Their new book, to be released July 30, is called Socialism Sucks, and it’s off-beat in a refreshing way. Its motif is a breezy alcohol-fueled travelogue. You follow Ben and Bob as they visit Sweden, Cuba, Georgia (not the state next to Florida, but the country next to Russia), and other places. One interesting chapter gives their impressions from a conference of American socialists, where participants seem to be operating without a clear definition of “socialism.” Another interesting chapter transcribes a conversation with Matt Kibbe on common populist appeals of libertarianism and socialism.
The basic question that a lot of us have is why capitalism is such a boo-word among young people and why socialism is such a yeah-word. Young people sympathetic to socialism seem determined to believe that when they observe things they don’t like, capitalism is at fault; when they observe things that they do like, socialism deserves the credit. Yet the book drives home the point that the truth is the opposite.
Overall, my reaction to Socialism Sucks resembles my reaction to Tyler Cowen’s Big Business. Both represent a clever, original approach to trying to persuade people to appreciate capitalism. I remain skeptical that either book will persuade (or even reach) people who do not already share its point of view.
Capitalism clearly works for some things, such as manufacturing or construction.
Socialism may be better for other things, such as healthcare or law administration.
I think the sentiment against the profit motive is timeless and not a phenomena restricted to today’s youth.
The reason, in my opinion, is that it is not intuitive to view voluntary exchange as a win-win scenario. The intuitive interpretation of trade is that the seller is in a position of power and that he chooses profit over people.
This is amplified when considering scalable businesses with enormous profits. Our cheat-detector fires when it appears that a person/company is gaining profits that are beyond the time and physical effort involved. “No one needs that much money” is the refrain from this point of view.
Socialism uses the language of people over profit.
That’s a good point. “Nobody needs that much money” is a pretty good argument to the average person, especially when you can imagine spending some of it yourself (you deserve it) or giving it to the needy (they have real needs, some of them).
Oddly, entertainers and athletes are often given an exclusion. Perhaps because they are in the public eye and many of us get a frisson of pleasure imagining their lives, and then sometimes *schadenfreude* when they have legal or relationship troubles.
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A pernicious aspect of Marxoid analysis is that it gives intellectuals (often living on a tight budge)t a ready-made justification for tampering with markets for the free exchange of goods, and also (sometimes) for basic property rights. Schumpeter was onto something.
I sympathize with the “Nobody needs that much money” argument. Being a weirdo, I don’t immediately want to redistribute anything. Rather, I wonder what people do with all that money, where they live, what they spend it on, what I might manage to sell them that they actually want or need, etc. “The Rich Also Cry.” Is that a soap opera?
The “nobody needs that much money” statement is a rhetorical flourish that often works.
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I like the fact that you mentioned the “scalable businesses with enormous profits.”
Another thing that introduces suspicion is that most of us are surrounded by large institutions, be they profit driven or non-profit, that act like they are inherently “grabby,” seeking to charge as much as they can, and let the buyer beware when it comes to quality and efficacy.
Examples include…
* Acute health care
* higher education
* the nursing home industry for end-of-life care
* consumer credit and banking.
That’s a good point. “Nobody needs that much money” is a pretty good argument to the average person
But not when it comes to selling their own house.
“That much money” is defined as either 5 times as much as I have or a million dollars which ever is lager.
Say Marketism, not Capitalism. Marketism is a more accurate, comprehensive term for a market economy. Not coincidentally to the comprehensive element, and very importantly, people like and can relate to markets – that’s where they go to buy stuff they want. But most people don’t feel a direct relation to capital.
Stop using Karl Marx’s term for Marketism, or stay perplexed.
I doubt the terminology matters much. Think of the popular pejorative “free market fundamentalist.” I don’t think today’s anti-capitalists are as confused as optimistic libertarians like to think. I think they know that markets are what they despise.
