Dear Commie,

What makes socialists different from super progressives?

Yours, Figuring it Out

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Dear Figuring it Out,

The big difference between a socialist and a progressive is that while socialists and progressives may want some of the same things in the short term (raise the minimum wage, better environmental controls, taxing wealth), socialists see the problems of society coming from capitalism. From a socialist perspective, we’ll continue to have these problems as long as we’re in capitalism.

Socialists point to how capitalism is about creating profit, not about taking care of people or social problems. The goal of capitalism is not to create prosperity for everyone in society. It is always to create more wealth for capitalists – there’s never an end. A capitalist as an individual doesn’t have to be a greedy, shitty person, because as long as you’re a player in the game, you must grow or die. That is the rationale of the system, and capitalist society is built to protect it.

Progressives usually don’t have a problem with capitalism itself, they think that we can have a reformed capitalism that works for everyone. Socialists disagree; we want to overcome capitalism. We want the world to be run democratically, and that also means the economy and energy systems must be run democratically by the people who make them work.

There’s more of course, but that’s it in a nutshell.

Class strugglingly yours, Commie.