Socialist utopia

[Faiyez]

What country today is the closest approximation to the ideal and values of social equality?

[Talby]

Publicado originalmente por Faiyez:

Publicado originalmente por Talby:

Technically Denmark, Norway, and Sweden are constitutional monarchies, while Finland and Iceland are republics. Social democracy is just a term to make communism "acceptable"...

See, it doesn't matter what you prefer to call it. Whatever Norway, etc. have done seems the most desirable in a society.

I don't know why some users are scrambling to distance Nordics and their social policies from their clearly socialist inspirations and ideas that were started by socialists.

Are we forgetting that capitalism on it's own accord is supposed to create feedback in the form of currency back into the country or state and eventually the populace that runs it? That is the entire point, the feedback loop is to create incentive to work for pay, your pay feeds the economy. Lather, rinse, repeat. In the US, all big companies started offshoring so they broke the loop. And here we are with the USD becoming more worthless by the minute.

[Faiyez]

Publicado originalmente por abcd:

Publicado originalmente por Faiyez:

See, it doesn't matter what you prefer to call it. Whatever Norway, etc. have done seems the most desirable in a society.

I don't know why some users are scrambling to distance Nordics and their social policies from their clearly socialist inspirations and ideas that were started by socialists.

because the nords are also hyper-capitalistic and their 'socialism' comes at the expense of all other states. often knowingly so.

kind of like switzerland.

I don't actually know what you mean by that, but I can tell you one thing for sure, and it's that "capitalism" and "comes at the expense of other states" go hand in hand.

[oldirty`]

Publicado originalmente por Talby:

Technically Denmark, Norway, and Sweden are constitutional monarchies, while Finland and Iceland are republics. Social democracy is just a term to make communism "acceptable"...

Im not sure if you understand the words you are using.
Technically it would be more accurate to call sweden a "Parliamentary monarchy". The monarch has zero political power.
Your framing is generally used by anti democracy conspiracy theorists.
Communism has nothing to do with this at all. Its specific sub form of socialism.

[Talby]

Publicado originalmente por Faiyez:

Publicado originalmente por abcd:

because the nords are also hyper-capitalistic and their 'socialism' comes at the expense of all other states. often knowingly so.

kind of like switzerland.

I don't actually know what you mean by that, but I can tell you one thing for sure, and it's that "capitalism" and "comes at the expense of other states" go hand in hand.

it is the implementation that is the issue, here in the US the administrative state is combining with big tech and big pharma, which proves your example quite nicely. I call it the "military-corporate-healthcare-industrial complex".

[abcd]

Publicado originalmente por Faiyez:

Publicado originalmente por abcd:

because the nords are also hyper-capitalistic and their 'socialism' comes at the expense of all other states. often knowingly so.

kind of like switzerland.

I don't actually know what you mean by that, but I can tell you one thing for sure, and it's that "capitalism" and "comes at the expense of other states" go hand in hand.

it's pretty simple.

the nordic countries, as an economic block, believe that the global economic situation is zero-sum. that there is no 'generative force' in economics, only various forms of exchange and taking.

thus for them to have a decent quality of life requires, by their own logic, that other countries have it worse than they do.

so when they hurt other countries with their policies, that's just a matter of course. they don't need to look for alternatives and are unlikely to bother.

[Talby]

Publicado originalmente por oldirty`:

Publicado originalmente por Talby:

Technically Denmark, Norway, and Sweden are constitutional monarchies, while Finland and Iceland are republics. Social democracy is just a term to make communism "acceptable"...

Im not sure if you understand the words you are using.
Technically it would be more accurate to call sweden a "Parliamentary monarchy". The monarch has zero political power.
Your framing is generally used by anti democracy conspiracy theorists.
Communism has nothing to do with this at all. Its specific sub form of socialism.

I do see "democratic socialism" as simply the implementation of "social democracy", and socialism as merely the gateway to communism via corruption - which is far more common than the Scandinavian way, which actually does work.

[Faiyez]

Publicado originalmente por abcd:

Publicado originalmente por Faiyez:

I don't actually know what you mean by that, but I can tell you one thing for sure, and it's that "capitalism" and "comes at the expense of other states" go hand in hand.

it's pretty simple.

the nordic countries, as an economic block, believe that the global economic situation is zero-sum. that there is no 'generative force' in economics, only various forms of exchange and taking.

thus for them to have a decent quality of life requires, by their own logic, that other countries have it worse than they do.

so when they hurt other countries with their policies, that's just a matter of course. they don't need to look for alternatives and are unlikely to bother.

