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At what percentage do we become a socialist (or communist) nation?

The payouts are primarily Social Security and Medicare benefits, and unemployment checks
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Issues of sustainability aside, wouldn't claiming the first two as "socialist" be like saying that money I put in the bank, and later take out, is a "bank payment"?

Today, more than 97% of federal income tax receipts are paid by the top 50% of income earners.
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Which just goes to prove increasing income inequality. If tax is a percentage of income, and increase in the percentage of (growing) tax receipts by any given group simply means that group is increasing their income by a greater amount than the rest of the group.

I always find it amusing that a factoid which shows the rich are getting richer is used by people as evidence they're being hard done by!

(note: not referring to this particular quote, which refers to fully half of income earners, but this style of statistic is often cited to support a claim of an unfair burden on the wealthy)
 
icerat said:
Issues of sustainability aside, wouldn't claiming the first two as "socialist" be like saying that money I put in the bank, and later take out, is a "bank payment"?
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You haven't answered the OP question. What percentage of the population must live on the dole before we call ourselves a socialist/communist nation?
 
Actually the OP thread title asked no sensible question, neither defining percentage of "what", nor who "we" was.

The link on the other hand didn't just include unemployment benefits (dole) as I noted, and certainly didn't include just a group "living on it"

You might want to define what you mean by socialist/communist nation as well.
 
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BeAChooser said:
You haven't answered the OP question. What percentage of the population must live on the dole before we call ourselves a socialist/communist nation?
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100% = communist
As far as socialism goes, it doesn't really fit on the spectrum as one doesn't need to have ANY public payroll and be socialist.
 
BeAChooser said:
You haven't answered the OP question. What percentage of the population must live on the dole before we call ourselves a socialist/communist nation?
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Can I suggest that at 100% of those who need it the label "civilized" might apply?
 
BeAChooser said:
You haven't answered the OP question. What percentage of the population must live on the dole before we call ourselves a socialist/communist nation?
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Icerat did, however, answer the OP's implication, which is that 35% of Americans are "on the dole", which is patently false.

Find a more honest number if you want to have an honest discussion.
 
The payouts are primarily Social Security and Medicare benefits, and unemployment checks. But they are not limited to those programs.
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What this means is that America is undergoing a demographic change. More citizens are senior citizens now than in 1960 (also, there was no Medicare in 1960 I believe).
 
icerat said:
Actually the OP thread title asked no sensible question, neither defining percentage of "what", nor who "we" was.
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Foolish me, thinking you'd be able to figure that out from the only places in the quoted material where percentages were mentioned and the fact the article was talking about the US. :D

ice rat said:
You might want to define what you mean by socialist/communist nation as well.
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You've completely missed the point of this thread, haven't you? :D
 
icerat said:
As chipmink stew said above - find a more honest number if you want to have an honest discussion.
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LOL!

http://investmentwatchblog.com/anyo...e-weight-being-carried-by-the-producer-class/

“Government social benefits to persons (A063RC1)” The number is $2285 Billion. From this one: http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/A576RC1 “Wages and Salary Disbursements” we get a total payroll for the U.S. of $6527 Billion. *If we add the above $1.1 Trillion in government employment cost, then the numbers are more interesting. Government costs $3385 Billion, of a total wage base of $6527 Billion.
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You're not making any sense, or at least your quotes don't.

Why are you trying to equate government employment spending with national wage base?

try this instead which uses the more sensible measure of government spending as a percentage of GDP.

And yes, you're heading in to trouble.

Still no idea what it has to do with socialism or communism though ....
 
icerat said:
Still no idea what it has to do with socialism or communism though ....
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most americans have no idea what socialism or communism is.
heck, many of them think obama is a marxist.
BAC has been asked a couple of times to define his terms.
he has not, because he really can't.
so, you will not see much logic from american conservatives in a thread like this.
 
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> At what percentage do we become a socialist (or communist) nation?

51% Socialism, 49% Capitalism would be rounded to "Socialism".

49% Socialism, 51% Capitalism would be rounded to "Capitalism".

Both of these would be better described as Social Democracy or something.
 
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