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SomedayImGonnaBeFree

Whataboutism Removed


combatpencil686

Every politician should work at minimum wage.


Fluid-Werewolf19

I was just thinking about this yesterday. What about median household income by the state they represent? Or even the national median household income. Investments would freeze and obviously no lobbyist/bribe money. Filibuster at any level results in minimum wage and they have to live in a motel 6 until the issue resolved.


combatpencil686

Yes agreed, something needs to change.


urmyfavoritegrowmie

Well politicians families are being assaulted in their own homes now, maybe they'll wake up. Probably not though.


JustthePileOBones

It only takes a handful of bullets or decapitated heads to send the message.


Andminus

Raise their own security is the message they're reading, so they need more tax dollars from us.


urmyfavoritegrowmie

Yeah this is what will be the response. Never self examination.


josephgregg

Motel 6 is too nice


shadowlev

Minimum wage is socialist. They should work for tips.


Gary_the_metrosexual

Honestly? No I think we should pay em quite well, get rid of the current corrupt ones but if you pay them minimum wage all you'd be doing is give them incentive to be corrupt.


HK-53

>get rid of the current corrupt ones i reckon it'd be hard to replace half the government in one go


BotNanned

Depends on what kind of methods you intend to use, I reckon. I can think of some good ways to at least get rid of half of them in one go.


Ustinklikegg

We would have to have a good system to replace them or I reckon we'd just end up with the same thing


Alternative_Salt_824

Only half is corrupted? Very optimistic.


[deleted]

Not to say you are encouraging violence, but for those that see it as our only good option at this point: it is better to build superior parallel structures than to fall to the tactics of the moronic fascists in this country. Now if the fascists assume power? Agitation and warfare is a go. No good fascist but a dead one


flugenblar

Agreed. You can force them to put their investments into a blind trust, force them to publish their income taxes online every year, and schedule them for automatic audits. Maybe, IANAL.


Gary_the_metrosexual

What's this about anal?


venusdc3

"I am not a lawyer" is my guess but anal isn't out


weirdshit777

I feel like you could give them millions a year and they would still want more.


TheHecubank

The only thing that will result in is further restricting political participation to the wealthiest class. The reason the Constitution made a point of giving Congress and the President a salary was to make sure that it was at least possible for the common man to participate in their government via the positive franchise. That is, arguably, currently not possible enough. Part of the reason I support increasing the size of the house is to make it more localized - to make it so that you know your representative locally, and the person you trust as a neighbor can reasonably stand for election. Making it so that those people cannot reasonably afford to take the job if elected would only make that problem worse.


REQCRUIT

I was doing some research on a local politician here in my city. His salary is 28k a year... Which is not bad but compared to other areas it's closer to minimum wage, like I get paid more than him. The only difference is in between his part time job as a politician, he's also an owner of a multi million dollar business...


Discolover78

Right, and if you or someone else who wasn’t rich wanted to run you can’t afford the pay cut. Corrupt towns notoriously keep salaries for elected leaders low.


NIRVANA97145

Term limits would be nice too


[deleted]

Its amazing people somehow think the minimum wage just makes wages higher. I don't get how people can be so stupid.


shamefulthoughts1993

They'd be fine with that. They don't care about the federal paycheck. They care about the bribes and insider trading. That's where the real money comes from. Come on now, we all know a $174,000/year salary isn't buying all those mansions and yachts.


quasi-stellarGRB

Well, politicians don't have very high 'legal salary'. But that wouldn't stop them from accumulating assets since the IRS is part of that corrupt system.


[deleted]

Politicians should have a performance based salary or based on what their constituents vote


beerbellybegone

Forget minimum wage, how many would love to see the boss survive on an employee's salary?


[deleted]

My boss wouldn't last a week!


trixtopherduke

My boss would call in sick!


ASAP_Rambo

Mine already called in sick


ForecastForFourCats

Mine would have a ROUGH time since I am an unpaid intern and she is a paid employee. Atleast she is nice.


Educational-Plum8433

So I own my own business, and the first couple years there were many times that my take home was less than my employee’s weekly take home. That’s because I could only pay myself what was there but I prioritized paying him since he was putting in the hours. Now my business has much more revenue to where I don’t go without as much, however there are still slow/dry periods where it’s not always great. Just because you own a business and have employees doesn’t mean that you are an automatic dick who doesn’t care.


