Great stuff. I wish that most voters on any point of the political spectrum, especially younger voters, had the patience and attention span to read this.
The working class long ago discovered that the objectives of social democracy, fairness in a merit based system that preserves the middle class and freedom, has not disappeared. It's home is the Republican Party under Donald Trump. If the Democrat Party is the party of the Brahmin Left...let them go form their own country and watch it collapse like academia is.
It is amazing how the Brahmin Left can't seem to figure out that snotty arrogance is not a winning strategy for attracting the working class voter. Supporting Republicans does not make one a white supremacist (especially considering it is the DEMOCRAT party that is obsessed with race and actively practices antisemitism) nor does it make someone uneducated. There is a vast difference between actually being educated and being steeped in the Left wing propaganda that increasingly has taken the place of education in academia. The Brahmin Left is steeped in propaganda...not educated.
Nobody knows what “merit based” means - they make it mean what they want. If it means “most demonstrated current capacity” that would be a terrible uniform basis for hiring or advancement. Otherwise every MLB draft selection would be spent on college pitchers and every CEO hired would be 65. If it means “best sense of future promise”, that would also be a terrible uniform basis because of low “hit” rate. If it means “highest floor, least likely to fail”, that would also be a terrible uniform basis because of insufficient upside.
Actually merit is pretty easily demonstrated...and DEI/affirmative action have demonstrated that they FAIL to achieve it as they push meritless race and gender based ideological positions. Example: When a job search is set with the goal of "hiring a woman" and male applicants are told by the search committee that they might as well not even apply as the only way they will get the job is if no QUALIFIED woman applies...that is demonstrably hiring without consideration of merit...because gender as the sole deciding category is clearly NOT a basis for hiring based on any possible form of merit.
1) Social Democratic policies did not create the economic growth of the 1947-73 period. More accurately, they redistributed the gains from that growth in popular ways.
2) The neoliberalism of the 1980s and 1990s was much less successful in rolling back Social Democratic policies that you claim: government spending on social programs and regulations are both significantly higher today than in 1980.
Social Democratic governance was dramatically associated with economic growth as well as redistribution during the,1947-1973 periods. Indeed, the social-democratic model thensuccessfully demonstrated that high taxation, extensive public services, and robust worker protections could coexist with, and even accelerate, sustained capitalist growth rather than stifle it.
The phrases "associated with" and "could" are doing an awful lot of work in that sentence you wrote. There is no evidence that Social Democratic policies CREATED the economic growth of the 1947-73 period (my original comment).
The policies that you listed were overwhelmingly implemented at the very end of and after this period. Just look at social spending and taxation as a percentage of GDP in that period. It was much lower than 1973-2026 (although less of an increase of taxes in USA).
You, of course, are a whiz at parsing out cause from.correlate (a!though you only deign to share such sophomoric facets of your economic growth savvy as low taxation and spending).
Less exceptional intellects will be impressed by such commonllace economic knowledge as this: Across the 1947–1973 period, the Scandinavian economies experienced historically unprecedented rates of expansion in real GDP and GDP per capita, driven by high capital accumulation, rapid industrial modernization, expanding international trade, wage restraint and active Keynesian macroeconomic management. With the added drags on growth that emerged with OPEC and other 1970s suyplly shocks, the Scandinavian nations did famously shift toward a greater emphasis on economic growth policy that moderated earlier redistributive efforts.
Adding in snark, misspelled words, and liking your own comment does not give evidence to your point.
I already gave you data to show that your original comment was incorrect. The increase in Scandinavian social spending as a percentage of GDP came at the end and after this period. It did not decline in the 1970s.
Again, look at the data. Public social spending as share of GDP in 1960 was under 10% in all Scandinavian nations. In the 1960s it shot up, and the growth rate did not slow down until the 1990s.
I think you miss one important point: the goals of Social Democracy were largely met. All rich countries have reasonably comprehensive welfare states. In the US, Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid are not only alive and well, but they've grown more generous over time. Non-discrimination was codified in law.
Economically, in some countries, and in some states in the US, Social Democracy objectives have been over-achieved. Welfare benefits have become generous enough that non-employment is a viable alternative to working-class employment for some. Employment security has been formalized in methods that make employment unattractive to employers. In France and Italy, it is nearly impossible for employers to fire workers unless they commit serious misconduct, or the survival of the company is in jeopardy. In California, there is an entire legal industry dedicated to suing employers over violations of the state's Byzantine employment regulations - to take one example, an employee who begs to work through a mandated lunch break can sue an employer who consents for massive damages and penalties. This over-achievement has reduced prosperity and swallowed all government spending capacity, at the expense of new infrastructure projects, maintenance of public works, and national defense, let alone any significant new social initiatives.
