Socialism for the rich, capitalism for the poor.

In 08 they should have let the banks fail. People claim it would devastate the economy. Bs. A rich person would have picked up the scraps for cheap and kept things going. They didn’t need our tax money and no punishment.

Oil subsidies are why we have cheap gas. I’m fine getting rid to them. Just realize your gas will cost more.

72

I never got the "economy would of been devastated if the banks weren't bailed out" argument made during the recession. The economy was in shambles anyway!

32
- It’s a tough one. Assuming nobody stepped in. Yes there would be devastation but somebody would pick up the assets in a fire sale. So no, there would have been some pain but the system would have been better long term.
  
  We can’t avoid all pain, otherwise we end up with companies who take stupid risk since they never fail.
  
  Let them fail and someone else will grow. Otherwise we don’t have a healthy capitalism.
  
  27
- Nobody ever argued that the banks would of been devastated
  
  They argued that the banks would have been devastated
  
  -2
the banks should have been seized and the owners should have lost it all and the government should have ran them for 5 years to stabilize the economy before selling them back off with conditions on their new owners and stronger regulations in general

25
- They wouldn’t have had to run them. They could sell them off with restrictions. Otherwise I agree.
  
  The regulations after 2008 are still a joke. They’re garbage. We need real regulations and consequences.
  
  I dont care when a crime is paid millions. If they create job growth, profits, better wages, etc then they should he rewarded. They should make millions then BK the company.
  
  15
Isn’t the banks failing how the Great Depression became significantly worse?

6
- Many things caused that but it was the money run. Money is protected for most people now.
  
  Now days with megacorps, someone would have bought them. The executives and board members were never punished and made millions. That’s the shit that has to stop and I’m a capitalist.
  
  We need companies to fail when they fuck up
  
  10
- Because there was no FDIC.
  
  An FDIC bailout would have been cheaper than TARP given the amount of money in most people's bank accounts.
  
  For people with individual accounts worth over a quarter million? Tough titties. If you have so much cash it isn't worth your time to use multiple accounts in case of FDIC bailouts, you clearly don't need it.
  
  7
Farm subsidies are a tricky one though.

Without them you end up importing all your food from Cheapistan. But then Cheapistan has a famine (or gets invaded), and then you have a problem. You can't just start up food production that quickly to avoid all your people starving.

1
- The problem starts with the belief in simplifications that in no way reflect reality. "True capitalism" doesn't exist, can never exist, and is as undesirable as the plague. The connection with "free markets" is a feat of propaganda. This idea that socialism has no "free markets" is proof of the propaganda's success. Economies depend on markets. The capitalist idea of organisation is an anathema to free markets. While socialism is the closest one can get to a functioning "free market" system.
  
  Getting back to farming subsidies, and subsidies in general. The issue is the distortions introduced through lobbyists and corporate machinations. The provision of subsidies is not governed by the question "what is best for the population?" Rather, it is about staying in power, serving clients, not people.
  
  5
Banks, yeah I agree with that. Oil is more complicated. When oil prices go up, the price of everything goes up, sometimes dramatically.

I'm not saying oil subsidies are a good thing, just that a lot more care needs to be taken with eliminating them.

-7
- Which is why oil should be nationalized. Same with the banks. If the people have to share in the cost of failure they should get the profit for successes.
  
  13
- I don't really see your point. Oil companies jack the price of oil up anyway, regardless of subsidies. The subsidies seem to only allow oil companies to expand their enterprises on US citizens' tax dollars (apologies if your in a different country, just change "US" to wherever you live). We're literally funding the expansion of industries that are actively killing our planet.
  
  From another perspective, the only reason everything rises in cost when oil prices raise is due to oil dependance. It would be a momentary hardship, but oil prices rising would be a strong incentive for individuals and businesses to become oil-independant, which would mean using greener means of transportation, lowered plastic use, etc. It's actually long-term the best thing we could be doing right now.
  
  5

When companies maximize profits they call it smart and good business. When employees try to increase their wages they call it greedy and bad business.

I wouldn't even call unions socialist, I think they're more like a capitalist tool for workers, so those that are already rich get to benefit from capitalism and socialism while workers benefit from neither.

30

I wonder if calling unions socialist is a deliberate union busting tactic since socialism is a dirty word in the US.

13
- Why wonder? It's obviously true
  
  14
It really isn’t socialism. It’s just a way to regulate capitalism by the workers.

I fully support the right for workers to unionize but I don’t ever see joining a union myself. It doesn’t make sense for what I do.

Right now it’s too easy for unions to get screwed by the companies. We need quicker enforcement of the laws we have in place. Often it takes years by then the union is busted or diminished.

We need enforcement in days. Not months or years.