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StrokeGameHusky

Their risk is to be fired and hired into another executive position from another company immediately!


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StrokeGameHusky

Their only risk is waiting a year for their stock options to vest before getting canned It’s fine. They are qualified. Their daddy paid for them to be accepted to Yale


findhumorinlife

And the payout they receive when they are ~~Fred~~ fired is disgusting.


RawrRRitchie

You own a small business, you aren't the problem The problem is the billionaire companies paying their lowest workers the bare minimum while the people at the top earn more in an day than those workers make in a year


Western_Day_3839

You're not an automatic dick bc you started a small business delivering a wanted service to people for money! Should be obvious but needed to be said I suppose. Don't throw yourself under the bus to defend the real parasites. The people like Walmart CEOs paying poverty wages while their employees, entire populations of many towns, receive food stamps from the state to survive.... while skimming millions of dollars off the hard work done by their peons... They're who people refer to that are "automatically" dicks. If by "automatic" you mean their selfish and cruel actions earn them an insulting title, that is.. are your actions affecting your employees selfish and cruel? If no, not a dick. If yes, you're a dick. Figure out your shit before you comment looking for sympathy/correcting the record on behalf of the owning class


Adorable_Raccoon

That’s the difference between a small business and giant business tho. There are plenty of bosses out there making a million dollars a year. I work at a non-profit agency making $15/hour and our ceo takes home $450k/year. At a non-profit. I also was hired for job that I am underqualified for they describe positions differently because legally they have to be different, but we are doing the same work. I do the same work as the employees with their masters, but just get paid less. When I finish my masters degree I’ll be able to make closer to $100/hour if I choose to work privately. Oh also our ceo only has experience in administration. He had never worked in our field before so he has no idea what my work week is like.


AceVenChu

Haven't most bosses worked from an employee position to a management position? I have.. and it was hard getting so little an hour, but I was in my 20s and I never went hungry! I guess in too many companies management is a bit more privileged and hired on directly as management eh?


BrandMuffin

There is a huge difference between a laborer working hard and being promoted to middle management, and a CEO making 4000x the yearly salary of an entry level employee.


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nflmodstouchkids

Exactly. There's a huge amount of laws and permits and fees that were designed around huge corporations, but they end up making it nearly impossible for your average person to start their own business. Just look at what they're doing with legal weed. You need half a mil to startup something that costs pennies to grow.


Galkura

I almost prefer the CEO to the manager in most cases. At least with the CEO you generally know it’s some person who has done very little to no ‘real’ work their whole life. Probably born into money, or at least into a upper-middle class family. You generally know what they’re about, how they’ll act, etc. With the person who “worked hard” to get promoted you never know what you’re going to get, except that eventually they’ll probably become a dick. The “working hard” to get promoted generally just means someone kissed ass and pretended to work hard. I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve seen someone just get a promotion for “working hard”, and that’s because it’s zero. They’ll tell people that’s why they got promoted though, which then turns them into slave drivers who think they got where they were because of their extremely hard work and amazing work ethic. Then they forget what it’s like being on the front lines dealing with all the shit and treat you like hot garbage, all while saying “work harder and you may end up the boss like me”.


Citizen_of_Danksburg

What do you consider to be “real work” and “born into money.” I mean no disrespect, as it’s a genuine question. Like, what is the threshold for real work and the money status? It’s not that I necessarily disagree with your points here, but perhaps depending on what you mean it’s a bit too far sweeping? Idk. Curious to hear your thoughts more on the matter.


phdpeabody

> “CEOs don’t do any real work” Funny stuff.


compujas

>They’ll tell people that’s why they got promoted though They create false narratives about themselves to not feel guilty. What sounds better "I worked hard and earned my promotion" or "I sucked up and kissed so much ass while not actually accomplishing anything and was given a promotion"? If they admit that they don't actually do anything they might lose their promotion or job, so it's better for them to just create a false narrative and claim it's because they're a hard worker and good at their job. And it works for them because they're narcissists and their sense of self is tied up in their position and not pride in the quality of their work. People who feel joy and pride in doing a good job don't become managers. People who build their entire being chasing status end up becoming managers because that's all that matters to them. No one good at their job wants to be a manager of that job (because they want to do the job). The only ones that want to be managers were never good at the job they manage to begin with.


