This post might appear very political in nature but I am trying to be objective while connecting a current situation to a recent class topic. That being said, here is my post:
While I didn't watch the full Democratic debate, I have seen some highlights and some press covering the hot points. Perhaps the most talked about is Bernie Sander's economic approach. His message has been against high income inequality and power of large corporations/high net worth individuals and a policy called democratic socialism (quoted from his response from the most recent debate).
My initial browsing for an article was aimed at finding more analysis on Sander's plan and what is similar/different compared to the nordic countries. The article I found here suggests that Sanders may need to reconsider policy objectives and wording. Firstly, the article confronts the use of "socialism" as incorrect because countries like Denmark, Sweden and Norway allow people to own the factors of production, which is capitalism. After that, the article tries to sort out the key points Sanders uses when comparing the US and the nordic nations, which may be achieved differently than discussed. Ultimately, the article is saying that the results Sanders desires to bring to the US are not achieved the way he is describing.
What do you guys think? Does his policy make sense in light of the factors we discussed in class that make the nordic system possible - i.e. culture, active labor policy, flexicurity, market solutions, etc. Also, what would you recommend as an advisor? (things to add to the policy goals, changing terms, etc.)
http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2015/10/14/bernie-sanders-wants-the-us-to-become-more-neoliberal-and-perhaps-more-unequal/
2 comments:
Full disclosure: I'm a huge Bernie Sanders fan and supporter, so my answer might (or definitely will not be) the most non-partisan of the bunch. I'm a full back of his ideas of addressing income inequality, universal healthcare and education and women's issues. I'm also a huge fan of the way Nordic countries are run (based on an outsider's perspective). During the debate, Sanders repeatedly said he was a democratic socialist, which is based more on social rather than economic principles.
However, the United States dwarfs the population and size of the Nordic countries. That makes me think it would be very hard for Sanders to implement his universal ideas. But, his tax plan on Wall Street is said to pay almost entirely for universal higher education. I feel like any presidential candidate, no matter the party, has very ambitious goals for their economic plans, but no one will ever find out how successful or unsuccessful they will be until they're actually elected and put them into place. And I feel like that's the case with Sanders. His plans are obviously ambitious and not perfect, but with the right tax cuts and spending money in the right places, I feel like it could be successful.
I feel like Sanders economic policies are a lot more debatable than what most people think. Sanders is a self declared socialist, yes. However he also needs to understand the American peoples disassociation with the word Socialism and in order to do that his economic program has focused on advertising itself as one that is more focused around power being returned to the people and taken away from firms (which is an inherently socialism oriented idea). He has agreed to the idea of a tax increase for big corporations but he has also said that there would be a marginal increase on tax rates for the average America. He does not intend to go full socialist on his economic policies but hes being careful how he words or phrases policies that may hint at the former for fear of disenchanting the American people.
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