3
unions are absolutely socialist (specifically syndicalist) and that's why they are based

1

Image Transcription:

X/Twitter post by user Justin Kanew @Kanew reading:

'They didn't call the trillion-dollar Wall St. bailouts "socialism"

They don't call nearly $1 Trillion in oil & gas subsidies "socialism"

They don't call the billions in farmer bailouts "socialism"

But health care, wages, food for poor people? "SOCIALISM."'

[I am a human, if I’ve made a mistake please let me know. Please consider providing alt-text for ease of use. Thank you. 💜]

24

Good human

13
- Thank you, fellow human 🤖
  
  9

Socialism for me rugged individualist capitalism for thee!

23

I've been with conservatives all my life it's easy to understand their faulty logic, their logic is: poor people are poor because they are lazy so they don't deserve help. Part of the money = intelligence / success stupid mentality

20

They want privatized gains and socialized losses.

16

Bailouts aren't socialism, nor are subsidies or healthcare for that matter.

14

Talking as someone who lived in an actual socialism as a kid, most "socialism" in US political discourse is just the bare minimum of social measures that most Western democracies are already doing matter-of-factly (not only out of the goods of their hearts but also because it is generally known to pay itself off in the long run).

20
- Curious, where was that actual socialism? As far as I'm aware of, any country that had (attempted) socialist policies got bombed, their leaders were assassinated, and/or got their economies crippled via crippling sanctions.
  
  1

America is socialist if you're a billionaire, can't have billionaires losing any money buying things. only they poor should pay for things. America is run by mentally healthy people. /s I fucking hate this country so much

8

That’s not what socialism is.

Why do you all insist on using words you have no idea the meaning behind?

0

BUT DEY MAEK ER JERBS!!

6

Well, they are right somehow: socialism is when you also give money to the poor, and they want none of this shit! All the money must go the rich because they "deserve" it.

4

Actually a ton of people did call all of those things socialism.

3

Yeah, sure, some people who know fuck all about anything, and who's only ability seems to be making ludicrous statements online, might have made that idiotic connection. But, saying a "ton of people" is stretching it a bit.

0
- Well some notable examples are people like Milton Friedman
  
  0

"You will be receiving health care by FORCE.."

2

Liberals need to get it through their heads that socialism for the rich is just capitalism. That's how it has always been. That's what capitalism actually is, the free market is propaganda that they feed to liberals to keep you from realizing capitalism is inherently bad.

2

its why people say "fascism is capitalism in decline", germany and italy saw massive government involvement in businesses: not to control or regulate them, but to bail them out.

i just started listening to blackshirts and reds so i wanted to butt in lol

7
It blows my mind that theres an anti work sub on lemmyworld. Are they just larping as socislists?

4
- antiwork no longer means the abolition of the oppressive relationship with the capital owning class in which we sell our labor as a commodity.
  
  it's been completely co-opted as a place for milquetoast reform (capitalism will work if we put the right people in charge and call it socialism), and low-effort outrage-porn.
  
  4

Aren't "bailouts" usually just loans? 2008 housing crisis springs to front of mind.

2

Exauce one makes them richerer and the other doesn’t.

1

https://www.oglaf.com/tax-deductions/

1

It's not only for poor people

1

And 98% of America votes for it, because all team blue cares about is the mean stuff someone somewhere said the other day, and all team red cares about is guns and abortion.

So we're screwed.

0

Ah yea, "both sides". Like one isn't constantly doing it's level best (worst) to fuck over, marginalize, take away rights, discourage or straight-up pass laws to limit voting access... But yeah - "both sides".

Now if you want to expand that a bit to say that the founders didn't want a bicameral system, I'd agree.

14
- Democrats voted for the bailouts. So literally "both sides"
  
  3
50% of america doesn't vote at all. we are a huge contributor to our own mess

12
- They can't afford to miss a day of work, and for most that's through no fault if their own.
  
  1

Posts like these demonstrates how little people understand socialism.

Nothing you listed so far is “socialism”.

-4

you're missing the entire point

13
- No, it's shit. Period.
  
  Replace "socialism" with "handout(s)," and it works. "It's never called a handout when giving billions to banks. But it's handouts when ever poor people receive money." Or "Bailout == Good; Handout == Evil".
  
  But calling it "socialism" makes zero sense. Making matters worse, it continues the myth that socialism is about government handouts, instead of workplace democratisation, and worker control over the means of production.
  
  -4
- The point is lost because OP is spewing hot garbage
  
  -6
That last paragraph (though it's missing say, free school lunches for kids as an example) is what the far right screams about daily as these wild socialist adgendas that will cripple the US.

7
- Far right screams about a lot of stupid shit. They lost their credibility a long time ago. I don’t listen.
  
  4

I call all of that bullshit government over reach.

-6