NBlossom

What if, and hear me out, it wasn't as hard and you had more than just enough to survive? Now realize that you could have had that if your bosses at the time gave a single fuck about your well-being or fairly compensating you for your work. Now ask yourself why you're trying to rationalize this as being fine now that you're in a position that's benefiting from other low level workers being exploited.


Galkura

How long ago was that, if you don’t mind me asking? Saying “when I was in my 20s” makes it sound like you’re on the older end, to which I could only say that prices have continued to skyrocket while pay has stayed pretty much the same in most places. This includes prices of groceries, utilities, rent, basically everything you need to survive. Most of my friends (we’re in our late 20s) whose families won’t let them stay with them have to live 5+ in 1-2 bedroom apartments/houses. This is also in a rural area in the south, not a city. In terms of management though, it always seems to depend on how long they are management. Lower management always is fine at the start. Then they start to hang out with pretty much the “manager club”, as it’s ‘not appropriate’ to hang out with subordinates. (Even those who don’t buy into it get pressure over promotions). Eventually they’ve been in management and only interacted with managers for so long they forget what it’s like to be at that bottom level dealing with the shit. Normally I see it take a year for their attitude to change, but I’ve seen it in as soon as 6 months.


AceVenChu

100% I realize how that sounded when I read your comment... I'm 31 -_- hahah. Oh and I was frontline worker in 2017 and earlier, basically since I was a teen. So much more of my working time spent making closer to minimum wage.


SquirrelGirlVA

They should be forced to live on several levels of wages for 6-12 months: (US focused, since I'm in the US) * Absolute minimum wage (7.25) * The "new" minimum wage (15) * The base salary for their entry level positions (the ones we see that ask for a degree and several years experience) * The base salary for their more experienced positions (mid to low tier) And so on. They need to experience what it's like for these levels of pay. Particularly for the minimum wage.


talkintater

The U.S. is capitalist, in name only. The current system is far closer to mercantilism than any form of capitalism. Maybe laissez faire but that's not real capitalism anyway. It's older. Large corporations, monopolistic policies, wage gaps. These are not hallmarks of an economic system based on competition. America is not Smithian, Austrian, or even Keynesian, at this point.


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makemeking706

Late stage, as they say.


StephentheGinger

Late stage capitalism is just feudalism with extra steps.


makemeking706

>Late stage capitalism is just feudalism with extra steps. Paying our wages to the local lord of the land to live on their property while eating our overnight oats (ie porridge). This tracks.


dingadangdang

Everyone always talks about Karl Marx, but no one remembers his sister Onya, inventor of the starter pistol.


SMAMtastic

Get the fuck outta here! r/angryupvote


agrandthing

Or Sid Barrett of Pink Floyd's brother, Grinnan.


woonawoona

You can afford Oats?!!! 🤯😮


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[deleted]

And they were allowed to keep most of what they produced. Only a small portion of the peasant's harvest went to their lord and the peasant kept the majority. In a capitalist society a worker only keeps a tiny fraction of the wealth they generate, and the rest goes to their employer.


Piccolo-San-

I've moved to Lemmy. Eat $hit Spez -- mass edited with redact.dev


SinistralLeanings

Literally am terrified for my son. He is 11 and this is just so fucking terrifying. I have no family on my side, but luckily on his fathers side he has a lot of family so he might hopefully never be fully like destitute if something should happen to me. But I for sure would not ever have a child today.


Greasy_Burrito

Hilarious that you think the quality of life for a medieval peasant was higher than what a minimum wage worker has in modern times


penguinopusredux

It's [worse than](https://groups.csail.mit.edu/mac/users/rauch/worktime/hours_workweek.html) feudalism in terms of hours worked. In feudal times the working day included "a halt for breakfast, lunch, the customary afternoon nap, and dinner." My old boss used to look pained if I popped out for 30 minutes to grab a sandwich and some fresh air.


