First, I really enjoyed the Socialism Sucks presentation by Dr. Ben Powell. Especially his light sense of humor when he is explaining how the beer in Cuba is bad compared to Iron Monk. Why is that though? Let us talk about that for a minute, we are talking about a socialist country that is mostly state controlled. This narrows the variety of items that are available to make, sell, and distribute.
Socialism has many different looks and is not a one size fits all for lack of a better phrase. Venezuela for example is a socialist state and was successful during the 70s. Unfortunately, though this was because of them joining OPEC and the country was carried by the increase in oil prices. Since then, they are struggling as a nation to stay financially afloat. A man who works for ABM contracted by OSU to clean campus is from Venezuela. I spoke with him about him coming to the United States and he described the difficulty of day-to-day life in Venezuela because of how low wages are.
Back to the topic of beer. The problem with the beer in Cuba is due to the products that are allowed to be produced and brought into Cuba. As I mentioned before this reduces variety and creativity. Let’s use campus dining as an example, OSU out-sources the stock for their dining. Our options will be the same today, tomorrow, day after etc. Now, this is not a great example either because we have good choices of food items, and they are enjoyable (for the most part).
Socialism strips away privacy, creativity, quality, and uniqueness in commercial production. In a socialist country you have “everything” you need but not necessarily the way you want it. Makes sense right? Like why do we need 20 different coffee cup manufacturers, you only need 1. This is the argument that a socialist would make, what they don’t understand though is that having so many different manufacturers increase competition for better quality, lower prices, and so on. On the other hand, it allows us to have yet I say it again variety in the products that we use and consume. The other argument I would like to make against the idea of socialism is that socialism constricts capital.
Socialist countries control where they spend their dollars for their resources. This means that if you bought all your resources from one company, they would be making all the money. So much for living lavishly. The whole idea of everyone having a share is complete nonsense because like any company there are ways to exploit it. The wealthiest of socialist countries would be those who run it, this is because they control the bank your money is in, the store you go to, the home you own, and the job you work for. The dollar is a circle in a socialist country circling the wallets of the governing parties, that is.
Capitalism is king, it allows people to grow the economy through innovation. Capitalism allows people to create their own success and prosperity, through the creation of companies, organizations, and corporations. Now the only one who has a problem with this would be a socialist that does not want to do anything and gets jealous of the success of other people.
Let me get on my soapbox for a minute. People advocating for socialism argue that we should not have private trade. Well, they better get over that Stanley cup they are drinking from (no offense to anyone with a Stanley). This is the picture that needs to be painted that the wonderful things we have from jets to cars to toothbrushes are because of the collaboration of thousands of independent minds. China is a communist state, and they are successful because of the capitalist economic structure allowing a natural growth. The last issue I have with socialism is that if everyone has the same income where is the incentive to work, to develop, evolve. Why would we need to do anything if it was provided. Nothing is free and somewhere in the socialist process someone is gaining from “control”.
Capitalism allows use scale production and innovate as a collective some. It allows competitiveness to drive innovation while simultaneously lowering the cost of things. Capitalism allows creativity, uniqueness, and accessibility to the goods and services we need. We can make money on money multiple times repeatedly. Socialists who disagree with the concept of capitalism usually are unwilling to get involved in the private sector and would rather everyone have less so they can have more.
