Students support socialism but think like capitalist

[TheVrolok]

As a capitalist, I believe anyone whose GPA falls too low, but is judged 'too big to faiil' should get a GPA bailout. Plus of course you should be able to inhereit your parent's GPA, and to lend it out at rate of GPA interest to your fellow students, rather than have to study for it yourself.

Well done, sir.

 

[Sheik Yerbouti]

We need an academic safety net so that nobody fails a class. Share your grades if you’re compassionate.

Oooh sick burn

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

I wonder how many times the person who made that video had to edit out people calling them a moron for making such a dumb comparison.

I'm against socialism! I should be able to kill anyone and take their stuff, laissez-fair and all. I think the guy doing the interview is the socialist, trying to steal IQ points because he's obviously impoverished in that regard.

I've seen greater persuasive arguments in dog vomit.

 

[Greenman]

It's amazing how hard you fellows will work to miss a point.

 

[MooseNSquirrel]

As a capitalist, I believe anyone whose GPA falls too low, but is judged 'too big to faiil' should get a GPA bailout. Plus of course you should be able to inhereit your parent's GPA, and to lend it out at rate of GPA interest to your fellow students, rather than have to study for it yourself.

Youre still a socialist. You dont support removing the cap on GPAs. Students should be able to get even higher than 4.3.

 

[brycejones]

It's amazing how hard you fellows will work to miss a point.

It’s amzing how much projection is in your post.

 

[ecogen]

It's amazing how hard you fellows will work to miss a point.

It's amazing how you consistently manage to miss the point without even putting in effort. Life's not fair.

As for the OP, is every conservative on this fucking forum economically illiterate? Can we get one, just one that doesn't have his head up as his ass? Please?

 

[Vic]

It's amazing how hard you fellows will work to miss a point.

The only point being missed here is that right wing assclowns continue to conflate equality of opportunity with equality of outcome. Thus, when someone says, for example, that they'd like to see everyone have the opportunity to pursue higher education, the right wing echo chamber reverberates with the din of "lefties want everyone to get straight A's."

 

[Blackjack200]

The only point being missed here is that right wing assclowns continue to conflate equality of opportunity with equality of outcome. Thus, when someone says, for example, that they'd like to see everyone have the opportunity to pursue higher education, the right wing echo chamber reverberates with the din of "lefties want everyone to get straight A's."

Pretty cheeky to push this narrative less than a month after this happened
https://www.cnn.com/2019/03/13/us/what-we-know-college-admissions-cheating-scandal/index.html

That's what capitalism in education looks like.

 

[Moonbeam]

Enter the workforce? You are selling the same recycled propaganda as the quote above.

I mentioned the working poor.

• Today 73 percent of workers earning under $15 per hour nationwide are older than 25.
• Households with at least one worker earning under $15 an hour include over:
  • 125 million people
  • 31.5 million children
  • That’s more than 42 percent of the children in the US.

Enter the workforce? Do you hate the American people so, that you ignorantly throw this scorn onto them?

These people, through no fault of their own, are part of an economic system that increasingly leaves them behind. Impoverished and destitute. In need of greater subsidies to sustain them. And these workers, they are consumers. Capitalism REQUIRES their health and vitality. We need them to have a sizable stake of economic liquidity so that they can fully participate in the flow of goods and services. So the rich people you ignorantly pride yourself with, may continue to enjoy that wealth.

You are right Mai, something has been taken from us. It is called Income Inequality, and it is increasing. Another way of saying it, workers today earn less than their parents did. Their children will earn even less. That's also called Trickle Down.

Back in 2008, for some reason, we all started talking about the economy a whole lot. Back then I followed the Libertarian mantra. You know it well. But the posters here had some real points on providing Stimulus to ensure we maintain a certain level on economic liquidity. So starting around that time I was real curious, and starting looking around for various solutions. Democrats were quite vocal regarding their solutions. Where were the Republicans? What are their solutions?

10 years later, that question has never been answered. I have since concluded that Republicans have no plan.

