The social democracies are superior to the U.S. in results -- in broadly shared prosperity, in lower rates of poverty and homelessness. They are superior in happiness. They are even superior in democracy.
A low poverty rate is more important than just about anything else.
The social democracies are not poor.
There isn't any downside to it.
That's certainly not a problem in the social democracies. They're free countries.
The host is the working class -- and in the social democracies, they are in no danger at all. And there isn't any parasite class, either. Or at least not one as all-powerful and exploitative as the American plutocracy.
The American plutocracy is no fantasy.
That is fantasy.
There is no country in the whole world where the poor are a parasite class. There never was.
I disagree.
Apparently not, because the production keeps on happening. The social democracies are not in the situation of the late USSR, where "We pretend to work and they pretend to pay us."
...yes, production continues, as Chad stated earlier "At the barrel of a gun."
Nobody is pointing a gun. Workers in the social democracies simply work for money, like here -- only they have unions strong enough to get them a fair deal.
Stop paying all of your multiple taxes, licensing, permits etc... ignore the Govt threats, letters, liens, etc...
None of that is any different in the social democracies than it is here in the heartland of capitalism.
My profession is the last bastion of the maritime industry that's non-union...
None of this detracts from my point: That things in general go better in the social democracies than here, and therefore they are models the U.S. should imitate -- regardless of whether what they have counts as socialism, and regardless of whether what we have counts as capitalism.
You're a prostitute?
Yep, an oilfield prostitute... my day rate is higher than the day rate of the union Chief Engineer who left his ship and came to my OSV.