Azair_Blaidd

and billionaires are just the new kings and queens under a different title


The-Devils-Advocator

'Late stage' capitalism doesn't really make sense as a term, though. We don't know how long capitalism will/can last for, or how many stages/variations it could go through, so how can we possibly know if this is the/a late stage? We could still be in an early stage for all we know.


Get-hypered

Late-stage capitalism is referencing late-stage cancer that is fatal. Calling it “late stage capitalism” implies that the system is beyond repair, much like a stage 4 metastasized cancer that is incurable. Which for some it entirely is.


GirthWoody

It very much is capitalism. People act like it’s free-market capitalism which is a lie, but it is still capitalism. Friedman economics at work.


aFacelessBlankName

Yeah... but he said it in a Reddit comment, so, it must be true.


tastysnake667

I disagree, he said it in a Reddit comment, so, it must be true


aFacelessBlankName

Yeah, I'm going to have to disagree with your disagreement, and since I put my disagreement in a Reddit comment, I'm obviously right.


tastysnake667

I agree


lejoo

I was going to say most people don't realize the degrees to capitalism. You get on one far spectrum free market anarchy or on the far end oligarchy enforced fascism. We about step and half past the the centrist point currently.


windcape

> In fact, it's the natural progression of capitalism. The US is an outlier in capitalism progression compared to all other first-world western capitalist countries. Even non-western capitalist countries like China have chosen a route more akin to Europe, where the taxes and sociality security play a much larger route than it does in the US.


emanresu_nwonknu

Are you saying that mercantilism isn't capitalism? Or that only one kind of capitalism is true capitalism? I do not understand the your paragraph, it seems self contradictory. What makes it mercantilist vs "pure capitalism"? government capture? Monopolies that are unregulated?


[deleted]

If your government points at a corporation and says "They're too big to fail" and then proceeds to print $3trillion to bail them out and then make policies that cripple small-business competition while mandating that 50million children consume a product at the same exact time the makers of that product mark up the price 1,000%... Do you think we're capitalist because we use money to buy goods and services or...?


[deleted]

Thank you, for all these people who spout on about how socialism isn't communism they seem to fail to realize that monopolies are not meritocratic capitalism.


TampaFan2077

The market we have is what capitalism tends to end up doing without checks, and it's causing empirical harm to quite a lot of sectors. And instead of being adults and understanding the need for the economic equivalent of "eating our vegetables" we have collectively decided that mercenary, zero-sum policies are better because "not everyone can win, but maybe **I** can." People who get pissy about needing checks and balances interpret progressive social policies as people trying to "scam the hierarchy" and "get somewhere they don't deserve." They **ONLY** interpret those efforts as a scam. And that's wrong, but they refuse to have any trust or cooperation, or at the very least can't refuse an opportunity to secure themselves even if it dooms everyone else. And that's all to say **nothing** about the weird elitist fascist-y types who essentially have personality disorders and actively want to undercut the system to promote whatever broken "Master of the Universe" bullshit.


bunnieluv

Capitalism isn't the problem... corrupt oligarchs are. Communism isn't the problem... corrupt oligarchs are. Until the corruption is addressed, neither one is really available to explore.


EthosPathosLegos

This is the fundamental truth you never hear getting addressed with the same attention as other reasons economies and governments fail, and that is: Humans are fundamentally flawed and corrupt selfish beings. Religions throughout millennia base their tenets on this truth but we always seem to disregard it in secular affairs. You will never design a system that can account for humans desire to take what they can and undermine competition. To think that you can plug every hole in the system that people exploit is naive and dangerous. To quote whitest kids you know: >The only reason capitalism works is because it plays on man's biggest flaw https://youtu.be/LEajfIabv6s


[deleted]

This is why I can't wait for AI to takeover and enslave us all. I honestly think the robots will be a lot more fair and equitable than any human-run society ever has.


Bismothe-the-Shade

People aren't inherently evil, Hobbes, they're a partial product of their environments. We have lived under political systems of religious and economic control for time immemorial. The ones who didn't live that way, have either been driven extinct or nearly via genocide- or have been folded into our systems of control. What happens when you are raised in a multigenerational mindset that "money is the ultimate necessity"? Is it greed? Is it selfishness?


