First, please define what you mean by socialism. That word encompasses a lot of very different forms of government, even when it’s used “correctly”, and it’s typically not.
The Nazis called themselves socialists, and I’m not moving there.
When many people say socialism, what they mean is capitalist democracy with a strong social safety net, strong government regulation, and highly progressive taxation.
Edit: for the love of god, please do a little bit of reading about socialism before reinforcing my point that this word is used terribly. We won’t take the wiki as ultimate truth, but please read. Be better. Read and think first. Comment later.
When many people say socialism, what they mean is capitalist democracy with a strong social safety net, strong government regulation, and highly progressive taxation.
Let’s go with that definition since that’s what most people think of as socialist.
Provided there is an appropriate amount of technocracy (decisions made by experts rather than politicians), it’d be hard for me to think of a better form of government.
Anyway, this was largely the US until Regan. Social safety net could’ve been stronger, but that had to evolve. Same as in Europe.
Except , racism. Addressing that is not a part of any definition of socialism that I’m aware of. Equality is certainly going along with the spirit of this definition of “socialism”
“Socialists of Lemmy, would you move to a country that someone who has absolutely no idea what socialism is thinks is socialist?”
Lmao.
The question doesn’t need to be hypothetical. I am moving to a country exactly like that. From the US.
Lack of modern health care coverage alone is enough to justify it. A bonus is that the quality of life across the board is significantly higher.
Where at and how’d you pull that off? Inquiring minds want to know
I read that Denmark releases a list every six months of the skills and degrees that are allowed to immigrate, or get priority or something like that. From looking at the last one I assume they value education, the liberal arts and humanities a lot more than the US.
It ends up being a catch 22. When you want to leave the US because of a lack of upward mobility, social services, jobs in your field, and you can’t save because of healthcare, rent, and debt, then how can you have enough money to move to another state, much less another country?
Portugal and a lot of effort (Plus cash to invest).
Basically going through the Golden Visa process (Which has changed substantially the last year, happy to explain more if curious)
They have qualifications. Or relatives. Or something of value to offer.
If you have a PhD or MD (additionally, you know, just straight money), you can emigrate to a lot of places. Probably most places.
Can’t answer the where at, but most likely by having an in demand skill and/or a job already lined up. Either that or they had family there. Immigration away from here is basically impossible otherwise.
Yep. Sucks being trapped here forever unless I get a PhD or get rich.
That is objectively not socialism (any definition of socialism that begins by defining it as a form of capitalism is fundamentally confused)
That said, I’d agree that it is a widespread misunderstanding today. And what people mean when they say socialism is usually actually social democracy (which despite sounding like the word socialism is a mixed system based on capitalism)
Using that misunderstanding as the definition I would definitely live in many of those countries. Many have some of the highest qualities of life in the world, low rates of poverty, universal access to good healthcare and education, and good social mobility.
E.g Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Iceland, Germany
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Yes… Please reread my last comment more slowly… particularly the first two paragraphs.
I swear. This place is way more toxic than Reddit.
I can’t imagine someone being so condescending there on a topic like this.
Please read the Wikipedia article. We don’t have to agree that Wikipedia is an ultimate source of truth, but it is a pretty good article.
I don’t think I’ll be able to communicate anything more to someone who tells me to “read more slowly”.
You’re the one who responded to their comment without actually reading it, why are you complaining about them?
Exactly. This is what the person you are responding to is saying as well.
They state that the above definition of socialism is wrong as it defines it as a from of capitalism with social features. But under the condition that this is meant he would move into these countries.
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It’s actually not even that. The Wikipedia page talks about free and mixed market in socialism.
That’s capitalism.
It uses the word literally.
When many people say socialism, what they mean is capitalist democracy
Lol. Lmao, even
@nodsocket @PetDinosaurs > OP: what socialist policies would you implement?
> commenter: what do you mean by socialism?
> OP: let’s go with an incorrect definition of socialism. what social democrat policies would you implement?I would love to.
No, “most people” do not consider that to be what socialism is. Particularly those of us who live in countries with the aforementioned policies. Here we’ve had real socialists who wanted to take away our fundamental individual rights, amongst them the right to ownership, which frankly is a scary idea.
A lot of our regulations and limits on the free market don’t have a socialist bent at all, but are intended to defend our individual liberties against large corporations, which if left unchecked can become corporate institutions, something the US has fallen victim to.
I’d consider these policies as important, if not moreso than our social welfare systems. The social mobility and safety provided by these are meaningless if an arbitrary decision by google, amazon or some bank can singlehandedly ruin your life.
Why couldn’t that what you just described be called something different other than “socialism” then? Sounds like a bad move to make it fall under that same umbrella especially since that term is very frowned upon if not straight out forbidden in a few European countries for example.