I’m talking about all the “low information voters,” not the committed anti-capitalists. Agree with you – the latter know they are anti-market. But for all the rest, even you say in a comment below that propaganda can work. Words matter.
The basic question that a lot of us have is why capitalism is such a boo-word among young people and why socialism is such a yeah-word.
What is the best way to make capitalism popular?
Have rising career wages, married, have children and get a mortgage. Capitalism high point was 1999.
These did happen 2009 – 2014 for the young generation.
I have a pipe formed of seven uneven hemlock stalks, a gift Damoetas once gave me and said, as he lay a-dying, ‘Now it claims you as its second master.’ So said Damoetas; Amyntas, foolish one, felt envious.
-Virgil
I am definitely to the left of the median commenter here, and definitely to the right of the Chapo Trap House/AOC crowd. I’m older than what I take to be the average anti-capitalist, but I do know and communicate with a decent number of debt-laden millenials who would seem to be prime targets for the policy slate I take to be coming from the US left wing. So take what I say with a grain of salt.
But I’m pretty sure that the youth anti-capitalist movement in this country is small, transient, and highly linked to political polarization in general. Most of them see the avatars of modern capitalism admixed with what they perceive to be intolerance, bigotry, and social policies with which they do not agree. I don’t want to litigate progressive intolerance again, certainly not here. But to the extent that this generation’s cardinal virtues are predicated on their sense of racial, gender, sexual tolerance – it’s easy to see how they might conflate the economic opinions of the opposition with the social opinions their opposition shares. They find rat/rodent metaphors really distasteful – even when they readily agree that Baltimore and other similar places are terrible and politically mismanaged.
This is all just anecdote on my end. It’s fully possible that the next generation’s pendulum is going to swing hard left and usher in European-style social democracy. But I wouldn’t bet on it. Reality has a well-known capitalist bias, IMO. The dozens of millenials I’ve helped cultivate into management reassure me that they’re not all or even mostly socialists bent on growing the regulatory state. For better or worse, they seem more keyed up about race and gender issues, abortion, and other hot-button issues; the MMT AOC BS is just along for the ride sometimes. It’s curious that I never hear them talk about immigration. Just my two cents.
I would go in the opposite direction. Many of my friends are religious middle class people. A lot of them have voted GOP for cultural reasons, and were moderate free market supporters. Now that “Woke Capital” is on the scene a lot of them have been questioning capitalism and big business in a fundamental way. They much preferred the old “culturally neutral money maker” role of business.
“Why do young people hate the market form that crashed as they came of age due to the greed and excess of the generation before them?”
– Old man who yells at cloud
“…that crashed as they came of age…”
That might be a reasonable comment in, say, 2010, but now — a decade later — after a record-long economic expansion and record low unemployment?
The reverberations of the recession still impact Milennials’ economic outlook in obvious ways 10 years later. Health insurance, home ownership, childcare and student loans are key issues which they face, and will be a persistent drag on economic growth unless they are adequately addressed. This can be done either by:
1. A market based approach solving for equilibrium, or
2. A broad government intervention through taxation
Believe it or not, Milennials are more willing than older generations to accept higher taxes, even if it primarily helps out others in their community regardless of gender, race, religion etc. The government, acting as a dealer, can disperse funds agnostically, rather than though a selective process via the church or specialized non-profit. Milennials like this approach.
Further, no one(except one lowly banker) was prosecuted for the 2008 recession, this serves as evidence that markets, or at least the finance industry, is effectively its own government with its own rules. It is a government that Milennials do not have the power to influence, and appears immune to the rule of law. So, it should be unsurprising that Milennials should turn to the actual government which they CAN influence to provide meaningful oversight of these quasi sovreign entities.
Proof that propaganda works. If you can convince enough people that capitalism sank the Titanic and blew up the challenger, it doesn’t need to lose in reality to be defeated in public discourse.
One of the reasons “socialism is such a yeah-word” among young people is that companies prime them for it. Seriously.
