Except for 6 none of what you want actually contradicts capitalist social democracies or what they (most likely) are heading towards.
I know how social democracy works, yes. And social democracy was invented by moderate socialists in the 20th century so it is no surprise we share a lot of the same goals. The average socdem platform is just a milder version of the average socialist platform.
The list I sketched out was exclusively for a US context, I will pretend it was a global program because I feel there's useful things to talk about here.
Personally I think is something that is guaranteed to be enacted in the next decade and in its primal form is actually already in place in most Western countries through strong social safety nets or welfare
The COVID payments every capitalist country is depending on to shore up their economy is a good example of "halfway" there. The only difference between me and them is I think they should continue these payments even after COVID is over.
Also already there, but mostly through mandatory taxation - which is fine, isn't it?
Not in the US, and its failing in the UK and I hear it is being gutted in everyone's favorite social democracy, Sweden but yes it generally works when it's not being privatized.
Not applicable, but can be converted to victims of colonialization or victims of ww2. Personally I don't think enough has been done to address this, but I also don't think it should part of the socialism vs capitalism discussion - it should matter regardless of that
I'm going to be honest with you, it is a bit laughable that a European would think they do not owe some sort of reparations to the global south. The list of "crimes" here is long and immense so I'll keep it short.
In 1838, France agreed to reduce the debt to 90 million francs to be paid over a period of 30 years to compensate former plantation owners who had lost their property. The modern equivalent of $21 billion was paid from Haiti to France.
en.wikipedia.org
I have no idea what that means tbh. Self-employment the become normative?
It means every company should be a worker co-op. A worker co-op is when every worker is a co-owner and gets democratic input in deciding the direction of the business. If the typical modern business is a top-down organization where the managers call the shots and the workers obey, then a co-op is a bottom-up organization where the workers elect managers and leaders (if so desired), set compensation, determine investment/expansion, etc. This is kind of the whole point of socialism, which is why it is critical to understand to know the difference between social democracy and socialism. Socialism isn't just "nice things for everyone", which leads to the erroneous conclusion that social democracy is a "better" socialism, it's "workplace democracy".
TL;DR:
Social democracy: Top-down businesses, employers own the equity, call the shots, employees obey
Socialism: Bottom-up businesses, workers are partners, share in equity, democratize directions
If you don't understand this distinction (and in fairness most people don't), you will have a hard time talking cogently about socialism. The question of "who owns?" was the original reason the social democrats split from the orthodox socialists back in the 20th century. Socdems said "bosses should own" and socialists said "workers should own" and that is how we ended up where we are today.
So maybe you just want social democracy in US?
It would be more accurate to say I want socialism but would not mind social democracy as an intervening step or a transitional state between neoliberalism and socialism.
People also think too abstractly about social democracy. As if it is as simply a switch that one can turn on at will. Think about it in this way. In capitalist society, the owners of capital form the ruling class. They control the economic forces of society, and through that control the political system. So how then, would you get social democracy from this?
The answer is that you need a specific combination of factors. The first is the need to appease the workers. If the workers have formed an organized force and are beginning to threaten your class rule, you need to give concessions in order to make them back down. In other words, the fear of socialism is essential in making the capitalists concede to a social democratic system.
The second element is a high rate of profit. The capitalists are only willing to accept a certain amount of wealth distribution. If profitably is high, they are more willing to throw some scraps our way. Only if they have to, of course. But when profitability declines, and the danger of socialism recedes, then both the factors leading to social democracy are dead.
And as a matter of fact, that event did happen. The post war era saw unprecedented levels of profit, so social democracy was seen as both possible and nessesary to appease the labor movement. However, starting in the 70s, capitalism began to enter a crisis of profitability.
This crisis signaled the end of the social democratic compromise. Wages were cut, unions were busted, and industry was privatized. The Reagan and Thatcher revolution sought to restore profits for the capitalists by abandoning the workers.
But the conservatives were not the only ones at fault. The liberal and social democratic parties quickly followed suit. Third Way politics became dominant among these so-called social democratic parties, and cuts, austerity, and privatization quickly followed. And that is a dynamic which still exists today.
We are in an era of declining profit. This has spelled the slow decline, and eventual death, of social democracy. Combine that with the lack of a strong socialist movement (which many in this thread probably love) and the lot of the workers aren't looking so good.
Excellent post. I agree with everything here, and did not bring up the falling rate of profit because it seemed too esoteric for a thread like this. However, I very much agree with the idea that social democracy was usually built by nations trying to appease their workers. That is, it is the fear of socialist revolution that forces capital to acquiesce to the demands of labor. Anyone who wants social democracy should support their country's socialists because when a socialist uprising is broken up via appeasement, it usually leaves behind social democracy. Social democracy was created by putting the fear of socialism into the hearts of capital, they did not do social democracy out of the goodness of their hearts.
www.theatlantic.com
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