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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: JohnM who wrote (10827)	2/3/2006 7:36:16 PM
From: TimF	Respond to of 541851

Well, the distinction is a bit different but may come to the same thing. Socialism consists of central planning of the economy. And is generally thought to be consistent with collective ownership of the means of production. You can argue this last bit at the edges but it's not worth the debate. But this is, as the social sciences say, an ideal type. No given economy has ever matched that. As so with capitalism. No given economy is ever purely market driven. So characterizing an economy one way or the other is a matter of a "fit." I can agree with all of that. But, again, these are characterizations of economies, not of school systems, hospitals, or political parties. But you can look at the parts of the economy and see if they are collectively owned. The more and more things are collectively owned the more socialist the economy as a whole is. I don't think it is wrong to call the parts socialist or capitalist either, but even if we accepted that it was it would still be accurate under your premises to say that the public school system is an aspect of our economy that increases the extent that the overall economy is socialist. Medicaid, medicare, social security are all safety nets within a mixed, but predominantly capitalist economy. Again a statement I can agree with.