Didn’t the land in basically every society excluding the last four or five centuries reside in the hands of a few leading to massive inequality?
I’m not saying socialism is the answer, I’m just saying that it would be interesting to see what the outcome would be should it not turn authoritative and the international world treated it as an equal. What can I say, I like experiments and if it crashed and burned, well there you go.
The
actual Marxist experiments over the last century seem to always revert to some modern form of traditional feudalism where a small cadre of lords (party members, politburos, military elites, family loyalists) exercise control with the vast majority of the population living in something very much like feudal bondage. The experiment, whether the Paris Commune, the Bolsheviks, or the Chinese peasant army, is inevitably followed by the absolute dictatorship of a Napoleon, Stalin, or Mao.
And no, in spite of what the comely if empty-headed AOC may believe, no nation in Europe currently represents a socialist economic system - successful or otherwise. Every single one has a capitalist economic market system. It is true most have higher tax systems supporting broader social safety nets. But, those "social" programs, greater regulations, limited access to forms of education, etc have nothing to do with government ownership of the means of production - merely the rules in which the capitalist system functions.
Due to parliamentary systems, most of Europe does have the ability to exploit pure majorities in ways that they can not be exploited in a republic due to structural legislative safeguards for geographic minorities (for which everyone on this site who owns a firearm or enjoys hunting should be eternally grateful to our founders).
Personally, I frankly can't imagine the mindset that would find a society that actually disincentivized individual achievement for the supposed good of the masses as even remotely appealing. "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs" is utopian fantasy no more realistic than the lyrics of John Lennon's anthem to socialism "Imagine" where he pines for a world with
.........
no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world
Perhaps if I were a bitter failure further wasting my time living in envy Elon Musk such a barren sameness would initially appear appealing - as one assumes it did to the serfs of France, Russia or China. But in the West, where opportunity exists for anyone with an iota of drive, the problem would seem to be more individual than systemic.
Churchill, as he did with regard to almost any subject, offered brief and very accurate comparisons of the two economic models.
"The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries."
"Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery."
