Trump Doesn't Know the Difference Between Capitalism and Communism
by John Lawrence
The Trump campaign is saying that they will bring grocery and housing prices down. To address high prices, Trump said he would sign an executive order on his first day sworn in as president “directing every cabinet secretary and agency head to use every power we have to drive prices down, but we’re going to drive them down in a capitalist way, not in a communist way,” he said. Really? In a capitalist economic system, which the US certainly is, prices are set by the market, not by the government. Now Trump proposes to use government to interfere with the market to bring prices down. That's anti-capitalistic. So exactly how do you bring prices down in a capitalist way without interfering with the market? You can't. If you're a capitalist, you let the market set prices, whatever they turn out to be. So Trump, a purported capitalist, accuses Kamala for being a communist or a socialist while he turns out to be one himself. Kamala has proposed a Federal ban on price gouging. Exactly how that would work is unclear. So both Trump and Kamala are proposing to use government to interfere in the market to bring prices down.
So what could be done to bring prices down? Bringing down prices is not really the problem. Making sure that every American can afford groceries and housing is. There is precedent for government supported housing also know as public housing for people that can't afford a house in the market economy. Kamala's proposal to grant first time buyers $25,000 for a down payment is also a good idea. That doesn't interfere with the price setting mechanism of the capitalist economy. Government has also supplied food for poor people whether it be food stamps or SNAP. So the market still sets the price of housing and groceries for those who can afford to buy these things in the market economy. This amounts to socialism for the poor, capitalism for the rich in contrast to the situation that now exists which is socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor. Trump's $7 trillion tax cut amounted to socialism for the rich.
The US has a mixed economy. It is partly capitalist and partly socialist as are most eonomies of advanced industrial nations. If Trump were a pure capitalist he would say that the market should set prices for housing and groceries, and that he as President would have nothing to do with that. But since he like most Republicans are hypocrites who will say anything to gain political power, he is all concerned about prices. Kamala by contrast does not claim to be a pure capitalist so she sincerely wants to help people at the low end of the economic spectrum to be able to afford adequate housing and nutrition. Exactly what programs she wants to implement do not have to be spelled out at this point in the campaign. The point is that she sincerely wants to help people at the lower part of the economic spectrum. Trump could care less about them. He only wants to help his rich billionaire friends.