Some car company has an ad campaign now about how all it cares about is you and what’s good for you. Of course, it doesn’t. It wants to make a profit and to do that, one of the things is has to do is make a product that is appealing to potential buyers. But the ad implicitly says that what car companies should do is CARE. And so many other ads imply the same thing.
Ads like that also prime people to think that wanting to make a profit is selfish and greedy and bad. It is but a short step to “society should not be based on profit-seeking companies.”
What is the alternative? The non-profits, led by the schools that directed you in a firm but caring manner for 13 or 17 or however many years. Of course, most schools are “public” so public this and public that may be the way to go.
Can’t wait to read the review of this book at the Crooked Timber website.
The basic question that a lot of us have is why capitalism is such a boo-word among young people and why socialism is such a yeah-word.
Here’s an interesting Reddit thread discussing the same topic: Why Don’t People Like Markets. I’ll repost my response:
Libertarians gloss over this a lot, but as amazing as capitalism is, there is a prerequisite for participating: a job. You don’t need an amazing job, even a low-paying one is enough to reap 90% of the benefits. But you do need a full-time job.
I think a lot of people dislike markets/capitalism because they instinctively realize this, and also realize that their employment is potentially precarious, especially in a time of high unemployment.
It doesn’t help that capitalists seem to want to cut jobs all the time, and encourage high unemployment in order to decrease the price of labor.
If Libertarians truly wanted to increase public support of markets/capitalism, they would pursue policies that push the employment rate closer to 100%, even if the net benefit is lower. A population who is secure, who is confident that even if they lose the job they have, they can find another one in short order, is a population that will embrace the advantages of markets and capitalism.
I’m not so sure. would rather be unemployed for a but between jobs and end up with more productive, better paying jobs while I have them. The more you guarantee employment, the less incentive people have to seek better employment, and the less productive people are in general. We shouldn’t want 100% employment. The frictional unemployment that comes with searching is ultimately beneficial.
It also needs to be said that eliminating jobs through innovation and driving up unemployment (which is more of a business cycle problem) aren’t the same thing.
You seem to be committing the fallacy of the excluded middle. Nobody wants the economy of Soviet Georgia, but consider going halfway there (ideologically and literally) – Western Europe is in many ways a nicer place to live than America, especially if you’re below median income. From where America is now, there are changes in the direction of “socialism” that plausibly lead to better outcomes (especially in healthcare, where the U.S. version is uniquely dysfunctional).
See also Scott Alexander on “the worst argument in the world”.
But people who refer to Western Europe aren’t usually referring to Western Europe in fact, but a Western Europe that exists in their imaginations. Most of these countries don’t have anything like Medicare for all. Most of them have rationing in healthcare that American socialists would decry draconian if imposed here. And what of Europe is unambiguously more socialist that they do want – like heavily regulated labor markets a la France – is decidedly something to be afraid of.
I think American socialists are playing a motte and bailey game: they say “we just want to be like Sweden and have high taxes and more welfare” but that’s not what their policy proposals actually look like. Sweden is in the eye of the beholder it seems.
The question worth asking is whether a particular reform is likely to lead to a particular state of affairs in a particular context.
For instance, Obamacare was a bit more to “the left” on healthcare, was it not. But as someone who worked on it for awhile I consider it basically a failure. It amounted to little more than an expensive way of shoving a few more people into and expanding an already broken system.
I’ve come to accept that reforms that may have been possible in smaller high trust homogenous societies like Scandinavia or Japan simply decades ago simply aren’t possible in modern day America. So speaking of them as some possibility is a waste of time. In modern America they always amount to mere fiscal expansions of already dysfunctional systems.
I get your point, but a lot of people said Trump was impossible. Politics can change quicker than you’d think, and change is always impossible until it’s inevitable. As a theory of politics, there’s a lot to be said for the garbage can model.
I blame Fox News for calling anything left of center “socialism” for the last 30 years.
The same applies for the left and “racism”.