Re: Capitalism versus Socialism


"Michael Scheltgen" <mjs818@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:HRzng.94911$Mn5.37557@xxxxxxxxxxx

Uwe E. Reinhardt, Ph.D., James Madison Professor of Political
Economy, Princeton University, responds:

?Socialism? is an arrangement under which the means of
production are owned by the state.

Wrong. It doesn't matter whether the entrepreneur owns or leases the means
of production. If the entrepreneur earns a profit, then he or she is a
capitalist.


Government-run health
insurance is not ?socialism,?and only an [idiot or] ignoramus
would call it that. Rather, government-run health insurance is a
form of ?social insurance,? that can be coupled with privately
owned for-profit or not-for-profit health care delivery systems.

Socialist professors getting angry when you refer to them as socialist. Back
in my days, socialist professors were proud to call themselves commies.



Conservative critics of ?social insurance? often forget that
they benefit from many other forms of ?social insurance? ? e.g.,
the principle of limited liability of shareholders, which is the
rockbed of capitalism. In a real sense, the national defense
system also is a form of ?social insurance? against threats from
abroad. People in the farmbelt may never rail against
?socialized medicine,? because so much of their income is
protected by another form of social insurance, agricultural
price supports and import restrictions (like the sugar quota.)


Mom and apple pie are social insurance. Mother's milk is social insurance.
Baseball is social insurance.





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