I oppose socialism for the sake of my brothers and sisters who are poor. Charity and free markets are imperfect, but the best way to get the job done.
If the choice were between a Scrooge like determination to let Tiny Tim die and a kind socialistic willingness to help, I would side with socialism. When I discuss socialism with Christians, they often give me this choice knowing what I will say.
“By all that’s holy, let’s save Tiny Tim.”
Greed isn’t good and no Christian can rejoice in the ignorance or want that comes from poverty. We must do something, but what should we do?
We need to get real about the problem and that starts by acknowledging that we are making great progress against poverty. That does not mean we should be complacent, but messing up a very successful strategy would not be wise. The battle against poverty is being won precisely because statist solutions are in decline globally with the end of the Cold War. The parts of the world that are free and have free economies have made great progress. Think of tiny Singapore with no resources and great poverty at the end of World War II. Coming out of colonialism, surrounded by hostile powers, the wise leadership of Singapore eschewed socialism and created a global economic power. Any nation that has gotten engaged in global trade, allowed free access to information, and has a stable and virtuous government (no bribes!) has done relatively well.
I love free trade and free markets, because they work.
Of course, they are imperfect. Eventually the free market would have caught up with the abuse of workers at Union Carbide, but before it could, my grandfather was killed by the cruel practices of that giant business. We need some government regulation and a social safety net to avoid the bad things that happen in an essential free system.
This is not socialism. It is a free people taxing themselves to provide essentials to the working poor. Of course, definitions of poor change from nation to nation. Many poor in the US would be solidly middle class in other nations. How much is enough? Socialists rarely answer those questions.
Socialism doesn’t work, not even European style socialism which is enervating those nations.
The problem with socialism is the harm it does to the poor and to those of us who are not poor. My grandmother saw it at the height of the Depression. When “relief” came to West Virginia, she knew people who “went to bed” and never worked again. This isn’t most people, it may not even be many people, but a social safety net comes at a price. It allows risky social behavior, because the “cost” of that behavior is less easily felt. Even the small number of people that are actually what the Victorians would have called “unworthy” of charity undermine the whole system in the eyes of the community.
Everyone on relief, my Nana pointed out, lost some dignity.
Government help comes at a cost to personal autonomy. Poor people are not most often to blame for poverty, but a handout (as opposed to a job on the free market) puts that person in the role of a supplicant. Government charity is more brutal than private charity because the “giver” is not choosing to give. Money is taken and given out by people hired to distribute the dole. This process has trapped entire communities in dependency. The very moment a person is forced to ask: “Can I afford this job?” he or she has been put in a bad place and yet government aid will often force this choice on the poor.
When a man or woman gives a gift from love to a person they know, then both are helped. It is more blessed to give than receive, but not more blessed to pay taxes than to shelter income in the Grand Caymans.
So even a “social safety” net is hard. We must have one in a modern economy, but we must be alive to the harm that comes with the good. Nobody starving has time to worry about the dependency that might come with the free soup, the colonization and destruction of the poor communities values by the “mainstream.” Starving people need food. Beyond basic needs, we have good reason to count the cost.
We want a nation where everyone reaches their maximum potential, not a nation of unwilling patrons and their dependents.
Socialism makes things worse. In most places, socialism takes the “means of production” from the entrepreneurs and job creators. Why is this good? I am told (sometimes) that we will only take or break up “big” business. Who will decide this? Not only does it begin in this injustice, it does not help the poor. Government ownership of the “means of production” cannot compete with free markets at getting people out of poverty.
Regulating the behavior of corporations, keeping them from harming people directly, is a good thing. Nationalizing them takes them from one group of elite and gives them to another group of bosses, but this group has the power of the law. It may be hard to fight Union Carbide (trust me, I know), but it is harder to fight the USA. Ask the First Nations.
When government takes over big business, one will end up with an unholy marriage between the old bosses and the new bosses. Just as Tsarist era generals ended up in the Red Army because the Red Army needed generals and the generals needed an army, so socialism ends up being the same people in power. The difference is that the rest of us, including the poor, can no longer play the state and business off on each other to survive. There is one power and when there is power the poor are hurt the most.
This is true of the soft socialism of Bernie Sanders. The “revolutionaries” will take over and start bossing big business round. This will seem good at first, but soon (below the true believers like Sanders) the middle managers will begin to merge. The marriage of big business and big government will be consummated and the unholy child will produce a few good treats for us at the cost of liberty and innovation. Why make a variety of Oreos? What waste! Soon we will have state cookies. I could live with that, but state medicine, state education, state supported industry becomes gray, ugly, and poverty returns with a vengeance. Visit Western Germany and Eastern Germany. The last time I was in Berlin I could tell where socialism had been by the lack of curbs on the sidewalks.
Socialism will soon be run by people who will tell Cratchitt what education, food, shelter, and lifestyle Tiny Tim must have. Later, socialism may decide that Tiny Tim doesn’t deserve the health care that a repentant Scrooge wants to give him. Private charity can innovate. Ask my friend Barbara Elliot. She was there when socialism fell in Eastern Europe and is helping the poor here in Houston. Liberty and private charity can work.
I want Tiny Tim to get well, be fed, and for his dad to have a good job. We know what works: freedom, some government support, and private charity (like Scrooge gives them). Let’s get to work.
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