Let me repeat. Republicans understand economics SO BADLY that they think we can fuck over the workers, the consumers of their products, and somehow they can still wake up behind their gated walls without the world burning down around them tomorrow. News flash, you are still part of this world. If our people are deprived of enough liquidity, enough value for their labor, !@#$ is going to hit the fan real quick. Real bad. American workers are ALREADY, TO THIS DAY, poor enough for that to occur. Except we have tax returns and food stamps and a real hodgepodge of bureaucratic "welfare" programs intended to try and keep people afloat. So they can still participate in the economy and not go French Revolution on our arses.

We need a fully realized, fully funded, a fully robust social safety net. We need to prepare for tomorrow by absorbing the lessons of the past 40 years of trickle down. And what it means for us as Capitalism evolves and drops labor. We can plan for and adapt to properly accommodate these changes. We can sustain our people by ensuring they will ALWAYS have a piece of the American economy. We just need to give it to them. Novel idea right? Keeping the consumers... consuming. By making sure they have enough cash. By giving it to them, one way or another.

Enter... Basic Income. Paid for by a 25% tax which, ironically, can pay for itself by virtue of the "nest egg". A baby is born, $1,000/mo becomes $216,000 by the time they turn 18 years old. Find a partner and PAY CASH for a house. Poof, mortgages and rents are history for over half the population, and massively reduced for the rest. Suddenly, for workers, that 25% has paid for itself with the practical abolition of those monthly house payments. And you still have that $1,000/mo income for each person coming in. Regardless of employment or location. Americans will be free to move and work where ever they please, with the security of knowing they can take their time to do it right. To work towards their dreams, instead of slaving for or begging for basic necessities.

In America's short lived golden age, our workers enjoyed more wealth than today. It's about time we gave it back to them. For the greater prosperity of our country. To SAVE our markets and our Capitalist system. You cannot survive if you leave your consumers behind. Basic economic liquidity 101. It's past time we did something positive on that front.

I think old solar water heater Carter was the high point for the working man. Imagine that fucking worthless vegetable tearing it down.

 

[Moonbeam]

The only point being missed here is that right wing assclowns continue to conflate equality of opportunity with equality of outcome. Thus, when someone says, for example, that they'd like to see everyone have the opportunity to pursue higher education, the right wing echo chamber reverberates with the din of "lefties want everyone to get straight A's."

I believe that if anybody can fall for the equality of outcome argument it's the left.

I think that in a competitive system like capitalism, people are born equal and strive to be as unequal as soon as they can, because, by limiting supply of capacity, people with skill, you limit opportunity. Advantage is thereby preserved. It is vital, then, in redressing the tendency of those who have advantages that limit their need to struggle, as opposed to those not so fortunate, that the victim card not get played in the form of identity politics. The proper way to go, then, it seems to me, is to increase advantage across the board, not take it from those who already have it unless they are playing the system unfairly say by using wealth to bribe, etc.

Again and as usual, the subject is complex which lets conservatives out when it comes to rationally thinking though the complexities.

 

[1prophet]

Sigh. Yeah, because that's how grades work in every single other first world country on the planet who has social programs in place that cover everyone.

Good gawd the right-wing is just blatantly fucking stupid anymore. The ONLY people this works on are your ignorant base. All you'll do with shit like this is recruit more retards.

This constant strawman you keep arguing against makes it impossible to have in actual, real debate about social programs.

This is how it always turns out:

Funny how liberals in the US who advocate socialism always point to lily-white Nordic countries but don't mention any of the successful mostly brown countries when espousing that same socialism, and they definitely don't want to make the necessary cultural/economic changes that allows what they perceive to be socialism in Nordic countries in order for it to actually work in the USA.

Context Is Key in Evaluating Nordic ‘Socialism’

The major advantage held by Nordic countries is a cultural focus on education, law-abiding behavior, and hard work.


Many of Scandinavian social democracies’ most successful ideas simply wouldn’t work in the U.S.

