Many thanks for stopping by dear reader. Today’s topic has been rolling around the proverbial noggin for quite some time. I don’t watch news, I read it. I know my biases and preferences and if I read three articles by three different people and they share the same information it is probably fact while the rest is opinion. I find economists and politicians take on both isms interesting and enlightening. The more I read the more I think… What if???

First, I will share my bias. I fall in the socialist spectrum. I see nothing wrong in replacing my insurance expenses with higher taxes to receive Medicare for all. I see nothing wrong in eliminating corporate tax breaks (how much money is enough?) I see taxing millionaires and billionaires as a necessary product of funding our social governance. As I see it, the more money you make the more taxes you can afford to pay and the more you assist your community. Again, how much money is enough?

Alright, so now you probably think I am going to rhapsodize on the glories of socialism. Wrong… There are some excellent innovations that come out of the products of capitalism. Many of these are scientific, medical, and technological. These things make our life easier. Was the drive to create these items capitalism or humanism? I feel it is capitalism. Greed is part of human ambition, as is power and influence (sadly!!) Capitalism drives innovation far more than just scientific curiosity. Capitalism is what the entire globe’s economy has been based on for eons. We need some sort of system to drive our cultural economy, despite the urges of Gene Roddenberry and other science fiction writers. Our Western cultural values are still too primitive to grasp the concept of humanism.

Pure capitalism would require complete lack of regulation and everything in the world would be an unfunded mandate. Want a highway repaired? Pay a toll. Want trash pick up, water, sewer, etc. Line up your own service. Have a break down in infrastructure in your community (better have insurance,) or your footing the whole bill yourself. My water service is already based in this system. It is expensive. I know Kansas (in certain municipalities) streets are not paved unless all the neighbors agree to a city tax increase to cover said paving expense. This is the conservative capitalism that makes sense to me. (Service based capitalism.) Health care? Pay for it, use insurance, or deal with it. Capitalism does not care whether one lives or dies. It deals with revenue streams and profits.

We can’t have pure laissez faire capitalism in the United States. It would require the elimination of corporate subsidies (socialism.) Businesses would be on their own to innovate, line up property, build to suit, supply infrastructure services, and then employ citizens of the community appropriately. This is the dirty secret of Neoliberal governance. In order to privatize governance you have to have that corporate socialism to make a profit. Governance is the holy grail market of neoliberals. Neoliberal economics is not the friend of the pure capitalist or the humanist who prefers socialism.

Socialism in the United States is a layered enterprise. Services that are based in social values include: Transportation infrastructure, Police, Fire, Library, Education, Social Security, Medicare, Postal Service and the various programs state and federal for the impoverished. The purpose of these services is to serve the public without intention of profiting. It is a net-zero enterprise. Imagine no postal service? lack of maintenance on our transportation infrastructure? policing or fire service in an emergency? no pre-k child care programs or public education for children? What would our society look like? Socialism and humanism have some alignment. There are countries on this planet that practice varying degrees of socialism, but it isn’t a pure socialism. The utopian ideal of any of the world’s isms are not possible. It works against the human psyche of choice.

The United States is a bi-level socialist state created by neoliberal economics. We have corporate and government services that are governed by socialist ideals. Wonder why the American debt is so high? It comes from funding two socialist enterprises (one based in neoliberal economics,) the other based in social humanism. I would like to blame one party, but both sides are equally responsible for reckless spending. In the end, once the United States defaults… we will be a neoliberal economic state where our values as humans will be based on our debts.

The United States needs to eliminate neoliberal (corporate socialism) economics from our economy. It will doom the great American experiment, as it moves us closer and closer to an oligarchic neoliberal state (economic fascism.) It needs to be replaced with incentive grants or incentive tax breaks, so governance can remain free of economic entanglements due to the privatization of government services. An example of this would be a new president’s policy regarding energy infrastructure (moving from fossil fuels to alternative energy.) Energy companies would be free to apply for grants or tax rebates based on progress made in developing new technologies toward the policy. It is the same procedure governance used by capitalists to reform education with NCLB, Common Core, Race to the Top. It is an unfunded mandate (unless you show progress towards the goal.) It would work in capitalism paradigm. It doesn’t in the socialist paradigm. (Do our representatives in governance even understand the motivations of the isms?)

Despite my preference for socialism our country needs a regulated balance of capitalism and socialism. We need a bit of both philosophies to serve and protect the tax payer from reckless economic neoliberalism while some aspect of the free market economy to take place. When we allow one system to have too much power over the other it corrupts society. Balance is necessary for all things governance and economics. The United States could learn about that from our neighbors in the European Union. (Learn from the mistakes of the past!)

I’m not an economic scholar. I’m not a government scholar. I read, I study, I think, and I’ve learned over my lifetime that too much of one system or philosophy is bad for a country. The men who founded the United States government in the 18th century understood this. They also understood their human frailties and urges. The United States in its present condition is failing their 18th century forefathers. There isn’t any compromise with Project 2025, so it must be dissented with to achieve a balance the American tax payer deserves… That is my opinion and fight against the Republican Party… Your neoliberalism is not democratic… It will not preserve the republic… so it goes…