An interesting little survey from the United States showing that this idea of votes for women was a bad one. Or, to be a little less jocular about it, that there really are differences between men and women, on average and in general, and it’s not just the details of the plumbing arrangements.
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]Four in 10 Americans prefer socialism to capitalism, poll finds[/perfectpullquote]That just shows that four in ten are either dim or ill informed. Or, of course, deluded by thinking they’ll be part of the nomenklatura when it happens.
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]According to the survey from Axios on HBO, respondents had varying views on what comprised a socialist political system. Seventy-six percent of respondents agreed that universal healthcare was a hallmark of socialism. Seventy-two percent agreed that tuition-free education was also a characteristic of socialism, and 68% thought a living wage was part of a socialist system.[/perfectpullquote]The one thing no socialism anywhere, ever, has produced being what the Americans today call a living wage – $45,000 or so a year. Just never has happened and unless it’s a much richer place instituting socialism and thus meeting it on the way down it never will either.
But this is the interesting bit:
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]Although 55% of women in the 18-54 age group said they would prefer living in a socialist country, “a majority of men prefer to live in a capitalist country”, Axios noted.[/perfectpullquote]It’s that old hunter gatherer divide, isn’t it? The risk taking potential bounty hunters as against – or different from – those happy to just farm the present for a reasonable return. We can be less polite about it too, given socialism’s propensity for taxing everyone into a stupor. Could be that women are programmed to insist on everyone else’s efforts be directed to the support of their own children. But that would be sexist, wouldn’t it?
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Part of the problem here is what definition of socialism is - I imagine most people in the UK wouldn't class half those factors as being particularly socialist, Instead defining socialism as being more hard-line communist in character
Many it seems don't know what socialism really is. Primary and Secondary education in the USA is without tuition fees, in all but the very few private institutions. Does that make the USA partly socialist?
Universal health care can be provided by socialist regimes, usually poorly, but capitalists societies also can, usually with better results. It was Churchill in 1943 that instructed his Conservative Minister of Health to develop what became, under the next Labour government, the NHS, the conservative impetus being to conserve the nation's health. In the preceding decade it was a Conservative regime that brought in unemployment benefits, to converse the work force while temporarily out of work. There are very good capitalist arguments for both policies, a sick or starving workforce isn't likely to support the growth of capital.
American women don't seem to be voting with their feet and decamping to Venezuela in their droves, nor rejecting labour saving consumer goods such as washing machines and vacuum cleaners. Many continue to get their breasts enlarged and most have their teeth polished to a dazzling degree, two of capitalisms more obvious markers. Perhaps they don't mean what they say, or perhaps they haven't thought it through or perhaps the teaching of history in the USA is as poor as it is in the UK. Either way, the idea that they really would prefer to live in a socialist country doesn't ring true.
It may (or may not) have been Herodotus who first observed that wars only become possible when there are too few old people left who can remember the horrors of the previous one. Much the same is now true of socialist governments.