socialism in America.
- Thread starter zdreg
- Start date
One might be forgiven for thinking China's one party system has something to recommend it on the economic scale. After all it has caught up remarkably in only the last 30 years.
However it comes at a cost of personal freedom. No one is allowed to hold different views from the One party.
OK so most agree to not hold forth with their own views ( only 2 votes against Xi being President for life ).
Many democratic heads of State really hate been criticised, ridiculed etc. by the opposition and look to emulate Xi.
The situation will play out as it will...................
However it comes at a cost of personal freedom. No one is allowed to hold different views from the One party.
OK so most agree to not hold forth with their own views ( only 2 votes against Xi being President for life ).
Many democratic heads of State really hate been criticised, ridiculed etc. by the opposition and look to emulate Xi.
The situation will play out as it will...................
You need to look at the IQ thing more objectively. It is a rather stable factor, not heavily influenced by political regime. Look at that the top 5: Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, Japan and China. Then you look around to see some other similar Asian countries like Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, Philippine, India and Indonesia, they are at a different levels. Cultures, education and history play some major roles, but the political systems would not: keep in mind the IQ tests are about the very essential cognitive ability and understanding.
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It's hard to trust any number for that matter since all studies might be run by an agenda. At least there's some study on that, some ground where you can start arguing, which is way much more than simply arguing based on ideology. I do agree those numbers are doubtful likely to be 100% precise tho.
I do think that it can actually be quantifiable. In the same sense you can name the attributes of a (let's say theoretically at least since it might not exist in its pure form) socialist or capitalist nation, you can start to quantify how much of classic liberalism or socialism that society has. In fact that's what the index of economic freedom does, it quantifies the degree of economic freedom taking into account multiple factors.
So on this subject It is my guess that there is some kind of objective truth that one can aim to arrive. Different opinions, nothing wrong with that.
The index of economic freedom is just another gauge that has some merit but there is no end all be all measure that can capture the true, complete picture of any society and their economy.
“... democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those others that have been tried.”
- Winston Churchill
Democracy, not Socialism.
“... democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those others that have been tried.”
- Winston Churchill
Democracy, not Socialism.
AMERICAN DEMOCRACY - with your 2 cows examples
Your 2 cows are yours for a while anyway. Your competing with huge multi-national corporations that receive a huge amount of $ in corporate welfare and tax shelters, hence the larger competitors have a massive advantage over the mug with 2 cows up to the larger competitors.
Chances are Monsanto will take over the farm claiming a few of their seed were found on the farm, even if the wind or birds caused this Monsanto will win in court since they bribed their way into becoming the regulatory body in agriculture. They are stealing farms out from families that held them for several generations winning every time in court. In capitalism the richest 0.5% end up owning 99% of the nations wealth - whoever has the $ make the rules is capitalism.
Your 2 cows are yours for a while anyway. Your competing with huge multi-national corporations that receive a huge amount of $ in corporate welfare and tax shelters, hence the larger competitors have a massive advantage over the mug with 2 cows up to the larger competitors.
Chances are Monsanto will take over the farm claiming a few of their seed were found on the farm, even if the wind or birds caused this Monsanto will win in court since they bribed their way into becoming the regulatory body in agriculture. They are stealing farms out from families that held them for several generations winning every time in court. In capitalism the richest 0.5% end up owning 99% of the nations wealth - whoever has the $ make the rules is capitalism.
Yes but many Chinese I talk to would much rather have food on the table for family, more western consumer lifestyle etc than 'freedom' as we see it in the West. US in particular seem to have been marketed as 'land of free' and many assume it is valued is same way elsewhere. There are differing views within China communist party and compared to more free and democratic India they have done a great job over last 30 years with a mix of BOTH capital and socialist policies.
This thread arguing over socialism or capitalism is like arguing over food or water. Any sensible person would take a mix of both, but individual preferred ratio may differ.
Agree. Some bits of the middle East are great. If your born a UAE, kuwait, Bahrain citizen then it is like winning the birth lottery but even with oil there are others which seem a perpetual mess. Sure they have had outside interference by e.g firstly colonial powers are more recently US, but other countries like Japan, Germany were wiped out and bounced back very quickly. Trying to pin country sucess on just economic models without taking culture, religion etc into account is far too simplistic.
Generalisation but at least in the developed world to a large extent you control your destiny, hard work leads to middle class lifestyle but in the developing world imho much is determined the moment you are born, family, caste etc. The dramatic exceptions make the press, provide hope for the many, but unfortunately the majority story is "born poor, die poor".
Too much surfing time this week under sunshade.
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