Politically, I think you're right that Social Democrats lost influence within the Left. Another way to say this is that the Left lost confidence in Social Democracy in favor of performative virtue-signaling. The issues you identified are real and important, but I think you miss another important one: Left parties in the US and especially in Europe have supported giving more and more power, with less and less democratic accountability, to technocratic and especially transnational groups that are deeply committed to the unpopular policies you identified. This leads the Democratic Party in the US, and left-oriented parties in many other western countries, to support agendas that are very unpopular with clear majorities of voters. The Democrats remain politically viable because Republicans, given the chance, have shown themselves to be largely uninterested in good government, and incompetent in execution.
I generally agree, however I don’t think it’s correct to state that the Republicans in general, as opposed to Trump specifically, are uninterested in good government. The mass migration we’ve been seeing from blue states to red states is almost entirely due to people fleeing bad government for good government at the state level.
OK - I didn't intend that last item to apply at state levels. At the national level, though, Republicans have done little that might be considered good, aside from securing the border. George W. Bush made the last big push for federal involvement in education, with the ill-considered and ineffective No Child Left Behind act. He treated important federal agencies as sinecures - "Heck of a job Brownie" wasn't primarily responsible for the poor response to Hurricane Katrina, but it showcased the ineptness of FEMA, which had been considered a well-run and effective organization. He prioritized tax cuts over fiscal responsibility, using the specious argument that we were at risk of runaway budget surpluses that would pay off the entire national debt. He started two ill-advised wars - Democratic presidents have as well, but Bush's were larger, costlier, and more clearly against US interests.
Congressional Republicans, in the meantime, have come up with essentially no positive agenda. Their last attempt was repeal of Obamacare, which turned out to not be a priority at all - they never even introduced legislation. At the national level, Republicans have shown they are unworthy of power, and deserve to be out of power for 20 years while they figure out an agenda. But Democrats insist on pursuing a deeply unpopular agenda, and keep putting Republicans back in office.
At the state level, some Republican-led states seem to be doing well, at least in comparison to Democrat-led states. So I'll give you that.
It’s as much of a mistake to conflate the Trump lead GOP of today with the old Bush/Cheney led GOP as it is to conflate the DSA lad Dems of today with the old Bill Clinton lead Democrats.
You should check your facts on Obamacare repeal. The GOP introduced plenty of legislation to repeal it. They even got some of that passed in the House. It got bogged down in the Senate.
I’ll also add that neither party seems to be particularly interested in the messy compromise (I.e. sausage making) required to pass legislation. Both seem more than content to let the Executive maximize the power Congress has ceded to it over the years. Of course this only applies when their side is in charge.
Anyone who tolerates a giant menacing banner of the sitting president’s face at the department of justice building can fairly be assumed to be uninterested in good government. Though who knows what is actually in their hearts!
One reason welfare benefits such as disability have become competitive with working class wages is that wages have sunk to the level of poverty. As we saw during covid large increases in wages and working conditions pull a lot of workers back into the work force.
If you'll read that article I referenced, you'll see that Social Security is fine. The problem is that thanks to Reagan, after 1983, Social Security payroll taxes just went into the general fund. At the time that article was written, 2013, the total amount stolen was $2.7 trillion. By now it's probably close to $4 trillion. The first and only thing Congress should do is pay that money back. It should be apparent that people in the mass media hate people on Social Security just as much as the .01%. Oh yeah, they *are* the .01%.
The demographic projections for Social Security are certainly not favorable. At the risk of telling you what you already know, under current law, when the trust fund is depleted, benefits will be reduced but not eliminated. It will be interesting to see what legislative action is taken. I can see three main possibilities, all of which will be politically fraught:
(1) Benefits are reduced to match current payroll tax collections.
(2) Payroll taxes are increased to maintain current benefits, or something closer to it.
(3) Money is appropriated from the general fund to make up the shortfall - in which case we'll let Arabs and China support our retirees.
