Humanity’s thirst for some form of ideal social system has proven a vain endeavor over the centuries, failed attempts littering the historical landscape like bomb craters. While attempts to improve both ourselves and our communities should always be applauded, fleeting excursions into utopian solutions, which appear to arrive like hopeful zephyrs whenever economies falter, remain something else altogether.
These attempts – while noble at times – have always failed because they generally lack even a basic understanding of economics and the frailties of human behavior. Whiffs of socialism, communism, and the desire to toss Western culture into the trash are with us again, stoking excitement as if these governing solutions were new, untested propositions.
I too once had a warm spot for socialism with its egalitarian vision of a distribution of goods, opportunities, and so forth. And many Americans appear to be warming to it once again. In a recent Gallup Poll, it was noted that 43% of Americans now have a favorable opinion of socialism, “marking the first time this figure has exceeded 39% in Gallup’s trend since 2010.”1
Interestingly, in the same poll Americans favored small business the most (95%), free enterprise second (77%), capitalism third (55%), while big business came in last with a dismal 35% approval. These results are simultaneously confounding and intriguing, because Americans apparently don’t understand that small business and free enterprise are capitalistic endeavors, which suggests they don’t truly understand what capitalism even is. Which raises another question: Do Americans really understand socialism, either?
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