Socialism

Socialism, American Style, Part 6

by Jacob G. Hornberger October 1, 2020

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 I grew up on a farm on the Rio Grande just outside Laredo, Texas, a city that is situated on the U.S.-Mexico border. I lived practically half my life in Texas. Throughout that time, I witnessed an immigration ...

The Socialist Elixir Is a Deadly Cyanide

by Richard M. Ebeling October 1, 2020

Suppose you saw someone holding a bottle that had a label with the word “cyanide” and he was about to drink from it. You tell him to be careful, that that is poison, and he could die a painful death. He says, no that’s not true, cyanide is a delightful drink, that he has heard that it cures many ...

Socialism, American Style, Part 5

by Jacob G. Hornberger September 1, 2020

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 The Federal Reserve System is another prime example of American socialism, because it is based on central planning, a core element of socialism. Government officials plan, in a top-down, command-and-control manner the monetary affairs of hundreds of millions ...

Socialism, American Style, Part 4

by Jacob G. Hornberger August 1, 2020

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 It would be difficult to find a better example of American socialism than the institution of public schooling or, as it might be more accurately termed, government schooling. Public schooling is based on socialist central planning. Whether at a federal, ...

Socialism, American Style, Part 3

by Jacob G. Hornberger July 1, 2020

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 I grew up in the poorest city in the United States. At least, that is what the Census Bureau told us back in the 1950s and 1960s about my hometown of Laredo, Texas, which is situated on the U.S.-Mexico ...

Should Social Security Be Expanded?

by Laurence M. Vance July 1, 2020

Time is running out for Rep. John Larson (D-Conn.), the chairman of the House Ways and Means Subcommittee on Social Security. The Constitution, in Article I, Section 4, mandates that Congress assemble “at least once in every Year.” Each Congress is numbered and lasts two years, with two legislative sessions. The current Congress is the 116th to assemble since the ...

Sell NPR to the Highest Bidder

by Laurence M. Vance June 11, 2020

Founded fifty years ago as National Public Radio, NPR — as it now always refers to itself — is a nonprofit media organization created by the federal government to replace the National Educational Radio Network (NERN). NPR, which is headquartered in Washington, D.C., functions as a membership organization of separately licensed and operated public radio ...

Socialism, American Style, Part 2

by Jacob G. Hornberger June 1, 2020

Part 1 | Part 2  | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 The crown jewel of American socialism is Social Security, a program that originated among socialists in Germany in the late 1800s and then was imported into the United States, where it became an established program in the 1930s as ...

The Profitability of Amtrak Is Not the Issue

by Laurence M. Vance May 11, 2020

In addition to the federal government’s departments, such as Energy, Interior, and Education; and independent agencies, such as the CIA, FCC, and EPA; there exist government quasi-corporations, such as the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), and the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA). What most Americans who take a train ride across the country probably don’t ...

Socialism, American Style, Part 1

by Jacob G. Hornberger May 1, 2020

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5  | Part 6 In September 1990, the first year of The Future of Freedom Foundation’s existence, FFF published an article I wrote entitled “Letting Go of Socialism.” The article’s opening paragraph stated, Socialism has held the world in its grip since the ...

Right, Bernie! We Are All (Ersatz) Socialists Now

by David Stockman March 12, 2020

In 1971 Nixon famously said “we are all Keynesians now” as he ash-canned the Bretton Woods gold exchange standard, thereby unleashing fiat central banking on the world economy. At the time, the Keynesian part wasn’t viewed as such a big deal by enlightened opinion. It was supposedly just the Republican Right catching-up with the Great Depression and shedding its vestigial ...

Liberalism Should Reject Welfare Statism

by Richard M. Ebeling March 5, 2020

Dislike for the personality and disagreement with the policies of Donald Trump have helped to revive a seemingly dead idea: socialism. This has placed friends and defenders of a free society on the defensive in having to make the positive case for free market liberalism. The economic and psychological shocks from the financial crisis of 2008-2009, and the emotional distaste ...