Poll: Democrats favorable to socialism, have no idea how to pay for it

Every now and then, a poll or a chart really encapsulates the entire problem we face as a country. According to a survey by the Economic Innovation Group, Democrats have a net favorable view of socialism by 31 points. Yes, socialism. The economic system of the old Soviet Union, and Cuba, and North Korea — of so many dictatorships over the last 100 years that have starved and oppressed their people.

How on earth could any American political constituency have favorable view of that?

At the same time, according to this exact same survey, Democrats, like Republicans, independents, young people, old people and every survey-able demographic there is, all think taxes are too high .

Moderate liberal commentator Matthew Yglesias describes this as the “strange evolution” of the modern Democratic Party, but to some extent it just describes Americans in general: A lot of people want a more robust welfare state, but they have no idea how to pay for it — and in fact, they already think they pay too much.

Leftist influencers and media figures have tried to solve this dilemma by gaslighting their supporters into thinking that we generate much more spending, even with lower taxes on most people, if we just raise taxes on the very wealthiest Americans. Confiscate more wealth from Elon Musk, that sort of thing. The problem with this plan is that it would not work at all. It is a fantasy that we can balance the budget that way. The very rich already pay an overwhelming share of the taxes. There’s just not that much more to squeeze.

As the economist Jessica Riedl notes: “Self-described socialists expect taxes on the super-wealthy to finance all of socialism. Its not a theory of shared sacrifice as much as lazy free lunch economics. And politicians feed that by promising free lunches.”

And yes, the politicians are to blame. They’re always guaranteeing more stuff but they don’t actually want to raise taxes on seniors, who receive most of the government benefits. At best, or at worst, they’ll support increases on income taxes and property taxes for younger Americans because these people don’t vote.

By the way, none of this is actually socialism. To be honest, I don’t even believe most Democrats who say they have a positive view of socialism actually know what it is. All too many people seem to believe that socialism just means the government spends more money on health and education and welfare. That is not socialism. You can be a vigorously capitalist country and still spend lots of money on welfare, that’s just most of northern Europe.

Socialism is an economic system in which the workers seize the control of the means of production, which in practice means that a powerful central government directs all the resources in society, ostensibly on behalf of the workers. Under socialist systems, entrenched and unaccountable government bureaucracies decide which factories produce which goods, who to trade with, how much food you get, all of those sorts of things. It’s an interesting idea, and it never ever ever works, because without a functioning free market, where firms compete to offer goods and services at the most effective price that people are willing to pay, you actually can’t calculate prices at all, so nobody knows how to value one good over another, and the result is mass poverty.

It would be a very, very, very bad to enact this system, and frankly it doesn’t seem like most self-described socialists at the ground level even want to do it.

At the elite level, however, the members of the Democratic Socialists of America, the DSA, which is currently taking over the party, actually does want to implement real socialism, or something similar to it. Their agenda calls for abolishing market capitalism and overturning the Constitution. It’s dangerous and radical, and it’s exactly what people like Angie Nixon and Claire Valdez and Darializa Avila Chevalier will try to accomplish when they get into Congress.

So to anyone who says they have a favorable view of socialism, but they’d be really mad if the government went to so far as to raise their taxes: Just you wait and see what the new crop of elected Democratic legislators are going to do. You won’t like it very much!

Robby Soave is co-host of The Hill’s commentary show “Rising” and a senior editor for Reason Magazine. This column is an edited transcription of his daily commentary.