As of 2013, Congress had stolen $2.7 trillion from Social Security. Inasmuch as much of the national debt has been borrowed to pay Social Security recipients, Congress owes considerably more. Even Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders will deny this. That article I referenced - and 17 other articles by the same author, linked to it, provide all the documentation you need to ascertain the truth. I don't know how this scandal could go on like this for decades except it proves even the "liberals" don't give two shits for working people.
I appreciate your willingness to engage respectfully. From 1940 through the mid 1980s, Social Security got more generous in that monthly benefits per recipient increased. Until 2000, Social Security recipients who earned income were penalized by having their benefits reduced; now there's no penalty for recipients who have reached full retirement age. Over the last 8 decades, benefits have gotten more generous because more participants live to collect them, and they generally live longer.
I would also look tge growth of Social Security Disability. Recipient numbers and costs have increased disproportionately as recognized disabilities for things like bi polar disorders and social phobias have expanded. States have been active at getting troubled individuals onto Social Security Disability to avoid utilization of programs that require contributory funds from states.
The Republicans have legislated every monkey wrench they can think of for Social Security. Half the people who apply for disability die or go homeless before they're finally accepted. There are ways to standardize criteria for disability and still be fair. But Republicans don't care about fair. All they want to do is make Social Security look bad.
Some groups live longer than others and some types of work are more prone to injury and are difficult to do after 50. I don't see many retirees doing hard labor.
That's because hard labor, like hanging Sheetrock, leaves people too fucked up to work into their old age. If you bothered to ask anyone in that business, they would tell you the same thing. An enlightened country might invest in research into how to extend people's productive lifespans, but America prefers just to chew them up and spit them out.
Bravo. This should be required reading for every US high school Senior.
It is more than a little ironic that as European Social Democracy appears to be dying, US Dems seek to import it. Perhaps because Biden's redistribution of wealth was largely up, not down.
Under Biden, confused billionaires were saved in the SV Bank Bailout. Understandable, because the world's wealthiest could not possibly comprehend FDIC limits.
Toss in $7500 tax checks, for needy Americans, buying $80K luxury EVs. Likewise, if you had Dem connections, a pulse, and could scratch out a Climate business plan on the back of a Bar napkin, Biden's Green Dollars rained down like manna from heaven.
The piece de resistance was the attempted forgiveness of trillions in college debt. Because who could possibly be more deserving of US tax dollars than young, MDs, DDSs, JDs, MBAs, PHD engineers and their ilk, surviving on $125K annually, on their way to a 1/2 million dollar middle age paycheck?
While US Dem Socialists were discovering the wealthy and well educated in need, what began in 2017 Italy seems likely to hit the European Big 3, like a ton of bricks. Polling shows the former East Germany voting AfD by more than 40%, next month. That is predicted to spark a Spring French Le Pen victory. The French have all but imprisoned Le Pen in a tower with an Iron Mask to prevent her ascension, but she is probably unstoppable.
From there, England's Farage seems likely, if not invincible. To truly comprehend the situation, it helps to have visited Europe pre 2010 and recently. The change often defies description.
Last week the WSJ, a champion of Open Borders since Reagan, ran a piece detailing British pamphlets handed to asylum seekers. They explained rape and sex with children are illegal. They contained sketches, complete with info on how to check a passport date of birth, pre coitus. If this is not the bottom, what would be?
I came out of South-Central LA so voting Gop has never occurred to me and I still won't. But I finally abandoned the Democratic has a bad deal over Immigration. I graduated high school diploma and all with a fourth-grade reading level... Not too much hope out there for that I suppose. But I managed to claw myself into an apprenticeship in a construction Union. Which 2 years later died with take a 50% cut in pay or we replace you with Illegals. We didn't they did... that Union no longer exists. While the Democratic Party proclaimed (Loudly) Immigrants don't take American Jobs. Really?
And not once but twice I have had to train my own H1B replacements when the Companies replaced the whole section with outside Contractors. Doing Jobs Americans wouldn't do? Jobs Americans can't fill? Really? I got 2 weeks' pay and an Immigrant got my job. But according to the Democratic Party they're all here to pick fruit... and do jobs Americans "Won't Do" Really? Or H1B's are all the best & brightest and don't take American jobs. I won't even mention the silly illusion that we can import millions without causing rents to go up.
I will say has a child of South-Central LA that yelling Racist at anybody & everybody you disagree with doesn't help. And I will say the DEI presentation at my work at the time made things worse, much worse. Starting the presentation with all Whites are inherently Racist and should shut up & listen didn't really help things. Caused troubles we didn't have before? Yes. Help not really.