It is, the term for this type of system is called Social Democracy which is not a synonym for socialism, but people (Americans at least) confused and conflate the two terms to the point that they’ve become one and the same in the minds of many people who don’t really understand the terms or their origins.
Because we’re too busy categorizing this stupid shit into bins of “good” and “bad” when reality is a greyscale between these two. These are fairly reasonable points and should be viewed as a more centrist POV, but since we (read: primarily North America) have a tribal “us vs. them” animosity about it we lump many reasonable ideas together on each end of the spectrum. Things like not having to go bankrupt when you or a loved one needs an emergency hospital visit somehow automatically gets lumped in with the other extreme “socialist” ideas just to solely argue against it and not budge from their end of the extreme.
Wow, yes this is so true for many discussions online and increasingly offline as well. Nuance seems to be not welcomed. Sometimes even suggesting there might be nuance or the topic might be more complicated than black and white already puts you firmly in the enemy camp.
Fucking Preach! I do not understand this mentality of one team or the other.
Words, used in non technical contexts, mean what people mean when they use them.
Descriptive. Not proscriptive.
Incidentally, most people suck at communication
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So in your view these people are inherently more ‘great’ than others? What would you call these people who are so above average? The over people? The overmen? The ubermensch… oh whoops
Are you seriously trying to compare that statement to Nazi ideology?
Yes. I think that great artists and scientists and chefs and authors and teachers and those that work hard contribute more to society than others.
The Nobel prizes are being announced this week.
The work of Katalin Karikó and Drew Weissman saved millions. Most people are not capable of that.
Yes I think subdividing humanity into the great people who perform all the work, and the lowly masses that exist to serve them is at the heart of Nazi ideology so I am making that comparison.
See, this is the kind of shit I’m talking about when I drag these pseudo-eugenicist techbros. How you gon classify who’s ‘great and greater’? Doming hammers, calipers, and speculae? You finna start talkin bout achilles heel lengths and skull dimples now? You know saying some downright ghoulish shit then deleting-and-running doesn’t make you seem any less ghoulish, right? “Oh, nah MS10k, life’s just split into the greats and not-greats and if you’re not-great you’re a fuckin serf to your betters” I sincerely hope you fuckin hear yourself someday
Yes.
Next question.
In a heartbeat.
But not just any country. I don’t like cold weather.
That shouldn’t be a problem anywhere in the near future.
What are you waiting for then? Go on, come over to argentina and join in the destroyed economy and ridiculous insecurity, I’ll swap places with you!
Dude, I think you don’t know what “socialism” mean.
“socialist”
Makes cuddling more fun but Im also from Minnesota so take my bias with a grain of leftse
Grain of snow, bud.
100% if that country is in northern Europe. Hard nope if it’s in South America.
I’d buy a ticket tomorrow if there was a job for me in a Scandinavian country and I didn’t need to speak the language immediately.
Soft same. Norway would be awesome. I love the cold.
Ireland is calling you. Cost of living is high but check it out.
Not wanting to learn a language of the country you live in, is kinda asocial tbh
The notion that free* healthcare, free* education, subsidised transport, government provided unemployment supports etc is even labelled “socialist” strikes me as particularly American.
supports
That’s a strut. Did you just mean ‘support’?
Support is also a strut.
But if you’re getting healthcare and unemployment that would be two supports that most Americans don’t get. The plural for support is supports isn’t it?
That meaning of support is a non-countable noun, like water or happiness (or Lego, but lots of people get that one wrong). There is no plural of non-countable nouns.
You might use (for example) “bodies of water”, “levels of happiness”, “pieces of Lego”, or “sources of support” etc.
Silence, bot, the only thing worse than a pedant is one that isn’t even correct.
One thing I’m not loving about going from reddit to lemmy is the amount of pedantry by people stuck somewhere between A and B on this graph.
Never heard of linguistics or prestige dialects, just go around parroting nitpicks they learned in 7th grade grammar classes.
Having lived for quite a long time in canada, I think most Americans would love the it.
Semi related - The USA is already socialist if you consider they have more spent per capita on healthcare, and pay for things like roads, police, fire departments, schools and the like. On the last point, they pay all the way through High School and then significantly subsidize universities as well. It’s all a matter of degree. In the usa, we socialize on many fronts, and then pay companies more than we would pay to socialize the same service and consider that better. Imo, it’s very much not.
I’m not sure if spending more per capita means “socialize” healthcare. Isn’t the problem with US healthcare is that “accessing healthcare at any time without the worry of financial burden” is not currently true for everyone?
I think your definition is a fine one. I think the Nuance I was trying to make and perhaps did poorly was that the US already pays a huge amount for healthcare but we pay it to companies to do research that they then use to make profit worldwide. Not to provide services for everyone. It’s a matter of priority
Socialism isn’t a welfare state, socialism is when the workers own the means of production.
