Just 53% Say Capitalism Better Than Socialism (US)

[Hazcat]

, April 09, 2009

Only 53% of American adults believe capitalism is better than socialism.

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that 20% disagree and say socialism is better. Twenty-seven percent (27%) are not sure which is better.

Adults under 30 are essentially evenly divided: 37% prefer capitalism, 33% socialism, and 30% are undecided. Thirty-somethings are a bit more supportive of the free-enterprise approach with 49% for capitalism and 26% for socialism. Adults over 40 strongly favor capitalism, and just 13% of those older Americans believe socialism is better.

Investors by a 5-to-1 margin choose capitalism. As for those who do not invest, 40% say capitalism is better while 25% prefer socialism.

There is a partisan gap as well. Republicans - by an 11-to-1 margin - favor capitalism. Democrats are much more closely divided: Just 39% say capitalism is better while 30% prefer socialism. As for those not affiliated with either major political party, 48% say capitalism is best, and 21% opt for socialism.

(Want a free daily e-mail update? If it's in the news, it's in our polls.) Rasmussen Reports updates also available on Twitter.

The question posed by Rasmussen Reports did not define either capitalism or socialism

It is interesting to compare the new results to an earlier survey in which 70% of Americans prefer a free-market economy. The fact that a “free-market economy” attracts substantially more support than “capitalism” may suggest some skepticism about whether capitalism in the United States today relies on free markets.

Other survey data supports that notion. Rather than seeing large corporations as committed to free markets, two-out-of-three Americans believe that big government and big business often work together in ways that hurt consumers and investors.

Fifteen percent (15%) of Americans say they prefer a government-managed economy, similar to the 20% support for socialism. Just 14% believe the federal government would do a better job running auto companies, and even fewer believe government would do a better job running financial firms.

Most Americans today hold views that can generally be defined as populist while only seven percent (7%) share the elitist views of the Political Class.

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http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/general_politics/just_53_say_capitalism_better_than_socialism

[JC5123]

That's because we've gotten to the point in this country where only 53% of people know what it means to pull their own weight. Not mention the weight of the other 47%.

[twyacht]

This is the same "sheeple" mentality that I had to help when the SHTF during Hurricane Bertha, Fran, and Floyd, when I lived in coastal NC.

They had the deer in the headlights look on there face, didn't prepare, didn't take the warnings seriously, had nothing and were in NEED.

That has now translated to the NEED of Gov't for all their lack of self responsibility. Becoming DEPENDENT on the Gov't is dangerous and will become a quick demise to our country.

Liberty is not a thing for the great masses of men. It is the exclusive possession of a small and disreputable minority, like knowledge, courage and honor. It takes a special sort of man to understand and enjoy liberty - and he is usually an outlaw in democratic societies."
H.L. Mencken, February 12, 1923, Baltimore Evening Sun

[Rob10ring]

Unfortunately, those under 20 will be running things someday. I don't remember the exact quote from Churchill, but it goes something like this:

"If you're not a liberal when you're 25, you have no heart. If you're not a conservative by the time you're 35, you have no brain"

Does someone have the exact wording? He had a few that were similar to that. Anyway, let's hope these college kids that are busy being indoctrinated right now, get conservative real fast.

With the economy the way it's going, looks like Romney was the only change we should've been believing in.

[tombogan03884]

Fuz, that's close enough.

[Sponsor]

[twyacht]

Fuz, that's close enough.

Hopefully, long after we're gone, some will say,..

Despite Obama,





http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsKDGM5KTBY&NR=1

[runstowin]

Let's see universal free education is the 10th plank of the Communist Manifesto, could there possibly be a connection here?
Nah!

[PegLeg45]

Unfortunately, those under 20 will be running things someday. I don't remember the exact quote from Churchill, but it goes something like this:

"If you're not a liberal when you're 25, you have no heart. If you're not a conservative by the time you're 35, you have no brain"

Does someone have the exact wording? He had a few that were similar to that. Anyway, let's hope these college kids that are busy being indoctrinated right now, get conservative real fast.

With the economy the way it's going, looks like Romney was the only change we should've been believing in.

Was going to post this in thread of its own, but it kinda fits here.........(emphasis mine)....


Mind-changing books

By Thomas Sowell
   
From time to time, readers ask me what books have made the biggest difference in my life. I am not sure how to answer that question because the books that happened to set me off in a particular direction at a particular time may have no profound or valuable message for others — and can even be books I no longer believe in today.

The first book that got me interested in political issues was Actions and Passions by Max Lerner, which I read at age 19. It was a collection of his newspaper columns, none of which I remember today and all of which were vintage liberalism, which even Max Lerner himself apparently had second thoughts about in his later years.

The writings of Karl Marx — especially The Communist Manifesto — had the longest lasting effect on me as a young man and led me to become and remain a Marxist throughout my twenties. I wouldn't recommend The Communist Manifesto today either, except as an example of a masterpiece of propaganda.

There was no book that changed my mind about being on the political left. Life experience did that — especially the experience of seeing government at work from the inside.
      
The book that permanently made me a sadder — and, hopefully, wiser — man was Edward Gibbons' The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. To follow one of the greatest civilizations of all time as it degenerated and fractured, even before being torn apart by its enemies, was especially painful in view of the parallels to what is happening in America in our own times.

