Obamacare does not limit the choices between private sector insurance companies. In that sense it is more like the kind of school funding that Friedman evidently prefers. The only choice that is removed is the choice not to buy any health insurance at all. That is like the mandate to have your kids educated. You are not allowed to give them no education at all.
If ObamaCare is not the nationalization of health care, I do not know what is! If I were to use your very narrow definition of socialism and nationalism, nothing would be socialism.
You are confusing and lumping all three parts of public education together and then saying that pubic education is NOT socialism. **Milton Friedman was very careful to say that only the administration of pubic education is the clear-cut nationalization (socialism) of public education. ** Unfortunately, you are silent on the subject of the nationalization of public schools. I can only assume that you disagree with Milton Friedman.
Where do you stand?
*“With respect to education, I pointed out that
government was playing three major roles: (1) legislating compulsory schooling, (2) financing schooling, (3) administering schools. I concluded that there was some justification for compulsory schooling and the financing of schooling, but "the actual administration of educational institutions by the government, the ‘nationalization,’ as it were, of the bulk of the ‘education industry’ is much more difficult to justify on [free market] or, so far as I can see, on any other grounds." Yet finance and administration "could readily be separated. Governments could require a minimum of schooling financed by giving the parents vouchers redeemable for a given sum per child per year to be spent on purely educational services. . . . Denationalizing schooling,” I went on, “would widen the range of choice available to parents. . . . If present public expenditure were made available to par! Parents regardless of where they send their children, a wide variety of schools would spring up to meet the demand. . . . Here, as in other fields, competitive enterprise is likely to be far more efficient in meeting consumer demand than either nationalized enterprises or enterprises run to serve other purposes (Friedman).” *
The first example of socialism (nationalism) is public schooling. It always shocks Americans when I inform them that free and compulsory schooling is one of the ten “planks” of the Communist Manifesto and that public schooling is a key aspect of the Soviet, Chinese, and Cuban ways of life. Yet, even after discovering these little-known facts, they continue to believe that public schooling in those countries is socialism while public schooling in the United States is free enterprise. Let’s examine the principles of public schooling.
The public schooling system, like all coercive redistributive programs, is founded on the Marxian concept of “from each according to ability, to each according to need.” The political system is used to plunder the wealth and savings of everyone, even those who don’t have children, to pay for the schooling of other people’s children.
The plain truth is that public schooling is also the absolutely perfect embodiment of the socialist concept of central planning. The “education” of each child — from teachers to textbooks to curricula to time in school — is planned for him by a central political agency, either on a local, state, or national basis. The government, not the parents, controls the “education” of the child.
The tragic failure of socialism in public schooling is as well known as the failure of socialism all over the world. Yet, Americans just won’t let go. What is the common answer to the horrific results of public schooling? Plunder the citizenry and distribute the loot to an even greater extent!
But the real tragedy is that so many freedom devotees in America also won’t let go of socialism. All too often, their answer to the problem involves a futile attempt to make socialism work more efficiently. They want competition in public schools, vouchers, and other schemes which have the ultimate effect of leaving the socialist system intact, reformed, and more efficient.
What is the answer to socialism in public schools? Freedom! Why not separate school and state in the same way that our ancestors separated church and state? The Founding Fathers trusted freedom in religious activities, and look how blessed we are that government no longer subsidizes or controls our religious activities (or that of our children). How would you instead like a voucher system with public and private churches? How about competition between public and private churches? If anybody should trust freedom in education, it should be the Americans who have such a wonderful legacy of religious liberty.
A second example of socialism in America: Social Security. Having come into existence as part of the New Deal in the 1930s (the earlier Americans would have nothing to do with it!), the Social Security system is also founded on stealing. Here, the loot is forcibly taken, again under the guise of “taxation,” from the young and given to the old. The recipients always rationalize the process by convincing themselves that the money, which was plundered from them was retained in some type of investment pool which earned interest. They block out of their minds that the politicians spent their money years ago and that they are now engaging in the classic socialist scheme of using the political process to take from those who have and give the loot to others.
A tragedy again concerns many freedom devotees. What is the all too common answer to Social Security? Reduce Social Security taxes! What? Reduce Social Security taxes? Why reduce Social Security taxes? Isn’t this just another attempt to make the socialism of Social Security operate more efficiently?
What is the solution to Social Security? Eliminate Social Security taxes by repealing this evil and immoral scheme! And then constitutionally prohibit it from ever being passed again! Freedom is the solution!
What will then happen to the elderly in a system in which there is no Social Security? Probably the same thing that happened in America for its first 150 years when the American people refused to use the political process to steal from others. Some people saved for their old age. Others depended on their children for help. Others relied on friends, neighbors, or private relief agencies. Those Americans had faith and trust in freedom and in the caring nature of others. They did not believe that politicians, and their bureaucratic minions, were the only good and caring people in American society. And the result was not only the most prosperous society in history but also the most charitable society in history.