This is fascinating and first I heard of this. Sounds almost like a conspiracy theory.

[oldirty`]

Publicado originalmente por Talby:

Publicado originalmente por oldirty`:

Im not sure if you understand the words you are using.
Technically it would be more accurate to call sweden a "Parliamentary monarchy". The monarch has zero political power.
Your framing is generally used by anti democracy conspiracy theorists.
Communism has nothing to do with this at all. Its specific sub form of socialism.

I do see "democratic socialism" as simply the implementation of "social democracy", and socialism as merely the gateway to communism via corruption - which is far more common than the Scandinavian way, which actually does work.

I think you should maybe google those terms before using them... They have clear definitions and are not based on ones opinion. ;)

[abcd]

Publicado originalmente por Faiyez:

Publicado originalmente por abcd:

it's pretty simple.

the nordic countries, as an economic block, believe that the global economic situation is zero-sum. that there is no 'generative force' in economics, only various forms of exchange and taking.

thus for them to have a decent quality of life requires, by their own logic, that other countries have it worse than they do.

so when they hurt other countries with their policies, that's just a matter of course. they don't need to look for alternatives and are unlikely to bother.

This is fascinating and first I heard of this. Sounds almost like a conspiracy theory.

it's simple open economic policy. they've been pretty forthright about this view.

[Ulfrinn]

Publicado originalmente por oldirty`:

Publicado originalmente por Ulfrinn:

I don't know why it's so hard for people to understand that safety nets are NOT socialism. Socialism is an economic system, specifically, one where the means of production is publicly (government) owned. So your factories, farms, energy, for example are not privately owned. Communism is a step further in that the means of distribution, meaning stores, restaurants, etc are also government owned. None of this has anything to do with safety nets, welfare, healthcare, etc.

And the reason those economic models always turn to dictatorships is simple. While you may thing you can evenly distribute property, you cannot evenly distribute labor because people do not just work for free of their own volition. They need a reason to do the jobs people don't want to do, like collecting trash, digging ditches, unclogging sewers. There are only two ways to get someone to do a job they wouldn't otherwise do. The capitalist method is to pay them more than anyone else, and the socialist method is to put a gun to their head.

Very good post. Although capitalism also puts a gun to peoples head indirectly. Lots of jobs suck and get payed bad while others dont and get payed very well.

No, there's a big difference between not liking your job, and doing it to pay your bills and get the things you want, and someone putting a gun to your head, and giving you nothing but the privilege of living another day for doing it.

[Swarmfly]

North Korea.

[GunsForBucks]

Publicado originalmente por Swarmfly:

North Korea.

Interesting
Someone else said that as well.

What is life like there for the average working guy on the street?

[oldirty`]

Publicado originalmente por Ulfrinn:

Publicado originalmente por oldirty`:

Very good post. Although capitalism also puts a gun to peoples head indirectly. Lots of jobs suck and get payed bad while others dont and get payed very well.

No, there's a big difference between not liking your job, and doing it to pay your bills and get the things you want, and someone putting a gun to your head, and giving you nothing but the privilege of living another day for doing it.

Sure, but there are cases where you a forced to do a bad job and dont get payed good enough for it. Capitalism doesnt fully solve the problem. Which is why minimum wage etc exists.

[GunsForBucks]

Publicado originalmente por oldirty`:

Publicado originalmente por Ulfrinn:

No, there's a big difference between not liking your job, and doing it to pay your bills and get the things you want, and someone putting a gun to your head, and giving you nothing but the privilege of living another day for doing it.

Sure, but there are cases where you a forced to do a bad job and dont get payed good enough for it. Capitalism doesnt fully solve the problem. Which is why minimum wage etc exists.

I'm waiting for them to justify bringing back child labor

[Ulfrinn]

Publicado originalmente por oldirty`:

Publicado originalmente por Ulfrinn:

No, there's a big difference between not liking your job, and doing it to pay your bills and get the things you want, and someone putting a gun to your head, and giving you nothing but the privilege of living another day for doing it.

Sure, but there are cases where you a forced to do a bad job and dont get payed good enough for it. Capitalism doesnt fully solve the problem. Which is why minimum wage etc exists.

Minimum wage exists to buy votes from people dumb enough to think someone in a suit can wave a magic wand to make them rich and all it takes to do it is electing them.