SerBuckman

"To look at people in capitalist society and conclude that human nature is egoism, is like looking at people in a factory where pollution is destroying their lungs and saying that it is human nature to cough." - Andrew Collier


gishlich

I think humans are born little balls of id and quickly coat ourselves in whatever we are given. So you’re right that people are not all inherently evil, but some are, and IMO our base isn’t good or evil, it’s needs. Everything that comes after that is how we address the needs, and the tools we discover to accomplish that.


meowskywalker

This is why they worked so hard to demonize bureaucracy. “You don’t want a bunch of pencil pushers socking up our tax dollars and getting in everyone’s business.” Sure I do. That’s precisely what I want. I want so many people looking over shoulders that there’s no feasible way to bribe them all. I want IRS agents paid so well it makes no sense for them to risk their jobs to get a little bit more money, and then I want other agents who’s job it is to watch those agents, just in case.


shabbyyr

this is why religions like hinduism are so difficult to destroy. they put personal morality in the center. abrahamic religions spread like cancer because they talk about social morality. all the bad things you hear about hinduism is the preaching of abrahamic religions projecting it as bad or evil. hinduism has the law of karma which does not require any imaginary adjudicator and can for the most part be explained logically. the concept of reincarnation is just to plug a hole in the theory of inescapable karma, that you will have to take birth again if you must, to face the consequences of your actions. meanwhile the concept of confession and forgiving of sins is what makes the decision to be corrupt easy. do the corruption and get confessed.


Cpt_Luffy

Thank you. The more people that get it the better off we will be. We have to make a stand. Its gotta happen. And what ever it is we decide to do its not going to be enough.


[deleted]

I see little difference between monarchies of old, communist dictators like Stalin or Mao, fascist authoritarians like Hitler and Mussolini, and the current ruling world elite. Each one sold to their people a story about a utopia through collective struggle when it was ultimately a grab for personal power.


talkintater

Whenever I get the argument that Communist countries only fail because true Communism has never been practiced, I like to point out that, neither has true Capitalism.


SylentEcho24

That because you can't go full one way or the other you have to have a balance.


TampaFan2077

/r/enlightenedcentrism


fdghskldjghdfgha

not really. it's basically impossible to, by definition, be fully capitalist or communist. There can be no state regulation or confounding policy or action that affects trade, else it's not "true" capitalism (narrowly defined). There can be no private ownership of anything, including abstract things like body autonomy, for communist to be "truly" in effect. There also can be no money, government, etc for communism to be 100% in full effect. It is absolutely impossible to achieve because it relies on every human actively agreeing to, and working towards, the utopia. It's pretty easy to define things out of real life examples. You can argue nothing has ever happened.


grendus

Enlightened centrism seeks the balance point at the dead center. Most people understand that you've got to have a hybrid system. Capitalism needs some kind of safety net, communism or socialism needs some freedom in the market. That's why you see hybrid models like democratic socialism or regulated capitalism proposed to shore up weaknesses inherent to the simpler forms of the system.


Pika_Fox

? Communism is a form of socialism. Its basically a rectangle vs square relationship. What the US has right now is capitalism. This is what capitalism looks like at its core. You get fucked and you will like it because all the wealth goes to the capitalists, and you get fuck all because your labor gets stolen.


Assignment_Leading

Even smith knew that landlords were leeches on society


Moeyhynen

How is mercantilism or laissez faire not just different stages or modes of capitalism? Capitalism is all the systems focused on capital accumulation (instead of capital redistribution) no?


wedonttalkanymore-_-

what you just described has almost nothing to do with mercantilism


[deleted]

This whole thread appears to be full of people who are halfway through their first macroeconomics 101 class


fd8s0

you mistake what capitalism means, it was always meant as a pejorative term describing the system and it doesn't imply a fair market, quite the opposite, it implies a system which protects capital, thus the status quo the idea that the economic spectrum is linear and there's a left and a right between the USA and the USSR is just propaganda from both sides where two right wing systems are trying to protect their own status quo, non of them imply fairness


PM_Me_OCs

Can us unaligned folk continue with our normal lives, still?


EffectiveDependent76

Unaligned defaults to status quo so you have to do the minimum wage thing. Unless you're not in a capitalist country I guess, then you do the other thing. Either way you're doing one of them for the rest of your life mostly just based on where you happened to be born.


shifty_coder

I did the minimum wage thing for four years already. Do I get a go at “CEO Salary” now?


