Often, as a trial lawyer, I found listening was at least as important as speaking when arguing or negotiating. Understanding the opposition’s position and reasoning is incredible ammunition for your argument and, many times, once you grasp their position, there is much you can accept. Actually understanding the definition of words being used can cut through hours of superfluous argument.
I see this observation having relevance to the political debates swirling around us today. One term used without much effort to define is socialism. I was raised in a conservative household and taught socialism was the fate fatal for American free enterprise. Coincidentally, I was also raised in a fundamentalist Christian family which ignored the scriptures that evidenced Jesus to be a socialist at heart. John 13:29; Luke 10:25-37.
There is no single definition of socialism. Social, (government), ownership and management of businesses appear to be the common element. Free enterprise is an economy based on private business and individuals organizing and operating for profit in a competitive system.
The US experiment of a free enterprise has been a classic historical success. Of course there are many activities in our system that are not part of a free enterprise system: National defense, public highways, police, flight control, FDA, public education…the list goes on.
The explanation of the U.S. economy might better be explained as free enterprise buffered and supported by governmental activities. If we buy this observation as accurate and government activities reasonable, it then is silly to debate for or against the two systems but rather whether we have the right combination of these economies.
One problem with free enterprise is the inevitable transition to an economic oligarch evolving over generations. One percent of the citizens of the US own and control the majority of the wealth. Ironically much of the wealth of the 1% is not earned in the free enterprise system but by inheritance and the advantage of monopolies. Smart business deals are replaced by corporate mega deals among the one percent. This is contradictory to a free enterprise system. A necessary element to free enterprise is the free and easy ingress and egress into the marketplace. This becomes progressively more complex and difficult as our society and its economic system becomes more complex and difficult. If the vast majority of the population doesn’t have the ability to do so, then the underlying mechanics of free enterprise cannot work properly.
Another serious problem is that the education needed in the past is inadequate for ingress into the hyper-technical economy of today. Although the free high school education of yesterday was adequate for much of our economy, that is quickly becoming a relic of the past.
In many ways the game of Monopoly is an example of our free enterprise. Everyone starts off with the same amount of money and has equal chance to take advantage of opportunities. Eventually someone accumulates the vast majority of hotels and the game loses its appeal. Everyone quits and later a new game is started. All players start off even again. Otherwise no one would want to play a second game except for the winner of the first. Once again everyone—just like free enterprise—must have free ingress and egress into the marketplace.
Once an intelligent person views the complete picture of the political economic structure, it is hard to argue absolutes. The true remedy might be to reset the Monopoly game with higher education; retirement of student debt; reasonable health care and housing so that free enterprise can better work in the future.
In any event the path to reasoned conversation about our country’s political and economic future is thwarted by use of clichés rather than logic. Listening must prevail over interruption to win the argument.
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