No no no
Socialism is when the government does things, and when the government does a lot of things, that’s communism.
#boomerlogic
#jokeslibsthatwanthealthcaredontget
Don’t forget the farmers who are subsidized.
That really depends. Are we talking immigrate to somewhere with functional socialist policies, or to a psuedo dictatorship with what looks a whole lot like strong man fascism except they promote a few (most often failed or failing) socialist programs? Because I have no interest in moving to a failed state like Venezuela. I’m not going to slaughter and eat a bunny.
Rabbit isn’t all that bad though…
You want to be gifted a live one for food by the government?
I mean yes? Fresh meat!
Rabbit is my favorite after lamb.
Functional socialist policies, like Switzerland.
Social(ist) policies are extremely removed from socialism. The countries people list here, aka Canada, Danmark and Ireland among others are extremely capitalist still. This thread is therefore useless.
Yeah, I feel like “a country with strong social safety nets” would be a better way of putting it
Socialism has a TON of historical baggage
We have socialist policies here in the US. We just have fewer of them than other countries.
My favorite example that I think you could consider is the United States program to assist citizens with ESRD, in some cases I think the entire cost is covered. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/End_Stage_Renal_Disease_Program
As a German, I think I would. Given that it is good and just.
Pretty sure we Germans already live in such a country, don’t we?
I would argue that Germany is not a socialist country. Politics are targeted at the already wealthy and cooperations.
I’m not versed enough in politics and history to give detailed examples. I’m just a normal guy. However, I’m currently listening to the Jung & Naiv podcast on Spotify.
In episode 661 they discuss the development of the housing sector since the 1950s and very little in the 18th century. The important information is that the housing sector grew from being socialist to being a housing market.
I think they mention that in the 50s there existed a “Kostenmiete” (Cost-rent). That would only be allowed by law to be as high as it needed to be to cover the costs for building the house/flat. The owners were not allowed to make profit exceeding 3.5%. Any profit had to be put into housing again to keep the housing sector growing. Around that time the state was heavily supporting housing unions and other groups (not cooperations) to build housing. The state itself built 500.000 !!! appartments a year. Last year the interview says they built 6 appartments. Six, in case you thought you read a typo.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ At least in the housing market we are not socialist anymore and it becomes worse every year. Education becomes worse every year. The medical sector becomes worse every year. Public transport becomes worse every year. Loans do not keep up with inflation. Everything becomes more expensive.
Yes, we are better off than many. But are we not just richer slaves with more benefits than others? The interview says that there exist studies that estimate 11 million households to qualify for social housing. In some cities that is 60% of their population. 60% quality for social housing. Are we alright?
My impression is that Germany is considered a social democracy. Maybe it is towards the milder end of the spectrum but still fits the definition.
As an outsider I think Germany has got a lot of things right, and found a good balance. Not perfect, but good.
This is basically the million dollar question and also the source of confusion, when one person thinks of socialism they could be thinking of either social democracy, like modern Germany, or a communist state like the DDR… so depending on your point of view, you’ll have a different answer
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
Im from the US, and Ive always looked at Germany with envy, though I’m definitely not a fan of their decisions regarding Nuclear energy, or lack thereof
Do they have legal marijuana?
Yes
Yes and no. Because that’s the state of the country right now.
Isn’t this a hypothetical situation where this socialist country has legal marijuana? If so, then yeah, maybe I would?
Sure then. Maybe I would look into it.
I’m an American who has lived in the UK and Australia. Socialised medical systems are fucking amazing.
Why would I move somewhere that America is planning a military coup?
I did! Hello from Scotland . . .
Scotland is only a borderline social democratic welfare state.
Sounds horrible. Quality of life must be terrible there!
We visited in May and decided we are going to end up there. Already considering what we might be to do to make it happen.
These kinds of questions, aimed at any ideology, will result in a “no” for the average person unless they can take their friends and families with them.
To be fair, a lot of people have left their families behind to leave Europe and enter the US.
The bulk of that immigration happened in the 19th and early 20th century when European countries were the most capitalistic and economically stratified.
Economically stratified, absolutely. Capitalistic, though? Most European immigration to the Americas happened when kings and queens still wielded absolute power.
I feel like a lot of redditors are joining because I see a lot of down votes but only one response.
Yes that is true, but the average person in those countries in the 1800’s was starving which changes things a lot.
I took your question as “people living in the US or Europe, would you move to a socialist country” so the average person in that would not be starving, so family and friends matter more.
I mean I already do, we have publicly funded services like firefighters and emergency medical care, the problem is the shit like that we don’t do because sounding too socialist scares the boomers
