not realizing much of what they enjoy today is a product of Capitalism. 

While many say Nordic countries are ideal socialist countries, they fail to realize that the Nordic model is underpinned by capitalist principles.

For starters, Nordic nations had developed their booming economy through years of a free economy with free trade (a capitalist model), which allowed them to create a strong economic foundation. Another example of Nordic nations using capitalist policy to boost their economy is Nordic countries do not have minimum wage laws! Unions are powerful and hold a lot of bargaining power so that there are fair wages, but the government has no control over it. Similar to President Trump’s belief in school choice, Nordic nations offer just that! Nordic citizens get ‘vouchers’ that can be used at any school, whether public or private, because they too understand that zip code shouldn’t define education. 

What leftists also fail to mention is that once these Nordic countries began implementing Socialism, things soon turned sour.

According to the Foundation for Economic Education, in the 1970’s, high taxes and intense government intervention led to a decline in economic growth. In the ‘90’s government spending was 70% of GDP and unemployment rose. However, Nordic politicians acknowledged the issue and actually began implementing more capitalist-like programs, such as privatizing parts of health care, cutting back on welfare programs, and creating school choice. Sweden in particular slashed corporate taxes from nearly 60% in the early ‘90’s to roughly 25% as of 2013, and eliminated the Estate Tax. What they found was that higher taxes do not promote economic growth. While Nordic Nations do incorporate socialist aspects, such as some ridiculously high taxes, they are not socialist nations like leftists will have you believing.

So what price is too costly to pay for Socialism? I’d say 100 million lives. 

That’s right, in the 20th century alone, 100 million people were killed as a result of socialist and communist policies. Whether it was in Cambodia, China, or the Soviet Union, Socialism was not worth even one life. 

The United States has over 300 million people. Mark our words: not one American will lose their life to socialist or communist policies.