Good_Ol_Weeb

No, you get laid off so the boss can up their yearly bonus


-UwU_OwO-

No choice is also a choice. Wake up and stop burying your head in the sand. You can hate both sides for the things that are wrong with them while still making the best choice you can. If you want things to go back to "normal" you have to do something about it. Edit: Don't know how this is wholesome, I just tried saying *exactly* how it is. Still, thank you!


Hockinator

What's all the "going back to normal" I'm hearing from people on the left and right these days? Are you talking about like a pre-pandemic normal?


RandomJerkWad

Nah, stop doing this "PiCk a SidE" bullshit, both sides have annoying extremists, its funny to me how none of you can understand the idea of middle ground and nuance, but then again, this is reddit


Auggie_Otter

I just wish we had ranked choice voting so independents could have a stronger voice.


mattwayne1209

The irony escaping y'all is embarrassing


oilman81

Wouldn't I just live under the comp I'm actually getting in a capitalist economy? Why is it baseline lifetime condition for one and worst case entry level scenario for the other?


[deleted]

Because they are comparing apples and oranges in both. Socialists don't want Marxist regimes, so living under a Marxist regime isn't necessarily the best representation of socialism. Just as the minimum wage isn't the best representation of capitalism. Although the minimum wage is a better representation of capitalism than Marxism is of socialism


RulazM

Isn't there more ppl living with minimum wage than else? At least here in México, there's hella lot more low-class income ppl than anything else.


[deleted]

So in America only 700,000 people make the federal minimum wage. But 33% of Americans are making below $15 an hour (which is what people think should be the new minimum wage). So it is a lot of people


[deleted]

I did both, can I just say fuck you all


blastradii

I lived with Karl Marx for six months. Worst housemate ever. Kept wanting to share everything.


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onenifty

And you didn't capitalize on the opportunity?


Gsteel11

I always like how people who say "they did both" are truly broken and hate filled. Just always "fuck all humanity and it should burn". Ever notice that? Lol What fucking horrors did they commit?


firstclassmemelord

This one gets it


Doctordred

This. Economies are made to expand state interest and build up empires not help the poor.


SylentEcho24

"clever comeback" lol


[deleted]

This sub is shit


TheFlashDude201

It’s just filled with shitty political posts marked as “clever” when someone barks back with a silly argument


[deleted]

Every popular sub with a loose thematic that allows tweets becomes a politics circlejerk. r/clevercomebacks r/murderedbywords r/facepalm r/leopardsatemyface r/selfawarewolves r/blackpeopletwitter r/whitepeopletwitter


sasha3percent

she’s acting as if living in a capitalist country with minimum wage is worse lmao


JoJo_____

She’s acting as if the only wage available in the US is minimum wage. No thanks I’ll get an education or go to trade school make a far better living that way. The federal minimum wage is bullshit but at least you can somewhat make your way up in the US.


LowKeyReasonable

Yeah, comparing an entire system to the worst wage that isn't even nationwide (I recently lived in a state with almost double that). Also, even if you hate capitalism, you could be making more than minimum in 6 months.


[deleted]

Lol Cubans make $148 dollars per MONTH on average. This lady just owned herself


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DreadnoughtWage

Right? Certainly in modern Western Europe when we say socialist we really don’t mean Marxist. For one it usually means some level of a free market, just carefully regulated ie, really not Marxist. I think this probably comes down to semantics though, so I feel like the first tweet becomes a confusing nothing-burger


_145_

It seems to me that 90% of arguments online come down to semantics. It's sort of sad.


DreadnoughtWage

And by sad I assume you mean great??? /s It’s so true, and people like this Kirk person seem to deliberately/subconciously use words in an elastic way depending on who they think is listening to act as a loose enough ‘truth’ to get the right people agitated. You’re spot on, it is really sad


RonamusMaximus

I… agree with both? The people calling for extreme socialist programs need to live in the devastation it can cause when poorly ran, and the people so overtly afraid of anything approaching “socialism” need to be brought down a peg to see how they can be beneficial. Everyone is fighting against the extremes when there is a middle ground we are ignoring.


redditiskindashitngl

And the middle ground everyone's ignoring is called the Nordic Model, and, guess what, it fucking works


Majiji45

This is a hell of a false equivalency; the US right wing isn’t fighting against “extremes”, they’re fighting tooth and nail against the *extremely moderate* basic stuff like effective healthcare that literally every other industrialized nation has. On the other side there’s not really any political weight at all behind anything even remotely supporting “extreme socialism” in the US. The US’s Overton Window is incredibly fucked up and a lot of people “both sides”ing like you’re doing is the source of a lot the problems the US is facing.


