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[smjjames]

... like, amusingly enough but a government controlled insurance provider (medicaid/medicare, loosely speaking) actually is kinda' socialist?

So's Social Security and nobody's raving about how that's socialist and evil....

"It ought to be Medicare for none" will play interestingly in the election with the "keep ya damn gubmit hands offa mah Meddycayre" crowd, to be sure.

I can definetly see that played over and over in various campaign ads.

[Frumple]

... like, amusingly enough but a government controlled insurance provider (medicaid/medicare, loosely speaking) actually is kinda' socialist?

So's Social Security and nobody's raving about how that's socialist and evil....

Ten bucks I can find someone raving about that

E: <sub>please don't take that bet, though

I don't actually want to trawl through what parts of the internet would have them, now that I think about it</sub>

[SalmonGod]

... like, amusingly enough but a government controlled insurance provider (medicaid/medicare, loosely speaking) actually is kinda' socialist?

So's Social Security and nobody's raving about how that's socialist and evil....

Ten bucks I can find someone raving about that

Things keep going, that will be mainstream eventually.  With the same rhetoric we're hearing now about stuff like healthcare.  We're just not at the point yet where it's the only thing left to cannibalize for somebody somewhere to be able to post growth on the next quarter's revenue reports.

[smjjames]

... like, amusingly enough but a government controlled insurance provider (medicaid/medicare, loosely speaking) actually is kinda' socialist?

So's Social Security and nobody's raving about how that's socialist and evil....

Ten bucks I can find someone raving about that

E: <sub>please don't take that bet, though

I don't actually want to trawl through what parts of the internet would have them, now that I think about it</sub>

I non-seriously half considered it, but okay, lol.

[Trekkin]

... like, amusingly enough but a government controlled insurance provider (medicaid/medicare, loosely speaking) actually is kinda' socialist?

So's Social Security and nobody's raving about how that's socialist and evil....

Ten bucks I can find someone raving about that

E: <sub>please don't take that bet, though

I don't actually want to trawl through what parts of the internet would have them, now that I think about it</sub>

Well, since there's no abyss I won't stare into: https://atlassociety.org/commentary/commentary-blog/5952-how-to-counter-socialists-about-social-security

[EnigmaticHat]

I don't like social security because I don't think its socialist enough, does that count?

[MrRoboto75]

I don't like social security because I don't think its socialist enough, does that count?

well I don't think its secure enough

[thompson]

... like, amusingly enough but a government controlled insurance provider (medicaid/medicare, loosely speaking) actually is kinda' socialist?

So's Social Security and nobody's raving about how that's socialist and evil....

Ten bucks I can find someone raving about that

E: <sub>please don't take that bet, though

I don't actually want to trawl through what parts of the internet would have them, now that I think about it</sub>

Well, since there's no abyss I won't stare into: https://atlassociety.org/commentary/commentary-blog/5952-how-to-counter-socialists-about-social-security

Just read the article. Sounds like the government should buy stocks and fund itself from the returns. So communism?

[Trekkin]

Just read the article. Sounds like the government should buy stocks and fund itself from the returns. So communism?

Yeah, corporate communism. It's the end state of unrestricted capitalism: one entity accretes capital until it owns everything and everyone, so currency is meaningless and everyone is kept maximally profitable and exploited accordingly. From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs.

Communism goes through a similar switch when people actually try to implement it.

Ultimately, I think, people keep rejecting capitalism because it works poorly on a large scale (see: all of DC) and rejecting communism because it works poorly on a small scale (bureaucratic complexity, individual motivation, etc) and just keep bouncing rejections off of each other. Operating a capitalist economy within a socialist one -- in effect legalizing the black market boogeyman -- can be made feasible with durable negative feedback loops so they don't subvert each other, but it's the sort of messy implementation detail that doesn't fit well in a chant.

[smjjames]

‘Communism works poorly on a small scale’

What about tribal societies where you’d have to share a common pool of resources? Though that starts breaking down quickly once you get beyond a certain size since social stratification takes hold. I know it’s not actually communism, but some of the ideas are there.

[Trekkin]

‘Communism works poorly on a small scale’

What about tribal societies where you’d have to share a common pool of resources? Though that starts breaking down quickly once you get beyond a certain size since social stratification takes hold. I know it’s not actually communism, but some of the ideas are there.

Yeah, primitive communism's the clear counterpoint to that -- and unfortunately, the sort of people who usually use the "communism fails at small scales" argument overlap with the people who would consider their own society inherently superior to those tribes, usually by dint of having conquered them, which is usually where this derails into nationalism. Setting that aside, there are legitimate questions to be asked about how the definition of need changes when a society moves away from the subsistence level, as well as how abilities change as people are able to specialize; in an overly reductive nutshell, whether a society can be said to be communist by default, having solved the integral challenges of communism, when everyone's abilities and needs are unambiguous and largely homogeneous.

I don't particularly endorse that argument, since it amounts to calling an inconvenient solution trivial, but nevertheless it's worthwhile to consider.

That all having been said, when I say people complain about communism not working on a small scale, I mean in the sense of the problems I listed parenthetically: how the bureaucracy swells to account for every loaf of bread, in their understanding, and people slip through the cracks, and how individual workers have no incentive to perform beyond requirements without what would eventually amount to a pay rise and therefore some manner of wages. Communists worry about multinational corporations rather than lemonade stands; capitalists worry about individuals more than countries.

[sluissa]

I think it's more that. "While communism statistically wants to provide for the masses, the individuals might be left falling through the cracks with little recourse when the state doesn't provide what's needed" and "While capitalism works great when everyone's a mom and pop store starting up and you don't have the specter of corporate hegemony looming over and driving all the mom and pops out of business."

It's a little bit comparing apples to oranges. But I think I understand the idea.

But I think there's general agreement that one extreme or another isn't the best solution and something in the middle, whether it be capitalism with appropriate government regulations keeping things fair, or something more on the communism/socialist end with adequate economic freedom that people are still allowed chances to improve their situation beyond simply what the state provides. Perhaps neither of those are the optimal solution either... but most would agree they're still better choices than unrestricted capitalism or fully autocratic communism.

[PTTG??]

We don't have any choice, long-term. Automation will consume the concept of employment; it's solely a matter of deciding if people have an innate right to the essentials of life, or not.

[Trekkin]

We don't have any choice, long-term. Automation will consume the concept of employment; it's solely a matter of deciding if people have an innate right to the essentials of life, or not.

Well, then, that's easy. They do not, because rights are a totally artificial concept and exist only insofar as we are collectively willing and able to pretend they do. That latter condition is what complicates things.

[PTTG??]

Thank you for your contribution to the conversation.