The article entitled “Sanders’ socialism falls short” that appeared in the Sept. 23 issue of this paper provides poignant insight into the degree to which Bernie Sanders detractors are blind to historical economic trends and the success of socialist principles around the world. In the article the author purports to put backers of Sanders’ aims for things like universal healthcare and free college in their place by noting that these programs would cost money.
What a revelation, right? It’s almost as if the author doesn’t want to take stock of the fact that the United States actually spends more on healthcare as a percentage of its GDP than any other industrialized country, or that currently the burden of college in America is such that there now exists in this country more than one trillion dollars’ worth of student loan debt. For all the attendant challenges of completely subsidizing education, I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for Scandinavian college students to opt for crippling debt once they’ve finished their studies.
There’s also the assertion that Sanders supporters “don’t have any strong justifications” for asking wealthy individuals and corporations to pay their fair share of taxes to achieve the economic justice central to Sanders’ platform. Yes, there isn’t any conceivable reason why a company like General Electric, which routinely makes billions of dollars by conducting business in the U.S., should feel guilty for paying nothing in taxes. Forget that the American economy experienced unprecedented growth in the post-WWII era even as the nominal tax rate reached as high as 90 percent under Eisenhower—so long as conservative pundits get to convince us that higher taxes herald the death knell for businesses and people’s incentive to get rich, history be damned.
The article also attempts to revive the kind of staid trickle-down economic theory whose success was never born out by history when it reads, “All of the things that rich people do with their money provide value to society. Even spending on seemingly wasteful luxury goods like private jets and exotic cars gives producers of those goods a way of life.” There you have it, folks. Middle class wages may have stagnated in the decades following Reagan unshackling the rich from their tax obligations of yesteryear, but at least the obscenely wealthy have used the money that could otherwise go towards universal healthcare and subsidized tuition to prop up the critical luxury airliner industry.
So much of what undergirds the anti-Sanders ethos is an assumption that proponents of socialist principles are naively asking for changes that aren’t feasible in an economic climate conducive to making people disgustingly rich. There’s truth to this sentiment. If as a society we want to go on privileging the ability of the ultra wealthy to continue to accrue more and more money at the expense of critically needed social programs, then I suppose Sanders’ proposals are unrealistic. They wouldn’t be unrealistic, however, if we collectively decided that there’s a point at which those who have disproportionately reaped the benefits of conducting affairs in America should actually contribute to the well-being of their fellow brothers and sisters.
Wealthy individuals, corporations and the politicians they collude with would like us to think that in spite of the success and relative fiscal efficiency of social programs in places like Europe, where Germany boasts a markedly renowned and robust economy, that redistributing wealth in such a way as to guarantee a higher standard of living for all citizens is a ludicrously dangerous proposition. Morality and history, however, which I see as more credible adjudicators of this issue, tell us that the socialist goals enumerated by Bernie Sanders are altogether noble and feasible ones.
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