The fall of the Roman Empire was not just a matter of changing rulers or political systems. It was the collapse of a whole civilization — the destruction of an economy, the breakdown of law and order, the disappearance of many educational institutions.

It has been estimated that a thousand years passed before the standard of living in Western Europe rose again to the level it had once had back in Roman times. How long would it take to recover from the collapse of Western civilization today — if we ever recovered?

The kinds of books most readers seem to have in mind when they ask for my recommendations are books that go to the heart of a particular subject, books that open the eyes of the reader in a mind-changing way.

James Q. Wilson's books on crime are like that, shattering the illusions of the intelligentsia about "root causes," "prevention" programs, "rehabilitation," and other trendy nonsense. Professor Wilson's books are a strong dose of hard facts that counter mushy rhetoric.

Peter Bauer's books on economic development demolish many myths about the causes of poverty in the Third World — and about "foreign aid" as a way of relieving that poverty. The last of these books was the best, Equality, the Third World and Economic Delusion.

If you are interested specifically in why Latin American economies have lagged behind for so long, try reading Underdevelopment is a State of Mind by Lawrence Harrison.

Among my own books, those that the most readers have said changed their minds have been A Conflict of Visions, Basic Economics, and Black Rednecks and White Liberals.

A Conflict of Visions is my own favorite among my books. It traces the underlying assumptions behind opposing ideologies that have dominated the Western world over the past two centuries and are still going strong today. The Vision of the Anointed is another book of mine that deals with the same subject, but concentrating on the conflicts of our time, and it is written in a more readable style, not as academic as A Conflict of Visions.

The most readable of this list of my books is Basic Economics, which may also be the most needed, as suggested by its being translated into six foreign languages.

Black Rednecks and White Liberals challenges much that has been said and accepted, not only about blacks but about Jews, Germans, white Southerners and others.

Experience has probably changed more minds than books have. But some books can pull your experiences together and show how they require a very different vision of the world.


http://jewishworldreview.com/cols/sowell040809.php3

http://www.tsowell.com/

http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/sowell1.asp

[fullautovalmet76]

If you really want to know about the nuts and bolts of a free market, go here: www.mises.org

[fightingquaker13]

If you really want to know about the nuts and bolts of a free market, go here: www.mises.org

As a good libertarian, I have to warn you about these guys at the Mises Institute.

Ludwig Von Mises was the founder of the Austrian School of economics. His two most famous proteges were Fredreich Hayek and Milton Friedman who founded the The Chicago School (not the institution the philosophy). Its best known adherents, like Thomas Sowell can be found at George Mason today. Essentially they argued that state run socialism, whether marxist or not, (they didn't care as much about the politics as much as the economics), would fail because of the scarcity of knowledge available to state planners. In a nut shel,l do you make more tractors or typewriters? The planners would screw it up, the free market price system driven by supply and demand, while not perfect, would give you a more accurate and effecient allocation of resources.

So far so good. The problem with the Mises Institute (which has no affiliation with Von Mises other than the name) is that it got infiltrated by a bunch of neo-confederates who slipped a states rights, racist and eugenisicist, and Christian dominion theology spin into this,that in some writings amounts to a very ugly social darwinism. This is sad, as all of the above men loathed bigotry in all its forms as well as relious fanaticism as being inherently anti-human and economically stupid; as it wastes talent and therefore makes us less prosperous as a society. I would reccomend instead the Reason Foundation, the CATO Institute, Institute for Humane Studies and Liberty Magazine.They are a much more savory bunch and will give you a good "free minds and free markets" viewpoint without the ante-bellum and eugenics baggage of folks like Charles Murray. Understand that this is not a whole cloth condemnation, but rather a VERY strong note ofcaution. I would say this was why I got turned off  from these guys a while back  because there were other agendas at play that you won't find elsewhere (cf footnote1). Caveat emptor. Just my .02.
Fightingquaker13
PS For a reading list I would strongly reccomend Hayek's "Road to Serfdom"which describes how socialism will become more authoritarian in order to solve the "knowledge problem" central planning can't overcome. (note Sweden stands as a good though imperfect counter example).
Friedman's "Free To Choose" is a good and accesible intro to how free market/libertarian markets work. It was based on a PBS series Friedman did and was a best seller in 1980. Both are brief and fairley quick reads. I would start with Friedman.

Footnote1:
"In every society, a few individuals acquire the status of an elite through talent. Due to superior achievements of wealth, wisdom, and bravery, these individuals come to possess natural authority, and their opinions and judgments enjoy wide-spread respect. Moreover, because of selective mating, marriage, and the laws of civil and genetic inheritance, positions of natural authority are likely to be passed on within a few noble families. It is to the heads of these families with long-established records of superior achievement, farsightedness, and exemplary personal conduct that men turn to with their conflicts and complaints against each other. These leaders of the natural elite act as judges and peacemakers, often free of charge out of a sense of duty expected of a person of authority or out of concern for civil justice as a privately produced "public good."

From an article entitled "Natural Elites, Intellectualls and the State" By Hans-Hermann Hoppe (and no I'm not making that up) in which our author goes on to argue for a natural aristocracy, castigates democracy and implies our problems lie in our inability to recognize our betters. It is what it is, but it ain't classical liberalism (liberarianism) and it sure ain't American. There is a lot of this stuff in the Mises Institute.