Socialism

What is Socialism? My opponent's burden is to define the resolution in the first round, but since he hasn't done this, I'll define it for him. Socialism, traditionally, is a system where the means of production (workplaces) are owned and controlled by the workers. Before Lenin, almost all Socialists, from the Marxists to the Anarchists, and the Social Democrats as well, believed in Democracy. In fact, they believed in a system which is more democratic than Capitalism. They wanted a system which was both politically, and economically democratic. Economic democracy means that a workplace is democratically governed by the people who work in that workplace. A good example of this would be the worker cooperative. Worker cooperatives are democratically run and owned by all of the workers. A traditionally socialist economy would be composed of these worker cooperatives. I advocate a system of market socialism. In this system, there would still be markets, but instead of having Capitalist firms competing in the marketplace, Socialist firms, or worker cooperatives would function in this way. To be completely clear about this, worker cooperatives are BUSINESSES. Government would not need to grow any larger to create this Socialist system. All that would need to happen, where the government is concerned, would be a change in how the government spends it's money. We currently spend over a hundred billion dollars a year on Federal corporate subsidies, and 80 billion dollars a year on local, municipal, and statewide corporate subsidies. If the money which is spent on corporate subsidies get's reallocated to creating worker cooperatives, than in a decade or two you will see the socialization of the economy. Now, with this in mind, let us turn to my opponent's arguments. "'A Bill of Rights is what the people are entitled to against every government, and what no just government should refuse, or rest on inference,' Thomas Jefferson once said. We, as people under the Constitution of the United States, hold these to be our unalienable rights. As of now, they're in jeopardy to what is known as socialism,..." I'm a socialist. I value liberty. Thomas Jefferson's friend Thomas Paine had some fairly socialistic ideas in his 1795 pamphlet, Agrarian Justice. More social democratic than socialistic in the sense that is defined here. Nevertheless, in the socialist society which I described, our Bill of Rights will remain intact. Our Constitution will remain intact. The government wouldn't necessarily be any larger than it is today. The only change which is necessary to make an economy socialist, under my definition, would be a transition from corporations to worker cooperatives. "We all know hard work comes with rewards such as satisfaction, and perhaps a paycheck. When you work hard in life, you reap its benefits, but under socialism, there will be no rewards for hard work." On the contrary, there are greater rewards for hard work under socialism than there are under Capitalism. As I will prove in my first contention, Capitalism exploits workers. In order to make a profit, Capitalist businesses pay workers less money to make a larger profit. In Socialist businesses, workers democratically determine their own wages, AND even more importantly, they own the profits. This means that workers are paid their true value. "For example, if one man works all day and another man only works half of a day under socialism, they will both get paid the same wage." Well, no. We're speaking about HOURLY wages. In a worker cooperative where the wages are the same for everyone, those who work fewer HOURS make less money. By the way, socialism isn't necessarily complete economic equality. It is economic democracy. In some worker cooperatives, workers vote for differentiated pay scales. Differences are much smaller though. In Mon dragon, for example, the highest paid employees make 8 times more than the lowest paid employees. Your average corporation pays its CEO 350 times more than it's lowest paid employees. " When we begin to spread the wealth too evenly, we kill innovation because everyone strives to do great things, not because it benefits those around them, but also the fame and wealth that comes with it. We look up to innovators, many young people wanting to become like one of them as they grow older. " Okay, first of all, people will be voting on their own remuneration. Working people, including inventors, will not only decide their wages; they will own the profits. Furthermore, the urge to discover, and the urge to invent is part of human nature. Scientists enjoy working in labs. They work because they enjoy their work, and because they can be comfortably paid. They don't need to become fantastically wealthy. I don't have enough room for all of my contentions. Regarding my point about exploitation, average American pay has gone up 113% since 1948. Productivity went up 254% in that time. Irrefutable proof.