Which economic system is better: Socialism or Capitalism

I'm not going to refute your statements in any particular order because there's a lot I need to clear up. "Oh right, like how in the soviet union each and every citizen had a fair chance to succeed at going to the gulag." The Soviet Union was not Socialist. (http://www.chomsky.info...). The soviet union was a dictatorship where the government had absolute control over the economy. This wasn't even communism. The soviet republic in no way resembled a Marxist economy. A true communist nation has never existed because in order for communism to exist there cannot be a central government. Nobody is able to have more power than anybody else. "I'm very thirsty and you are writing a book. So we trade my pen for your bottle of water. who loses? Nobody." This statement completely ignores why we do not barter anymore. John Green wonderfully explains the problem with barter here: If Con does not wish to watch, he explains that "If I make cheese and you make shoes, but you're lactose in tolerant, barter breaks down, because I need shoes, but you don't need cheese." He also mentions that if I raise cows, and I want a pair of shoes, well they're not worth an entire cow. However, trading in partial cows is very messy, and the cow loses a lot of its value because it's dead." Barter is not a good idea. Yes, I will concede that barter can be used effectively in some situations, but it does not work as an economic system on a large scale. Currency is a much more effective form of economy, which is why there are no civilized nations that have barter as their economic system. Con may be thinking that barter could be used in the form of a pair of shoes for favors, but that doesn't work either. The man who receives the actual good might disappear before you can collect on the favors. This system of barter only works well with family or close friends, which as anybody who as loaned something to friends or family can tell you, can be very problematic. Why would you pay back your nephew when he can't exactly hire Ed to come and shoot you if you don't pay him what you owe him? "Now if there were a man named Ed, and he went around pointing guns at people and taking their money with the purpose of using the funds to building roads, there would be no question of his guilt." There's a slight difference between Ed and the government here. The difference is that people want the government doing things for them. People are unable or maybe even unwilling to do everything for themselves. Even the champions of capitalism, Conservatives, rely on socialism. (http://politicalblindspot.com...). Owsley County, Kentucky has the highest rate of food stamp usage in the entire country, even though it is 95% republican. The fact that capitalists rely on socialism says a lot about capitalism. Without my tax dollars going to these people, they would be dying of starvation. Con's attempt to claim that the idea that "if government doesn't do x. x won't get done" is a logical fallacy is itself a logical fallacy. I'd like for Con to elaborate one who will pave the roads if the government doesn't. Surely it cannot be companies. I would not be willing to pay a company to build a road I wouldn't be using. Also, if cities all pitched in to have the company build roads all over the city, that is socialism. "Do companies force workers to work for them? No. Workers are there by their own choice. The workers work for the company in exchange for money. That is the trade." This statement goes against what the United States learned in the late 1800s to the early 1900s. During this time there were way more workers than jobs. As a result of this, companies could pay their employees whatever they wanted to, and workers couldn't afford to leave, because there was a very low chance that they could get another job. Families were starving at the hands of the monopolies. Companies would create alliances so that they would not have to raise wages to stay competitive. We have so much regulation for businesses in the US because of this. Also these conditions sparked the idea of labor unions, which by the way, are socialist. The idea that many workers would pool their money/resources to create better conditions for themselves is socialism. I noticed in that when trying to claim that government is unnecessary, you failed to mention the military. Who is going to fund our protection? As I articulated earlier, leaving someone who does not represent the people in charge of our defenses is terrifying. If the US Military Complex were a private entity, it could potentially be purchased by an Irish corporation, that would then shut it down so Ireland could invade. I would now like to bring the free lunch program into the spotlight. Without government funding the lunches of children in poverty, they will not be able to perform well in school, and then not succeed in life. You can't simply take away this option from children. It's not their fault that their parents cannot afford lunch for them, it may not even be their parent's fault. This is a pretty good segway into my next point. In capitalism, if you are poor, you have to be smart/lucky to become rich, while if you are rich, you have to stupid/unlucky to become poor. The idea of socialism is that your social status should not be defined by the family you were born into. "Free" public school and "free" university are both examples of Socialism trying to combat the problem of inequality. I say "free" because it's not free, it's paid for via taxes. If I was born into a poor family, I couldn't afford the obscene prices of a good university in the US. I'd have to rely on scholarships and student loans. The next thing you know I'm 50 and still paying off my student loans which have kept me from being successful. If university was free here, like in most civilized nations, my socio-economic status at birth would be irrelevant. I'd be able to afford to go to a good university, and not have to worry about making money while I'm laying out the foundation for a successful career. Also, I know that many of the best universities in the world are private schools, and that should stay that way, but for people that do not have rich daddies that can buy them into Harvard, or were not able to get straight A's in school, public universities are necessary. Social programs don't even cost that much to the average taxpayer. Somebody in the USA making $50,000 a year will pay 36 dollars to food stamps, and 4000 dollars for corporate welfare/tax cuts. Although, I'm sure that as a libertarian Con is against the idea of corporations receiving money from the government. On the other hand, Con is probably also against corporations paying taxes, so I'd be interested to hear Con's point of view regarding this conundrum. I will also concede that any social program will have fraud. Less than 1% of all SNAP (Food stamp) receivers are fraudulent. This doesn't mean that the 99% should be impacted by this. If 1 out of every 100 people were a murderer you would not incarcerate all 100 of them just because of the vast minority that was breaking the law. In summary, I argue that Socialism is necessary in order for a common citizen to rise from the bottom to the top of the economic food chain. Before Ed went around pointing guns at people, he tried to get into a good university but could not afford it. After years of trying and failing to make it in the world without a college degree, Ed finally snapped, don't let there be another Ed, introduce more socialism.