“Only 53 percent of American adults believe capitalism is better
than socialism,” according to an April survey by Rasmussen.
Age made a large difference in how Americans viewed capitalism
and socialism, according to the survey, with capitalism getting
the worst grades among adults under 30. Only 37 percent of the
under-30s favored capitalism, 33 percent preferred socialism, and
30 percent were undecided. It sounds like they could vote in a
Castro if he had a good smile.
The preference for socialism, in contrast, dropped to 26
percent among the 30-somethings in the Rasmussen survey, and
dropped to just 13 percent among adults over 40.
By party, Republicans by an 11-to-1 margin said that capitalism
was superior to socialism, while Democrats were more
pro-socialist and more evenly divided, with only 39 percent
preferring capitalism, 30 percent favoring socialism, and 31
percent undecided.
Rasmussen didn’t define socialism or capitalism for the
respondents during the survey, so we really don’t know how
many of the aforementioned responses were based on even the
slightest knowledge about the two economic systems.
In January, for instance, I surveyed 50 recent high school
graduates, now all in college or on their way. To the question,
“Define capitalism in 10 to 20 words,” here are some of the
written responses, not atypical:
“Capitalism is making the most money for the government and
having the government control the people.”
“Capitalism is the money that is in the government. It is when
the government controls all the money.”
“Capitalism is based on a money-hungry nation, seeking to
establish power through money.”
“Capitalism is when an economy is based on the needs of the
people.”
“Capitalism is when the government takes a bigger role in the
economy and controls more things.”
“Capitalism is when the government is the only one deciding laws
and regulations.”
“I have no clue what capitalism is because I’ve never paid any
attention to politics or the world around me until this year.”
“Capitalism is everything that makes our government run
properly.”
“Capitalism is how the government is run. It is the government
system.”
“Capitalism is when the government has complete control over the
decisions that the country makes.”
Those responses, coming primarily from students in the top half
of their class in allegedly high-quality school systems, don’t
provide much encouragement about what’s going on in high school
classes in history, political science, government or business (or
much confidence in the value of the Rasmussen survey).
Not all the responses were that bad. One student, for example,
wrote: “Capitalism promotes individualism. It is a free market
system that allows individuals to use their entrepreneurial
skills to advance their lives.” Another wrote, “Capitalism is an
economic system in which wealth and the means of producing wealth
are privately owned and controlled, rather than publicly
controlled or state-owned.” Wrote a third student, “Capitalism is
an economic system based on markets (both regarding markets for
goods and services and markets for labor) and based on the
private ownership and private control of capital.” And more
succinctly from another student, “Capitalism rewards hard work
and risk-taking — the opposite of socialism and communism.”
The bad news is that there’s nothing to keep this latter group of
better-informed students from being out-voted by the former and
larger group of less-knowledgeable students.
The good news is that it’s not very hard to get these students on
the right track once they’re exposed to even a modicum of
information regarding the fundamental differences between
capitalism, socialism and communism.
On the final exam in an economics course that I just completed
teaching, one question asked students to evaluate capitalism.
Wrote one student, not that many semesters out of high school, in
a not atypical response:
Capitalism represents a profound change in human thinking that
occurred over the past 400 years, a drop in the bucket in time.
And yet, these recent centuries have seen remarkable and
historic advances, improvements in the quality of life for the
masses that were unthinkable in the Dark Ages, due
overwhelmingly to free market enterprise. Capitalism carries a
host of inherent positives — the self-regulating effects of
competition, workers with specialized skills who can command a
livable wage, increasing technological advances, voluntary
exchange between workers, consumers and businesses, the
property rights of citizens, the encouragement of risk-taking
and business creation. Most importantly, capitalism marks a
“rags to riches” story never before seen in history, wherein
hard work and a cutting edge mind can lead the poorest
individual from poverty to wealth.
The bottom line? It looks like we need a bigger supply of
pro-capitalist teachers.
