> If there's any societal system that has been shown not to work, it's communism. That experiment has been tried so many times, in so many countries, with varying cultures, geographies, and levels of development... and not one of them was successful. Yes, capitalism has had failures, but at least it's had successes.
If your response to that is, "No true communist state has yet existed." Well… the same goes for a true capitalist state. The real world is full of implementations, not ideals.
When we look at implementations of capitalism, some are amazing successes (South Korea, US, UK, Canada, post-WWII Japan & West Germany, Taiwan, etc). Some are hellholes (the Belgian Congo). When we look at implementations of communism (The Soviet Union, East Germany, North Korea, China before Deng Xiaoping, Venezuela, Vietnam before Doi Moi, etc.), none of them are successes and many are hellholes.
I'm not an ideologue about this. If communism led to better quality of life than capitalism, I'd be fine with that, and I'd vote for communists. But the evidence is that it doesn't, so I don't.
I see nothing incorrect, nor unnecessary, nor unkind in my statements. If anyone disagrees, I welcome responses.
Thanks!
I think saying that some people are "crazy communists", and that communism is failed, is not enough to discredit all the positive socialist measures that are likely leading to increased innovation and a healthy economy in the long run, in most developed countries.
- debt-free higher education - free health care - financial sector regulations - tax poors less than rich - taxes on corporations, which will be important in the future to deal with automation of most jobs, such as lawyers and truck drivers. - basic income (only exists in Finland at the moment in 2016, was tested a few times in the last decades, with success apparently)
The "Communism is failed" argument is typical of the neo con media, it's disingenuous and completely misses the point. Socialism is very different from communism. Socialism improves on capitalism. Socialism provenly works. Most developed countries are socialist, to different degrees. The most successful ones in innovation per capita happen to be the most socialist ones, literally, scandinavian countries. The US is already socialist to some extend, not just capitalist.
An interesting point to add is that Milton Friedman, the guru of the neo conservative current, actually supports basic income. Basic income just got voted in Finland. Basic income is very different from communism, and was proven to work in many real-life experiments, without affecting people's drive to work. See interesting TED talks on that subject.
… In 1962, the libertarian economist Milton Friedman advocated a minimum guaranteed income via a “negative income tax.”
I'm also one of the highest karma people on this very site. ;)
BTW, thank you for all your contributions to Rust, Rails, and countless other open source libraries and modules. Your work has benefitted millions.
https://twitter.com/steveklabnik/status/682787891936948224
https://twitter.com/steveklabnik/status/682788969843658752
https://twitter.com/steveklabnik/status/682787609446330368
https://twitter.com/steveklabnik/status/682787371235016705
He retweeted this: https://twitter.com/kantrn/status/683385220167368704
https://twitter.com/steveklabnik/status/682759650362658816
https://twitter.com/steveklabnik/status/682759288012554240
Heck, his Twitter profile pic is a communist logo. His Twitter bio says, "Every loss for a worker is loss for all of us and every gain for a part of the working class is a victory for all." That's a quote from the Industrial Workers of the World[1].
I don't know how much more communist one can get.
1. http://www.iww.org/content/iww-greece-announcement-regarding...
Also, I care more about left unity than arguing over the exact kind of leftist I or others are.
Steve Klabnik is an extremely talented programmer. He's a core developer of Rust and is the main author of The Rust Book[1]. He is also a communist. (Edit: This is not 100% accurate. Klabnik is better described as anti-capitalist. See downthread for details.) Don't take my word for it. He wants people to know this. Read his blog[2]. Look at his Twitter[3]. Judging from his follower count, he's not exactly alone in his opinions.
I wish you were right. Communists should be straw men. If there's any societal system that has been shown not to work, it's communism. That experiment has been tried so many times, in so many countries, with varying cultures, geographies, and levels of development... and not one of them was successful. Yes, capitalism has had failures, but at least it's had successes.
1. http://doc.rust-lang.org/book/
2. http://words.steveklabnik.com/an-introduction-to-economics-u... At the end: "…this post is basically my own little summary of Capital, Volume I, chapters 1-7, by Karl Marx."
3. https://twitter.com/steveklabnik