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by danans
1891 days ago
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> That can very well be socialism for a subgroup of your existing population. This is like calling ancient Sparta - where the Spartans lived in an egalitarian structure while simultaneously oppressing their Helot slaves - socialism. Or for a more a recent example, apartheid South Africa, where whites received a great deal of support via government policy that practically ensured their prosperity. That wasn't socialism, either. Socialism is not about centralized state control. It's about whether the state plays a strong role in ensuring a standard of living for all it's citizens. In successful examples (like Social Security and Medicare in the US) it has accomplished this while the majority of the economy is not under state control. |
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In terms of economic policy, all the examples you cited are on the left side or going left in my book. There is definitely nothing capitalistic about state intervention.
It also makes sense historically: it took us a long time to understand that capitalism is the most efficient way to create value and advance technology. Even the communist dictatorship that is China understood that and it's using this to rule the world, while the western world (especially the USA) marched back on their capitalism and hampered their economy with more and more regulations.
I think we still don't have enough capitalism and we need a completely unregulated market and no government at all.