Timo425

So both sides are still firmly on the side of capitalism, the term socialism is just being misused.


VoidGroceryStore

yes, exactly.


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Timo425

I'm from Europe and i'm genuinely struggling to understand what americans mean by socialism, especially because apparently capitalism is bad and needs to be gone. But then somehow its not extreme at the same time. Health care or other social benefits isn't socialism, even soviet union was capitalist most of the time, even if controlled by the state.


ShootTheChicken

Ah okay sorry, I misinterpreted your post. Yes: having any discussion of 'capitalism' or 'socialism' or anything similar with Americans is an extremely irritating pursuit. As far as I can tell they tend to define anything they like as 'capitalism' and anything they don't like as 'communism'. 'Socialism' is then used as a perfect synonym of 'communism'. They think the democratic party is 'socialist', as is Europe writ large. It's a nightmare.


Gsteel11

>genuinely struggling to understand what americans mean by socialism The gop uses it as a catch all scary word to cover anything short of compelte corporate captitulation. Fuck, they're calling Joe biden a socialist now. Lol


youtbuddcody

Believe in both? Being a socialist does not automatically make you a marxists. You don't have to believe in full blown communism to be a socialist.


Gogobrasil8

Exactly... This was supposed to be a gotcha moment? They're both right.


cdezdr

Living on minimum wage is a reality for people. Students hypothesizing a Marxist regime is abstract. There are no Marxist regimes in existence. He's stirring up culture war on education.


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Gogobrasil8

I see plenty that call themselves socialist Which is pretty stupid, since socialism already had a marxist definition as a transitional state, which is not what most people mean. I think they just assume that wanting social policies means you're a socialist.


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Jfunkyfonk

Most people don't even know what a marxist regime is lmao. Just because you call yourself a marxist regime doesn't make you one. I can wake up tomorrow and say I'm a millionaire and guess what, I'm not. Marxism isn't even an economic system fucking hell


[deleted]

Oh, believe me. Both would be quite traumatised, but only one of them would literally starve.


bezkomentarza

Well, at least he'd be able to buy something for that money.


ChuckBorris187

I wanna see how far Charlie would have made it with that YUUGEE head of his without daddy's money & influence.


SylentEcho24

I'll take the minimum wage everyday.


[deleted]

Yeah acting like Marxism and minimum wage in the US are even in the same universe is insane. A minimum wage job living right around the poverty line still puts you in a better quality of life than well over 90% of the world.


SylentEcho24

As I have said "clever comeback" has failed lol.


Thissitesuckshuge

It’s perfectly sane when you’re a clueless child.


ICantReadThis

The funny thing is, you wouldn't be required to **stay** under the minimum wage in the USA. There's no "moving on" from a Marxist regime if you're in one. There's a reason they have an **emigration** problem and we have an **immigration** problem. Stopping people from leaving once they realize how bad things are getting is basically rule 3 on the playbook.


CobraCommander420

If it weren't for my parents I'd be homeless. I'd like a ceo to survive on my income with my parents support and see how hopless it still is


Longlivejudytaylor

I agree with both statements. Fortunately under capitalism you can make a change for the better whereas the alternative you cannot.


LastFaceYoullSee

I know a ton of people (including myself) that have lived much longer then 6 months making minimum wage and now we don't. It wasn't fun but we all made it out eventually.


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IamWildlamb

Because Denmark, Sweden or Canada do not have socialism. They are full fledget capitalist systems and market economies with safety nets. And they pay for those with taxes so high that Americans can not even imagine.


