Socialism vs. Democratic Socialism

“Democratic socialism” is the new thing: a name for what the progressive side of the Democratic party has wanted to do for quite some time.

It isn’t socialism. For that, we need to go to Venezuela. Both Democrats and Republicans (and especially young people should know better than to say it is). Here’s Greg Ip:

… The very word “socialism” has been debased into a millennial hashtag on the left and a schoolyard taunt on the right …

Some polls find young American adults prefer socialism to capitalism …

Would these people actually know socialism if they saw it? Taxing the rich, Medicare-for-all, and a Green New Deal that replaces fossil fuels with renewables are certainly liberal, probably radical, possibly unwise.

But socialist? Hardly.

They redistribute the outcomes of the market; they don’t replace the market with the state as the means of allocating production. That’s the hallmark of true socialism, and Venezuela’s catastrophic experience is a useful lesson in why it is has fallen out of favor around the world.

Here’s what real socialism did in Venezuela, according to Ricardo Hausmann:

… Expropriated six million hectares of land, the steel sector, cement sector, supermarkets, telecoms, banks, dairy factories, coffee processing factories, hotels, and essentially ran all of them into the ground …

Back to Greg Ip:

Venezuela’s socialism, which was heavily influenced by Cuban communism, isn’t just a disaster; it’s unique. Despite the region’s long history of left-wing populism, no Latin American country has since followed Venezuela’s path.

The point of all this is that we may as well drop socialism from the “Democratic socialism”. But that just leaves. But that points up the essential problem: maybe “Democratic” wasn’t selling that well to voters, so they’re trying to dress it up differently.

Read the whole thing, entitled "Venezuela’s Collapse Exposes the Fake Socialism Debated in U.S." in teh February 6, 2019 issue of The Wall Street Journal.