Levi Todd is a sophomore English major and writes "Leave it to Levi" for the Daily News. His views do not necessarily agree with those of the newspaper. Write to Levi at lctodd@bsu.edu.
In the 2016 presidential election, Bernie Sanders has American voters either on their feet or up in arms over his plans for single-payer health care, debt-free state universities and a tax on Wall Street. Like President Obama, he’s gotten much flak for being a “socialist” (the go-to buzzword to attack Democrats with plans for government funding for social services). Sanders, in turn, has elaborated that he is in fact a democratic socialist. Much of America has a false idea of what this means, despite the fact that America is actually built on the ideals of democratic socialism.
Let’s refresh with a bit of Political Science 101. America is a pretty darn capitalist country, meaning that both business owners and employees are given the freedom to make and keep a profit as they compete in their respective markets. However, they are also asked to pay taxes that contribute to both the federal and state budgets, which pay for public services. This makes us a mixed economy, meaning we’re not entirely capitalist (in which government would have no interference with business), and we’re not entirely socialist (in which they could have a lot more involvement in redistributing wealth).
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Democratic socialism, in short, is the idea that socialist ideals can be applied in a democratic society. That sounds complicated, doesn’t it? Then let’s say, hypothetically, that a country had its citizens agree to pay taxes to fund roads, parks, infrastructure, K-12 education, and medical access to low-income and elderly folks. That, hypothetically, would be democratic socialism. That sounds familiar, doesn’t it? That’s because Americans interact with democratic socialism on a literal daily basis.
Why, exactly, do we have so many public services paid for by citizens? Firstly, imagine that you live in a house with a bunch of your friends and you want to buy a new TV for everyone to enjoy. The logical choice is to split the cost — after all, if everyone will be using it, it makes sense that everyone would help pay for it. And accordingly, we split the cost of our roads and highways, parks and general maintenance of our towns and cities. If we didn’t have democratic socialism, there wouldn’t even be police or firefighters. We generally accept that the cost of our taxes outweighs the potential harm that could occur if we didn’t have these services at all.
Secondly, there are some programs that are funded because they are quite simply an investment in our nation’s success. Public education is provided from grades K-12 for free because we know that our economy benefits from an educated working class. If our citizens can’t read or write, it’s difficult for them to get jobs in which they earn income to contribute to our economy (and therefore state budget). Likewise, we fund Medicare and Medicaid because we know that if elderly or low-income citizens are burdened with debt from medical bills, they can’t afford much else that would contribute to our economy. So sure, we pay taxes to help support these programs, but we also know that without them, the economy would be less successful — and therefore we would, too.
I’m not here to argue for or against Bernie Sanders’ plans regarding democratic socialism. However, we can’t cast him off as a radical commie based on a misunderstanding of what he stands for. It is not communism. It does not rob you of your paycheck. And if you have ever driven on a road, walked on a sidewalk or attended public school, you have to admit that democratic socialism is not the monster it’s made out to be. By all means, go ahead and disagree with Sanders’ plans. But make sure you don’t ignore that his ideology is already in action, and has been since the founding of our nation.
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