Capitalism is easy to understand.
You do something and you get something - even if you cheat by “outsmarting” someone else. The reward is tied to your actions. Like doggy treats. At no point is it revealed that your effort might be worth more than you get. This doesn’t matter because it appears as a direct transaction. Work = pay.
It’s not though, but that’s what it appears like to anyone who doesn’t think further than to getting their paycheck.
Socialism disconnects the transactions. Roughly put, the work that everyone puts into the system is used to pay out to everyone. You’re no longer working directly for the hand that feeds you.
Like many places elsewhere, Denmark has social security system that sort of works like this. Everyone pays taxes and the pool of money is distributed to those who needs it, based on all kinds of things other than what people paid into the system themselves. It disconnects the effort and the payout.
This has good and bad effects in comparison to capitalism. A bad thing is that people who don’t understand the larger picture will still look at it from a transactional point of view. Suddenly they think they deserve to get free money, and start making up their own explanations of why. They’ll also look at it as a zero sum game, where they believe that if anyone else gets something then they must also have the same or else they’d feel that other people take more than they deserve. All kinds of racism and fasicm grows in those capitalistic arguments when applied to a social system.
The good thing though is that they’re actually right in saying that they deserve more even if they don’t contribute. Everyone deserves more than nothing from a system. It’s possible, because it’s not a zero sum game. It raises the lower bar, and keeps more people healthy and thus capable of producing more.
There’s this quote “a greatness of a nation can be measured by how it treats the poorest”. It’s a mis-quote, but it’s true. Capitalism can not achieve the same when there’s no lower boundary to poverty. It will still have the costs of sickness, homelessness and poverty even if it tries not to pay for it by closing their eyes.
A socialist system is the key the solving this. So maybe we do sometimes pay people who doesn’t deserve it, but it’s still cheaper than to have to pay for the costs of the problems in capitalism.
Socialism is not welfare, nor is capitalism any form of doing something in favor of a reward. Your metaphor, I feel, does a disservice to understanding each.
Capitalism is a system where capital owners dominate the state and the commanding heights of the economy, socialism is a system where workers dominate the state and the commanding heights of the economy. Any confusion of welfare for socialism implies that systems where capitalists are the dominant force is still socialist if it gives welfare, but existing social democracies that follow this model depend on exploiting the global south to prop up this welfare while maintaining capitalist profits.
Capitalism is easy to understand. You do something and you get something - even if you cheat by “outsmarting” someone else. The reward is tied to your actions. Like doggy treats. At no point is it revealed that your effort might be worth more than you get. This doesn’t matter because it appears as a direct transaction. Work = pay. It’s not though, but that’s what it appears like to anyone who doesn’t think further than to getting their paycheck.
Socialism disconnects the transactions. Roughly put, the work that everyone puts into the system is used to pay out to everyone. You’re no longer working directly for the hand that feeds you.
Like many places elsewhere, Denmark has social security system that sort of works like this. Everyone pays taxes and the pool of money is distributed to those who needs it, based on all kinds of things other than what people paid into the system themselves. It disconnects the effort and the payout.
This has good and bad effects in comparison to capitalism. A bad thing is that people who don’t understand the larger picture will still look at it from a transactional point of view. Suddenly they think they deserve to get free money, and start making up their own explanations of why. They’ll also look at it as a zero sum game, where they believe that if anyone else gets something then they must also have the same or else they’d feel that other people take more than they deserve. All kinds of racism and fasicm grows in those capitalistic arguments when applied to a social system.
The good thing though is that they’re actually right in saying that they deserve more even if they don’t contribute. Everyone deserves more than nothing from a system. It’s possible, because it’s not a zero sum game. It raises the lower bar, and keeps more people healthy and thus capable of producing more.
There’s this quote “a greatness of a nation can be measured by how it treats the poorest”. It’s a mis-quote, but it’s true. Capitalism can not achieve the same when there’s no lower boundary to poverty. It will still have the costs of sickness, homelessness and poverty even if it tries not to pay for it by closing their eyes. A socialist system is the key the solving this. So maybe we do sometimes pay people who doesn’t deserve it, but it’s still cheaper than to have to pay for the costs of the problems in capitalism.
Socialism is not welfare, nor is capitalism any form of doing something in favor of a reward. Your metaphor, I feel, does a disservice to understanding each.
Go ahead then. Tell like it is. In words that people understand.
Capitalism is a system where capital owners dominate the state and the commanding heights of the economy, socialism is a system where workers dominate the state and the commanding heights of the economy. Any confusion of welfare for socialism implies that systems where capitalists are the dominant force is still socialist if it gives welfare, but existing social democracies that follow this model depend on exploiting the global south to prop up this welfare while maintaining capitalist profits.