One of the biggest misconceptions about socialism, especially in the United States, is that we want the State to control ALL aspects of the market, abolish all private property, and/or recreate the Soviet system in the United States or elsewhere. To be honest, this couldn't be further from the truth, most Socialists are realistic in our goals, and we really don't want a widget factory to be owned and run by some centralized government. To be blunt, that would be inefficient and a waste of government resources.
What we DO care about, however, is that the workers at the widget factory earn a living wage, work under safe conditions, and has strong representation, either through a Union, or the factory itself can be owned by them, as a Co-op. We also want to minimize the damage that such a factory would cause to the community it resides in, and make sure the factory owners PAY for any problems that the factory causes, such as environmental damage, and are properly taxed.
Most Socialists can actually be quite conservative, at least in a traditional way, we generally oppose privatization of public utilities, which seems to be a great experiment for local governments lately. Most people in the United States has at least 2 utilities that are publicly owned, and are therefore "Socialist". Most likely these are your gas and water utilities, the reason why they are public is because they are "natural" monopolies, in other words, competition cannot take place in the same community they serve due to safety and physical constraints.
Deregulation of these utilities and privatization, contracting out the utility to some private entity, usually ends up backfiring on the community. Rates go up, because this is a for-profit enterprise, all of the sudden, and service decreases, because public oversight is diminished. Its odd, but in a case like this, Socialists are among the most "conservative" people to oppose such measures.
Many Socialists believe the Energy infrastructure should be under national control, the reason seems obvious, its an interconnected grid, most of it crisscrossing state and national borders, and is vital to the national economic system. It should be regulated and run similarly to the National Highway System. In addition, we are advocates for a Universal Health care system as well, we consider both to be necessary for the citizenry to function.
As Socialists facing the challenges of the 21st century, we need to try to find the optimum balance between the needs of the citizenry and the existence of a private run market. We need to preserve the commons, the open spaces, public utilities, and open government for the people, and also allow for some flexibility to allow for innovation and to reward that innovation properly.
What we DO care about, however, is that the workers at the widget factory earn a living wage, work under safe conditions, and has strong representation, either through a Union, or the factory itself can be owned by them, as a Co-op. We also want to minimize the damage that such a factory would cause to the community it resides in, and make sure the factory owners PAY for any problems that the factory causes, such as environmental damage, and are properly taxed.
Most Socialists can actually be quite conservative, at least in a traditional way, we generally oppose privatization of public utilities, which seems to be a great experiment for local governments lately. Most people in the United States has at least 2 utilities that are publicly owned, and are therefore "Socialist". Most likely these are your gas and water utilities, the reason why they are public is because they are "natural" monopolies, in other words, competition cannot take place in the same community they serve due to safety and physical constraints.
Deregulation of these utilities and privatization, contracting out the utility to some private entity, usually ends up backfiring on the community. Rates go up, because this is a for-profit enterprise, all of the sudden, and service decreases, because public oversight is diminished. Its odd, but in a case like this, Socialists are among the most "conservative" people to oppose such measures.
Many Socialists believe the Energy infrastructure should be under national control, the reason seems obvious, its an interconnected grid, most of it crisscrossing state and national borders, and is vital to the national economic system. It should be regulated and run similarly to the National Highway System. In addition, we are advocates for a Universal Health care system as well, we consider both to be necessary for the citizenry to function.
As Socialists facing the challenges of the 21st century, we need to try to find the optimum balance between the needs of the citizenry and the existence of a private run market. We need to preserve the commons, the open spaces, public utilities, and open government for the people, and also allow for some flexibility to allow for innovation and to reward that innovation properly.
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