One of the least charming elements of the new push for democratic socialism by members of the media and the American Left is the utter willingness to ignore context. Take, for example, Elizabeth Bruenig of the Washington Post. Bruenig consistently celebrates the virtues of supposedly socialist Nordic countries:

The Nordic states are most famous for their generous welfare systems: free college, universal health care, long and well-funded parental leave, heavily subsidized child care and much more. . . . The people of the Nordic states have come a long way toward democratizing ownership, dispersing wealth, lowering inequality and placing workers’ lives under their own control — in other words, the socialism of the Nordic states seems pretty close to the kind of socialism that I wrote would satisfy me.​

All of these ideas could, Bruenig implies, be transferred overnight to America, making us fair and prosperous.


Obviously, this is untrue. Norway has 5.2 million people; Finland has 5.5 million; Denmark has 5.7 million; Sweden has just under 10 million. This is fewer people than the population of the state of Texas. Wealth creation in Nordic countries long predated the advent of nationalization and socialist enterprise; so did income equality. And state ownership of enterprise in Nordic countries does not mean that those enterprises run along the anti-profit lines that democratic socialists tend to favor; precisely the opposite. It would be more apt to call Nordic ownership of assets a model of state-run capitalism than of socialism per se.


But the most irritating aspect of the Left’s new addiction to Nordic “socialism” is that it causes us to ignore the actual conditions under which Nordic programs flourish — conditions that we would do well to actually mimic. The major advantage held by Nordic countries is a cultural focus on education, law-abiding behavior, and hard work.


The crime rate in the Nordic countries is exceedingly low, and it has been for generations. Every single Nordic country except Iceland ranks below the OECD average in terms of single-parent households, and well below the United States. Nordic countries have long been linked with a strong work ethic, thanks in part to geographic difficulties that require long hours. As Nima Sanandaji writes, “High levels of trust, a strong work ethic and social cohesion are the perfect starting point for successful economies.” Of course, socialist welfare schemes tend to undermine both family relations and work ethic, and Norway has been facing serious problems with people opting out of work. (“This is an oil-for-leisure program,” Norwegian economist Knut Anton Mork told the New York Times a decade ago.)


Then there are the institutional differences that aren’t discussed all that often.


A major factor in the success of the Finnish school system, for example, is largely ignored by the American Left: Half of Finland’s students opt for vocational schools, meaning that Finnish education focuses more on job skills than on general education. That’s why 14 percent of degrees earned in Finland are in STEM fields and 18 percent are in the liberal arts, as compared with 8 percent in STEM and 38 percent in the liberal arts in the United States. The conditions in which Nordic unions thrive are similarly ignored by American liberals: So many Nords belong to unions because those unions work cooperatively with employers and the government, instead of in the adversarial mode employed by their American counterparts. As Oren Cass points out, “[Denmark and Sweden] don’t require workplace elections, good-faith bargaining by employers, or compulsory dues payments; yet a majority of workers are union members.” To achieve the same level of unionization in the United States would require heavy government restrictions on business, because the Nordic model is so different.


In short, many of the ideas that make Nordic social programs effective operate in a different context than that of the United States. To take those programs out of their context and plop them down in the United States would be, in many cases, to ignore just why they worked in the first place. An honest discussion of the efficacy of government programs in the Nordic “socialist” countries would start by taking into account factors other than mere government control and redistribution.

The Myth of Scandinavian Socialism
The Nordic model is far from socialist.
Thursday, February 25, 2016

Corey Iacono
Economics Socialism Welfare State Taxation Free Trade Free Market Scandinavia
Bernie Sanders has single-handedly brought the term “democratic socialism” into the contemporary American political lexicon and shaken millions of Millennials out of their apathy towards politics. Even if he does not win the Democratic nomination, his impact on American politics will be evident for years to come.

Sanders has convinced a great number of people that things have been going very badly for the great majority of people in the United States, for a very long time. His solution? America must embrace “democratic socialism,” a socioeconomic system that seemingly works very well in the Scandinavian countries, like Sweden, which are, by some measures, better off than the United States.
Democratic socialism purports to combine majority rule with state control of the means of production. However, the Scandinavian countries are not good examples of democratic socialism in action because they aren’t socialist.
Social Democracy Is Not Democratic Socialism
In the Scandinavian countries, like all other developed nations, the means of production are primarily owned by private individuals, not the community or the government, and resources are allocated to their respective uses by the market, not government or community planning.

