Socialism Is Not Harmful By Ronald Lankford

B) Summary: In the article, “Socialism is Not Harmful”, by Ronald D. Lankford, he emphasizes on many key points that many people seem to be very misinformed on Socialism. For example, a question asked “Doesn’t socialism meant that the government will own and run everything?” (Par.5). He responded by saying Democratic socialists do not want to create an all-powerful government to rule society, but do not want to have big corporations to do the same. He goes on to say that, Democratic socialists reject the belief of a centralized economy because of the inability for it to work. Another questions many critiques have on socialism is “Won't socialism be impractical because people will lose their incentive to work?” (par.16). He responded with a great sentence by saying people don’t work out of starvation or greed, but one the basis of responsibility and duty to their community and society. He also included employers should raise wages, offer benefits as well as improve the work environment, and that will incentives and encourage people to work. This article also includes some interesting perspectives on how socialism and capitalism work hand and hand, by creating many suitable and greatly appreciative benefits like paid sick days, weekends, family leave, and many others.

C)

Personal Response: I really like the article, it gives some great explanations to questions many of us have.

I really love the explanation of how Democratic socialism does not automatically mean communism, and an all-powerful government ready to destroy everything, but a way for people to protect themselves from corporations only in it for the money. This article does a great job at shedding light at the ramifications of socialism in the job market, like the amount of benefits thanks to ‘socialist movements’. I would have loved to see what types of programs came from socialistic ideas like Social Security, and

Medicare.

D) Analytical Response: This article informed people the positive reality of socialism, and not some ‘Red Scare’ nonsense. It provided information pertaining to what many misconceptions we had, and in fact still have today. Although the article did not show real statistics, it did provide great examples of democratic socialism in action, like Norway, Denmark, and Sweden, who are ranked as one of the happiest countries on earth. Sadly, the article never delved into the history of socialism, but it did give examples of the success of it.

E) Application Response: If I were writing a research paper, this probably would not have been my immediate go to, because there are some topics that were never discussed in its entirety or at all. The essay did however go into the topic of what a democratic socialist is, and it really did well in doing so. What really caught my attention in this article was “Democracy and socialism go hand in hand. All over the world, wherever the idea of democracy has taken root, the vision of socialism has taken root as well—everywhere but in the United States.” This line here is true in all most every fashion, only in America are we still afraid of socialism, and until we learn the true benefits of socialism and accept them as a right, we will suffer the consequences.