- #71
russ_watters
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Either I'm misreading this or it doesn't make sense. There's no time limit or how-did-we-get-here criteria on socialism, it is simply government ownership/control. Even if government creates the industry itself, it is still socialistic for the government to be owning/controlling it if government control prevents private industry from doing the same thing. Your characterization would seem to lead to logical problems such as:PAllen said:That's a valid point, if we start from the current state of affairs in the US. If we go back to a time when medical care existed as private industry, but medical insurance did not, then providing a government benefit would not be socialist policy, per my definition. But I grant that single payer would be socialist in the US context; single provider would be even more socialist because it would entail two industries.
1. The same government policy can be socialistic in one country and not socialistic in another depending on what existed before the policy.
2. If government invents an industry, then de-nationalizes it, we are left with nothing to call that.
3. Extension: A policy may be socialistic at the instant of inception, but once the government has control of an industry it is no longer socialistic because the government isn't in the process of actively seizing control.