By Kevin Grout–
Last week, a student submitted an opinion piece to this newspaper extoling the virtues of socialism. Although he admitted the evils committed during the twentieth century in the name of socialism, he contended that we fundamentally do not understand what the term means. I’m here to say this: we know what socialism is, we’ve seen its effects and we want none of it.
I understand that the author of the previous opinion attempted to make a distinction between the socialism practiced by Joseph Stalin and the “democratic” socialism of Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT). However, what he failed to do was provide a single example where any form of socialism, “democratic” or otherwise, created a positive result. Is there one economic system of comparable size to the United States that has achieved the workers’ paradise you want through these policies? I think the answer is no.
Furthermore, “The Wall Street Journal” calculated the cost of Sanders’ benefits plan, and the price tag amounted to a staggering $18 trillion over a decade. He says that he can find that money by taxing the top one percent of wage earners in the United States, but I’m not sure that’s plausible. According to figures from the Tax Policy Center, the “Top One Percent” contains approximately 1,128,000 people earning an average annual income of $2,107,531. That means the Sanders’ government could tax the one percent at a 100 percent rate and gain $2.377 trillion in revenue. Even over the course of a decade, this 100 percent tax would barely cover his programs, all while destroying the American economy. The job-producers would leave the U.S. immediately and they would take the means of production with them.
Of course, this intellectual argument over socialism has not even taken into account the American principles of property rights and free enterprise. As a country, we have a common law history of individual rights stemming from property. The ownership of property denoted status in the community, and for centuries Americans held property rights inviolate. Has that changed? Do we no longer value hard work, keeping the benefits of your labor, or critical American interests? I think we still do.
The American system has problems, and I don’t deny that. We face issues of corruption and cronyism. But instead of demonizing the wealthy and successful, address those problems. Instead of destroying our capitalist system and turning our backs on hundred years of Western tradition, let’s fix focus on those specific issues. And we can fix those problems without socialists, “democratic” or otherwise.
