Is it just me, or has the U.S. recently sped up its race towards socialism? Obviously not Soviet-style socialism, but modern E.U. style. From the Great Depression through the Bush administration, we went from debating the New Deal to passing multiple stimulus' and bail outs during one administration, while at the same time funding programs such as unemployment, Social Security, welfare, food stamps, and a list of other re-distributional social programs.
The government's influence on the economy has grown exponentially too; I can't see earlier generations of American's approving of Freddie and Fannie or government ownership of GM. On top of Obama's economic programs he gets Obamacare passed and unemployment extended, but these last couple of weeks have really shown me how much support socialism has in this country. The straw that broke the camel's back is the recent Occupy Wall Street movement and its protest of the 1%, and it all bears an eerie similarity to the writing of Karl Marx. Is the U.S. going down the path of Marxism? Was he right all along?
What really scares me is the protests. Up until recently, support for socialist programs and policy has been kept in check by conservatives, so that only necessary and beneficial legislation makes it through. The Obama administration had really stepped it up, however, and I believe set in motion the eventual socialist protests that are sweeping the country. While Obama firmly believes in this type of policy, outside of Obamacare and the stimulus it seems as though liberals were hoping that he would be the one to take us to European style socialism, and when he didn't the left got mad. You can tell they're not happy with what he's done because they are protesting the very same people the President they elected bailed out!
So by electing Obama, the far left was making a push for socialism, and when they didn't get it the protests erupted. Marx wrote about socialism being the transitional socioeconomic system between capitalism and communism, and if the E.U. is admittedly a socialist "experiment" and the U.S. has been making steady progress towards socialism since the New Deal, then maybe we are transitioning just as Marx predicted. One of his more famous pieces, however, called for revolution by the working class. Until recently, the West's move towards socialism could hardly be considered a revolution, but Obama and the Occupy movement has really sped things up. And at the core of Marx theories is the idea of class separation and warfare, where the working class, the proletariat, is forced to sell his labor to the wealthy upper class, the bourgeoisie, who pay them as little as possible to maximize his profits in a capitalist system. He considers this a form of modern slavery, since the proletariat aren't paid for the full value of their labor nor do they see the benefits, becoming a permanent underclass despite being a majority because the bourgeoisie hold the vast majority of the wealth, despite being an extreme minority of the population. Sound familiar? It should, its the main point of the Occupy protests.
As I checked out the Occupy Detroit protest today it really hit me how similar it was. The movement has become Marx's revolution. His theory claimed that it was inevitable that the working class, through strength of numbers and being the ones making the products and generating profit for the wealthy, would unite and rise up to take over the government and means of production. The Occupy movement's main demand is that the top 1% of Americans, who hold the majority of the countries wealth, use the money to help the other 99% by using the money to create jobs, give loans, pay taxes, ect.; they want them to redistribute the wealth. I even saw a banner today which called for Obama to issue an executive order that ordered the full employment of the population. They wanted the government to create programs and spend tax money to employ the 9% of the population that is currently unemployed. These and other issues have one thing in common: the redistribution of wealth. The Rev. Jesse Jackson straight up said on the news that its time for redistribution of wealth. The protesters want at the rich people and banks money to distribute to those who need it, expand social welfare prorams and for the government to raise taxes and spend more to stimulate economic growth. All of which are socialist policies. We are joining the E.U. in the move towards socialism, just like Marx said we would. So are we on our way towards full scale socialism? Is Marxism influencing the current administration and Occupy Wall Street movements? All I know is that we're well on our way, and the movement, by exposing the wealth inequality between the top 1% and the rest of us, is taking a page out of Marx's book, whether they know it or not, and helping speed the transition up. We'll see how much further it goes.
- Jon
P.S. - Despite the tone of the post, I'm actually fond of socialism as a socioeconomic theory. I understand that it isn't inherently bad, and several countries with capitalist economies, such as Sweden, are considered more economically and socially free and prosperous. Germany, despite being heavily socialist, used its government-industry ties to set economic policy and manipulate the market to allow the country to run an overall trade surplus. Had they not worked together to avoid a trade deficit they may have ended up like Greece or Spain, and the U.S. could probably learn something from them. The difference I see is that these countries are purposely structured for socialism, which eliminates many of the problems we face with the transition. Also, the people generally support socialism, which allows the government to enact the legislation it needs to run smoothly. We are so divided along party lines that one side may be able to get a program started but are unable to fund, staff, or market the program properly and its a total loss. I'm also aware that what is happening in the U.S. is far different from what Marx predicted. I just wanted to point out the similarities and highlight our transition towards socialism. Truthfully, in my view the thing that Marxists never saw coming and really stopped their theories from coming true was the Middle Class. Yes, the middle class is still part of the working class, but the working class in Marxism were more like peasants in Feudalism or the working class in modern developing nations; they are only paid enough to survive and keep coming back. American middle class is far more mobile and has more opportunities; it is very common for a child from a working, blue collar family to go to college and get a white collar job or start a business. Its not even unusual for middle class families to become rich - Bill Gates family wasn't particularly wealthy, but he became the wealthiest man in the U.S. Even so, the working class, blue collar family makes enough to afford a comfortable home, food to eat, an education for their children, and a car or two. By creating and sustaining the middle class the working class population had all they needed and enough social freedom to be content and simply never wanted a revolution. It has only been recently that the economic gap has gotten sufficiently wide and the economy poor enough to threaten the livelihood of the middle class, and the results are nationwide protests, not too far off Marx's theory. It will be interesting to see where this leads. In any event, America is set up economically and politically to be a capitalist federal republic and American's attitudes reflect it. Socialism, while theoretically a good, logical system, would require the American system to be heavily modified to be successful and I don't think the people are willing to yet. If things get bad enough though, I'd bet we take the dive into socialism. Time will tell.
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