I was born and raised in a liberal Democratic household. My grandparents were socialists and my parents leaned to the left side of the democratic party. Socialism is the default position for most people growing up, for the best of reasons, which is why young people overwhelmingly support political parties that lean left.
Historically and phylogenetically, socialism is the more congenial system because, above all else, it lends itself to the illusion that it is more fair. In capitalist systems, there is enhanced competition and the very nature of the system is to be unfair, as successful people get rewarded and the less successful garner much less material reward.
The last century showed, in rather unmistakable terms, that capitalism is the much superior system in terms of generating wealth, but under capitalism, unfairness is impossible to avoid.
Since we spend a great deal of time and energy trying to ensure that life is fair, a truly noble imperative, capitalism is counter-intuitive. It requires unlearning much of what we learn in our earliest years and gaining a much deeper and more nuanced view of the economy and fairness. In the end, those of us who evolve in our economic/political thinking recognize that capitalism is ultimately more moral and more fair to the greatest number of people. Unfortunately, far too many Americans are economically illiterate and well into adulthood operate as if the world should be designed the way a typical kindergarten works, where adult authorities make sure everyone plays nice and that all the toys are equally shared.
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Last year the Democratic Congress increased the minimum wage in the face of warnings from economists that doing so would lead to increased youth unemployment as small businesses, the single largest source of employment opportunities in America, were forced to make the calculation whether a young person worth $5.85 an hour might not be worth $6.55 an hour, moving up to $7.25 an hour next year. Only a liberal could be surprised that this has come to pass.
Presumably the next move will be for the Democrats to create a jobs program, administered for high fees by the usual community activists, to provide opportunities for these young people. The program will be funded by raising the taxes on the rich, including small business owners, who will have to spend hours filling out forms in order to hire these marginal people at a wage that makes sense, subsidized by the taxpayers, ie the rich, ie anyone making more than $75,000 a year.
Only a liberal could think this makes more sense than allowing the market to determine what wages make sense to businessmen and women. The new jobs program will become a typical bureaucratic boondoggle and will lose more money and create less jobs than promised. But, liberals will all feel warm and fuzzy knowing they did something to help young people and make the world a fairer place…even if it doesn’t work.