While it is true that the Scandinavian countries provide things like a generous social safety net and universal health care, an extensive welfare state is not the same thing as socialism. What Sanders and his supporters confuse as socialism is actually social democracy, a system in which the government aims to promote the public welfare through heavy taxation and spending, within the framework of a capitalist economy. This is what the Scandinavians practice.
In response to Americans frequently referring to his country as socialist, the prime minister of Denmark recently remarked in a lecture at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government,

I know that some people in the US associate the Nordic model with some sort of socialism. Therefore I would like to make one thing clear. Denmark is far from a socialist planned economy. Denmark is a market economy.​

The Embrace of Global Trade and Individual Choice
The Scandinavians embrace a brand of free-market capitalism that exists in conjunction with a large welfare state, known as the “Nordic Model,” which includes many policies that democratic socialists would likely abhor.
For example, democratic socialists are generally opponents of global capitalism and free trade, but the Scandinavian countries have fully embraced these things. The Economist magazine describes the Scandinavian countries as “stout free-traders who resist the temptation to intervene even to protect iconic companies.” Perhaps this is why Denmark, Norway, and Sweden rank among the most globalized countries in the entire world. These countries all also rank in the top 10 easiest countries to do business in.

How do supporters of Bernie Sanders feel about the minimum wage? You will find no such government-imposed floors on labor in Sweden, Norway, or Denmark. Instead, minimum wages are decided by collective-bargaining agreements between unions and employers; they typically vary on an occupational or industrial basis. Union-imposed wages lock out the least skilled and do their own damage to an economy, but such a decentralized system is still arguably a much better way of doing things than having the central government set a one-size-fits-all wage policy that covers every occupation nationwide.

It is clear that the Scandinavian countries are not in fact archetypes of successful democratic socialism.

In a move that would be considered radically pro-capitalist by young Americans who #FeelTheBern, Sweden adopted a universal school choice system in the 1990s that is nearly identical to the system proposed by libertarian economist Milton Friedman his 1955 essay, “The Role of Government in Education.”

In practice, the Swedish system involves local governments allowing families to use public funds, in the form of vouchers, to finance their child’s education at a private school, including schools run by the dreaded for-profit corporation.

Far from being a failure, as the socialists thought it would be, Sweden's reforms were a considerable success. According to a study published by the Institute for the Study of Labor, the expansion of private schooling and competition brought about by the Swedish free-market educational reforms “improved average educational performance both at the end of compulsory school and in the long run in terms of high school grades, university attendance, and years of schooling.”

Overall, it is clear that the Scandinavian countries are not in fact archetypes of successful democratic socialism. Sanders has convinced a great deal of people that socialism is something it is not, and he has used the Scandinavian countries to prove its efficacy while ignoring the many ways they deviate, sometimes dramatically, from what Sanders himself advocates.

Why are the Nordic countries ranked as the world’s best countries to live in?

