Thanks to Lorant Szabo on Facebook for pointing me to this 2014 video on YouTube, Socialism Betrayed – Roger Keeran & Thomas Kenny.

Very interesting video. While I might quibble with a few of the assumptions, it does present some novel viewpoints worth considering. The views are probably most novel to those of us who have grown up with the western media dominating our view of the world.

Being the skeptic (realist) that I am, I don’t believe than any ism, capitalism nor socialism, has all the answers. I think that was readily admitted by the two speakers in the video. So the question is how do we navigate in the real world to put together a society that works best in the real world. I don’t think the two speakers would disagree with that being the overriding question.

I won’t try to reproduce the conversation that ensued on Facebook, but I will mention a clarification about the comment on what I thought the authors would agree to.

The authors suggest that worker motivation is an inherent problem of Socialism that has to be addressed. Their discussion about Cuba and its jobs guarantee has interesting implications for proponents of the job guarantee in this country. I am not saying the job guarantee is without merit. I am just saying that it has to be implemented with eyes wide open to the problems that might arise, and would need to be solved.