[giorgosts]

"But our acceptance of those property rights is subject to the important qualification that the interests of men and of society come first and that warns us both the misunderstanding and the hostility of conservatives."

That's how socialism is defined, that the interests of society come first.

[inglor_cz]

Nope. Socialism is collective ownership of means of production, sorry. Words have meanings.

[oceanplexian]

Words do have meanings and “collective ownership of the means of production” is the oldest con in the book. It’s the ownership of the means of production by the State, backed up by violence if you choose not to participate.

You can’t go to the socialist stock market and sell 5 shares of your “ownership”. You can’t transact it. If you don’t like the product, you can’t choose to buy a different one.

[inglor_cz]

Uh, how did you come to the conclusion that I support that bloody thing? I very much do not. Equally, I can write that Islam worships Allah and has Muhammad as its prophet, while being a staunch atheist who despises organized religion.

I like good definitions, though, and the GP was pretty sloppy about his terms.

"is the oldest con in the book"

Con? In one sense, yes. It does not bring about the promised prosperity. Attempts at socialism generally fail, and I believe the incompatibility of such system with human nature is fundamental.

It is not a con in the sense that they actually mean it seriously and want to implement it, though. If a socialist politician talks about expropriations and nationalization, you'd better believe that this is his actual intent. History says that this intent was acted upon many, many times.

[nathan_compton]

Uh but you can vote.

My understanding of socialism is that, in practice, it is merely the assertion that some choices about how labor is allocated should come from democratic decisions instead of the market.

[dartos]

Most based communism take I’ve ever read.

[Avshalom]

that is not how socialism is defined.

[gehwartzen]

I mean in most economic theory ultimately the interests align with those who owns the means of production. In capitalism that is the individual (ideally) and in socialism it’s society (ideally) so not sure what’s wrong with GPs definition. The interest of those who own comes first in either case; that seems self evident.

[giorgosts]

In capitalism the capital has a life and a mind of its own, independently from the people who own it or serve it as professionals. It wants to grow and accumulate.

Only a mixture of capitalism with socialist policies can be beneficial to man, if you go with absolutes it brings misfortune to most people.