(Illustrative photo: Colourbox)
The Nordic countries have, in the last ten years, been ranked consistently as the “world’s best countries to live in”.
Norway, Denmark, Sweden and Finland have become icons of fair societies, with both high economic productivity and an unequalled quality of life.
This Nordic success has been a puzzle to outside observers.
Collaboration, not competition
In a new book co-edited by Nina Witoszek and Atle Midttun, researchers from traditionally adverse disciplines such as evolutionary biology and human sciences, explore the drivers behind the Nordic model.
"The book is a bit provocative because it’s been inspired by the latest evolutionary science which insists that cooperative and altruistic groups beat selfish groups," says Research professor Witoszek.
One of the main arguments in the book is that the Nordic countries have managed to create a sustainable modernity, thanks to an extraordinary balance of cooperation and competition.
"In short, the Nordic countries illustrate the competitive advantage of collaboration," says Witoszek.
Nordic uniqueness?
The editors insist there is a unique Nordic humanism, which has contributed to the Nordic countries’ cooperative and egalitarian societies.
The humanism we are talking about goes back to the founding tradition of Christian Enlightenment and the ideas of social solidarity, equality and cooperative ethos. Though Norway, Denmark, Sweden and Finland may differ politically and economically, their social sustainability springs from the same strong set of values that sprang from a prolonged Enlightenment, continues Witoszek.
The editors also point to the tradition of what they call sustainability thinking and practical knowledge that have been crucial to sustain life in the exposed, Northern coastal areas.
According to the the editors, this knowledge and thinking has created inbuilt reflexes of cooperation in the Nordic societies. The traditions of cooperation, for instance reflected in the Norwegian institution dugnad, has been central to the creation of the Nordic welfare societies.
The Nordic model on trial
The book also discusses the future challenges of the Nordic model. Witoszek explains that the Nordic model is now at a crossroads:
"A set of new challenges have arisen in the wake of the digitalized and globalized economy, the migration crisis, the medialization of politics, the fragmentation of work-life and the dominance of neoliberal values. They all challenge the ideals of equality, the tradition of strong cooperation, personal responsibility, and the pro-social mindset which have been the basis of the Nordic model’s success," says Witoszek.
A big question is whether these transformations will affect the future of the Nordic model.
"Today, we see signs of polarization in the Nordic societies, into "nationalist" and "cosmopolitan" camps. But our book’s main contention is that the Nordic model is relatively robust. This is partly thanks to the fact that these countries have created a sustainable modernity which takes time to dismantle," says Witoszek.
In evolutionary terms, the key to the Nordic model is its resilience, she concludes.

 

[FelixDeCat]

Ill just put this right here:

America is $21.5 trillion dollars in debt and we are likely to have a de-facto default.

We can no longer afford out of control military spending nor can we afford big, dumbass socialist programs.

It has already been suggested America will not default because we can "print dollars".

Do you know that "printing dollars" really means? It means debt will not be issued to back it like we do now.

Have $10,000 in the bank? Now its in hyper inflated dollars. So $10,000 wont buy sh*t anymore because it has less value than Monopoly money.

And you want more socialism?

LOL!!!!

 

[Jhhnn]

Ill just put this right here:

America is $21.5 trillion dollars in debt and we are likely to have a de-facto default.

We can no longer afford out of control military spending nor can we afford big, dumbass socialist programs.

It has already been suggested America will not default because we can "print dollars".

Do you know that "printing dollars" really means? It means debt will not be issued to back it like we do now.

Have $10,000 in the bank? Now its in hyper inflated dollars. So $10,000 wont buy sh*t anymore because it has less value than Monopoly money.

And you want more socialism?

LOL!!!!

Republicans crying crocodile tears over the debt is so cute, particularly when they're cutting taxes for the richest people in the solar system. Greed at the top will devour us all if we let it.

 

[JEDIYoda]

Ill just put this right here:

America is $21.5 trillion dollars in debt and we are likely to have a de-facto default.

We can no longer afford out of control military spending nor can we afford big, dumbass socialist programs.

It has already been suggested America will not default because we can "print dollars".

Do you know that "printing dollars" really means? It means debt will not be issued to back it like we do now.

Have $10,000 in the bank? Now its in hyper inflated dollars. So $10,000 wont buy sh*t anymore because it has less value than Monopoly money.

And you want more socialism?

LOL!!!!

A real work of art you are!!

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

It's amazing how hard you fellows will work to miss a point.

There is no point because this isn't applicable, but if you insist- Capitalism. Ok, some guy buys his GPA and degree while those of lesser means have to rely on merit, assuming they can get in at all. Donny is the perfect example of failure overcome by fortune. WIth that kind of money someone like him could bump someone like you if you were ten times better.

 

[mect]

Ill just put this right here:

America is $21.5 trillion dollars in debt and we are likely to have a de-facto default.

We can no longer afford out of control military spending nor can we afford big, dumbass socialist programs.

It has already been suggested America will not default because we can "print dollars".

Do you know that "printing dollars" really means? It means debt will not be issued to back it like we do now.