On the TG thing? Personally, I don't care. But the left spends a lot of time proclaiming that teens who commit Armed Robbery & Murder have undeveloped brains and aren't aware the consequences of their actions... But kids younger, much younger are aware of the consequences of gender reassignment? Anybody see a contradiction in terms there?
In the end a plague on both sides, not that it matters Voting hasn't accomplished anything in fifty or more years... And that don't look like to change.
TBT. While I would quibble with the economic causes of the decline of social democracy presented here; the cultural causes are spot-on. The Brahmin Left lives in a world of luxury beliefs that normal citizens do not enjoy. But they are like fish swimming in water having no concept of what water is. The economics of social democracy were inevitably headed for decline after the industrial and post-industrial era of the mid-20th century. Social welfare states, ala the Great Society, only hastened their decline. The end of Bretton Woods confirmed it. There was no wealth being created, just redistributed. Feminism and its morphing into identity politics derailed the political momentum of social democracy by making who you are more important than what you do. The Information Age has completely obliterated their original working class foundation and raison d'être. The Left is now lost in the wilderness of their own making. Buona Fortuna!
It is worth noting that Samuel Gompers, generally considered the founder of the American labor movement was adamant that the focus should be on the workplace-both wages and protection from arbitrary actions by management-and not on the larger social issues. This is why we have the Labor Day holiday rather than working class celebration on May Day, like in Europe. This has changed in recent years beginning with the advent of the CIO and accelerating with the takeover of the labor movement by the public sector unions. Of course, the public sector unions are hypocritical on this. Just try threatening their rice bowl in the interest of some social justice initiative they claim to support. The teachers' unions are probably the worst.
Excellent overview. I would add another factor that has led to the demise of social Democrats (which I think a a better term than "social democracy"). The Brahmin Left has rejected the social Democrat's belief in the power of government to smooth the rough edges of capitalism in favor of broad, centralized government power over the economy and the social welfare state. We've seen this transformation before - for example Harold Wilson's labor policies in the 1960s and mid 1970s - which were, subsequently, roundly rejected by British voters. The opportunity for the Republican party is to advance a political philosophy centered around individual rights and prosperity (vs "affordability"). A philosophy that believes in capitalism and free markets, but also the need and wisdom of targeted government regulation. That believes in equal opportunity and merit, but also believes government can play an important role in providing safety nets for the needy and elderly. That advances policies directed at ensuring safe and well-run communities and promotes ecomonic policies that work with private entities to invigorate commerce and industry. These were all features of the successful policies formerly advanced by social Democrats. I agree with Ruy that the Braham Left will not soon relinquish power within the Democratic party. They control the institutions and the finances. So Ruy and like Democrats have two choices: to continue to push the rock uphill, or to migrate to the Republican party and become a strong voice for policies supported by the working class.
Republicans shifted slightly in the direction of workers during Trump re immigration but I've yet to see broad policy on the issue that will turn into increased wages and a return of lost jobs, (read Stephan Edwards comment above). Much or Most of the Republican party remains anti tariff, ship jobs overseas, and open borders bring on low wages.
When Republican support a huge increase in pre distributive min wage with a Cola, and a strengthened social security by scrapping the cap, I'll consider changing my registration. My health insurance which is a tax free benefit is valued higher than most people in my neighborhood make in salary. Only the highly compensated take advantage of socking away many tens of thousands per year in 401Ks or SEPs. Tax incentives are strongly tilted towards benefiting the wealth, and that's a Republican policy.
Our healthcare system is horrible. Rs were supposed to have a better plan than Obama care, instead they make the poor and simple minded jump through more hoops in hopes that they simply won't even try to get Medicaid.
The Democrats are pretty bad, and I'm open to voting Republican again, I'm also ready for a third party.
Though I generally agree with this analysis I also tend to be a bit more optimistic than RT. When a party wanders into mediocrity like the Dems have in the last 20 years and the country is in crisis there is an opportunity for an individual to emerge with the courage and intellect to reset the narrative. Think FDR or Teddy Roosevelt or Ronald Reagan or Bill Clinton for that matter. Maga is clearly not the path forward. Nor is the DSA. There is an opportunity here.