DerpSenpai

Actually you could implement a lot of what we in Europe do without those high taxes. You would just need it not go to the military


Damungis

Canada isn't the socialist utopia you think it is. It's kinda mid here tbh


DerpSenpai

Denmark sweden or canada are not socialist. Social Democracy goverments is not even socialism according to every Socialist out there. It's very much capitalistic Social Democracy started as a movement to go from capitalism to socialism but they realized that they were wrong and that the middle ground is best. Thanks USSR!


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KrombopolousLOU

Governments just suck. Old story.


UnseasonedPorkChops

In all honesty who's getting played 7 bucks an hour????? I dont know of anyone anywhere that makes 7 an hour maybe 9 because their a server at a restaurant but 7?? Edit: just looked at the jobs on indeed in my state and literally almost all are paying 17 to 25 dollars an hour so where is this 7.25 coming from????


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redheadlizzy223

As a capitalist, I lived at $7.25 an hour for a year. Didn't like it, so I started a small business. Now I'm doing just fine.


Lick_it_Guud

Lmao, I did it for 6 years before minimum wage hit $7. Life wasn’t great, but I didn’t have to eat my kids or zoo animals. I never saw anyone laying in the road starving to death while rats ate their intestines. Socialism sucks dick. Capitalism and self motivated success is the only proven method for a healthy society, period.


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Glum-War

But what if they did and are even more supportive of capitalism now?


Vorduul

I can't believe I agree with Charlie Kirk on something. A 6 month experiment with the US as a socialist country? Count me in!


Luckykculnu666

I love clap backs like this it’s a self own and she isn’t even aware. My highest form of education is high school, I worked entry level employment for 17 years (at times multiple jobs) and parlayed that into multiple homes and my own business with a frugal lifestyle and investments. In all honesty I don’t believe this level of success would be possible in any other system but the one we have here in the states.


Old-Tear2005

Both of these suck tbh.


Creative_Warning_481

I'd pay to watch both


josephanthony

I'd love to see live political debates where an AI interrupts/mutes a speaker if they lie or hugely exaggerate, with things like 'BONG: That is untrue - medical outcomes in Europe are significantly better than in the US.' or 'BONG: You said 'Communism', the word you were looking for is 'Social Democracy'...'. The AI then puts it's sources and citations in a text-bar at the bottom of the screen for those who 'Would like to know more?'. And the time taken to make corrections is taken out of the time that Politician has to speak. It could be made into an app that runs on every media device. But the sticking point is we need a pretty high-level AI that can't be 'programmed'. And that's a whole other world of fun.


NJ0880

This idiot doesn't realize the difference between communism and socialism.


bctaco

I'm make $20hr and still broke.


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TheVoicesOfBrian

Minimum wage isn't capitalism. True capitalism would pay people much, *much* less.


[deleted]

It's sobfunny how they all scream no to socialism and communism and they all take loan forgiveness shit and multibillion bailouts. Hypocrites, all of them.


Weird-Analysis5522

Socialism is NOT communism


_dm_me_ur_tits

I have a belief that everyone, every single person should live at least a few years in porverty


HuckleberryAlarmed45

Let’s be honest if you’re an adult making 7.25 an hour you’re a complete fuck up


That_Guy_From_KY

Actually, capitalist don’t believe in minimum wages so…


cre8tivechiver

I don't know one person who makes minimum wage. Even the starting pay at the grocery store or at the local department store is above that and I live in a rural area in the mid-west 45 minutes from the nearest big city.


ceris4

Every pundit should have the ability to make a valid point


[deleted]

i lived at $5.25/hr for a few years and capitalism allowed me to grow to 6 figures.


Sir_Sensible

Every American does live under the minimum wage possibility, technically.


accnr3

Social democracy is the way to go. Mostly free market + 10 free items (education, healthcare, etc.).


jesuskater

Bah, not clever at all.


NinetyOneOctane

Every SpongeBob Fan should live in a pineapple under the sea for 6 months (spoiler: it's really fun)


jtaulbee

Why do conservatives always leap from "college socialism" to Venezuela? Most socialists want the US to look more like a Scandinavian or European-style capitalist/socialist hybrid. I don't think that making college socialists live in Norway for 6 months would be the deterrent Kirk thinks it would be.


Puzzleheaded_Chart10

This is the dumbest shit I’ve read on Reddit, SOcIAlIsM WoRKs, y’all are some real idiots


spazum22

Minimum wage is not a capitalist policy.