Have $10,000 in the bank? Now its in hyper inflated dollars. So $10,000 wont buy sh*t anymore because it has less value than Monopoly money.

And you want more socialism?

LOL!!!!

Republicans lost all credibility regarding concern over our debt when they just blew it up for tax cuts for the wealthy.

 

[Greenman]

It’s amzing how much projection is in your post.

You caught me! I was projecting

There is no point because this isn't applicable, but if you insist- Capitalism. Ok, some guy buys his GPA and degree while those of lesser means have to rely on merit, assuming they can get in at all. Donny is the perfect example of failure overcome by fortune. WIth that kind of money someone like him could bump someone like you if you were ten times better.

The point was that when someone achieves something through hard work, they aren't generally happy about sharing it. I can identify with this because it's the question I always ask when we come up with a new program or group that needs help. How many hours of my labor are going to be taken from me? I'm not talking about investments or passive income, I'm talking about the actual hours I have to work to support those less fortunate than I am.

 

[Jhhnn]

You caught me! I was projecting

The point was that when someone achieves something through hard work, they aren't generally happy about sharing it. I can identify with this because it's the question I always ask when we come up with a new program or group that needs help. How many hours of my labor are going to be taken from me? I'm not talking about investments or passive income, I'm talking about the actual hours I have to work to support those less fortunate than I am.

Which applies to greed at the top not in the slightest. It's not what we pay in but what's left after we do. When I imagine myself to be paying 70% on all income above $10M/yr I'm counting my lucky stars not whining about my tax rate. OTOH, I wasn't born to extreme wealth nor was I bouncing on Roy Cohn's knee as a toddler, either.

 

[whm1974]

You caught me! I was projecting

The point was that when someone achieves something through hard work, they aren't generally happy about sharing it. I can identify with this because it's the question I always ask when we come up with a new program or group that needs help. How many hours of my labor are going to be taken from me? I'm not talking about investments or passive income, I'm talking about the actual hours I have to work to support those less fortunate than I am.

However keep in mind that you could always ending up becoming way less fortunate then you are now.

 

[whm1974]

Which applies to greed at the top not in the slightest. It's not what we pay in but what's left after we do. When I imagine myself to be paying 70% on all income above $10M/yr I'm counting my lucky stars not whining about my tax rate. OTOH, I wasn't born to extreme wealth nor was I bouncing on Roy Cohn's knee as a toddler, either.

Yeah if someone can't live on a 10 million a year income, then there is something wrong with that person.

 

[Viper1j]

Ill just put this right here:

America is $21.5 trillion dollars in debt and we are likely to have a de-facto default.

We can no longer afford out of control military spending nor can we afford big, dumbass socialist programs.

It has already been suggested America will not default because we can "print dollars".

Do you know that "printing dollars" really means? It means debt will not be issued to back it like we do now.

Have $10,000 in the bank? Now its in hyper inflated dollars. So $10,000 wont buy sh*t anymore because it has less value than Monopoly money.

And you want more socialism?

LOL!!!!

Maybe you're right.. I guess we have enough "socialism"..

 

[whm1974]

Maybe you're right.. I guess we have enough "socialism"..

View attachment 4750

Well a mixed economy has both Socialist programs and regulated free market.

 

[Blackjack200]

You caught me! I was projecting

The point was that when someone achieves something through hard work, they aren't generally happy about sharing it. I can identify with this because it's the question I always ask when we come up with a new program or group that needs help. How many hours of my labor are going to be taken from me? I'm not talking about investments or passive income, I'm talking about the actual hours I have to work to support those less fortunate than I am.

You’re a fucking asshole.

 

[JEDIYoda]

You caught me! I was projecting

The point was that when someone achieves something through hard work, they aren't generally happy about sharing it. I can identify with this because it's the question I always ask when we come up with a new program or group that needs help. How many hours of my labor are going to be taken from me? I'm not talking about investments or passive income, I'm talking about the actual hours I have to work to support those less fortunate than I am.

As long as you are getting paid for your labor what does it matter?