I, too, am an optimist. But I fear that such a person is not yet in a position to take the reins. We may have more weak/corrupt/mislead leaders before such a person steps up. But I am also optimistic that such a person might not be evident initially.
Yes, and to fill that role we should be considering people with considerable experience in high level positions in the armed forces, such as Dwight Eisenhower then or James Stavridis now, but not Pete Hegseth.
With the current two party system, candidates are picked by the relatively small number of activists in each party, who tend to be extremists and have given us the likes of Trump and Vance and Biden and Harris.
Brilliant analysis! I'm sharing this one around, I know some people will be able to read the whole article. Too bad it won't effect the Leftists. Dedicated Lefties won't be able to read anything of this depth.
Consistent with his libertarian philosophy, Friedman advocated a passive approach by the Federal Reserve in the form of causing the money supply to grow at a constant rate. He was also skeptical about efforts by government to “stimulate” the economy with increased spending.
I suspect that he would have attributed the 2008 financial crisis to excessive meddling by government in the mortgage market.
I think Sandel was convincing in his 1996(!) article that things went wrong when liberalism stopped focusing on advocating for the principles that support responsible self-government — wrongly assuming that these habits were permanent. The change is indicated by JFK’s Yale commencent address:
"The central domestic issues of our time are more subtle and less simple" [than the large moral and political issues that commanded the nation's attention in earlier days.] “They relate not to basic clashes of philosophy or ideology but to ways and means of reaching common goals.... What is at stake in our economic decisions today is not some grand warfare of rival ideologies which will sweep the country with passion but the practical management of a modern economy." Kennedy urged the country "to face technical problems without ideological preconceptions" and to focus on "the sophisticated and technical questions involved in keeping a great economic machinery moving ahead."
The technocratic turn misunderstood the persistent need to reinforce the ethics and habits that alone make responsible self-government possible.
Regarding the role of Milton Friedman. As a matter of political philosophy, he was a libertarian favoring less government regulation and income transfer — which is largely a matter of values.
But his major contribution to economics was his objective analysis of the role of a nation’s money supply on inflation and real economic activity. That is generally recognized by economists of all political persuasions as being correct.
I'd say that's debatable nowadays. Friedman's analysis essentially pinned economic output on the actions of the central bank, in an attempt to strip away the role of 'animal forces' Keynes had emphasized. (since the classical Chicago monetarists believed that legitimized a larger government role in the economy) It was part of the neoliberal movement to try and reframe markets as 'self-regulating' and 'rational', and it extended from theories of the business cycle developed by Austrian school economists, the most famous of which--Friedrich Hayek--was Friedman's mentor.
This was very popular throughout the 80s and 90s, but since 2008 I would say the consensus has been shattered. There has been an attempt to explain the debt-deflationary event of 2008 in monetarist terms, but the crisis very much revived the credibility of the 'pure' Keynesian focus on animal spirits--or rather, that monetary aggregates are epiphonema that are the result of the herd behavior of capitalists and capitalist forces, not the determinants of that behavior.
But in the long view, of course, the economist most vindicated by the course of the last century is Hyman Minsky. ;)
The working-class will never be fixed if Immigration from places that just want to come here for economic reasons, create their own parallel societies, become competitors to the citizens you are meant to protect, and then are allowed to claim minority status and benefits for a set of programs meant for descendants of slaves and no one else are allowed to keep coming. People who majorities and privileged in their own countries get to come here and join a long list of minorities. Well, before long we run out of productive people and businesses to tax to death. Our Immigration laws are discriminatory to Western Europeans and almost everyone who would fit into society much easier. The bond between citizen and state has been broken. The Hart-Celler Act aka chain migration must be repealed or overriden and we must start at a place of not owing anyone anything more than objective rule of law for everyone. Right now, we have a country that is 56% giver and 44% not so much. Math says that's a disaster.
Great stuff. I wish that most voters on any point of the political spectrum, especially younger voters, had the patience and attention span to read this.
The working class long ago discovered that the objectives of social democracy, fairness in a merit based system that preserves the middle class and freedom, has not disappeared. It's home is the Republican Party under Donald Trump. If the Democrat Party is the party of the Brahmin Left...let them go form their own country and watch it collapse like academia is.
Yes, the MAGA GOP had replaced Democratic quasi-Social Democracy what might
have been called. Social Demagoguery, but the interloper no longer can put two clear or popular sentences together..
TDS is a feature of the Brahmin Left.
DTS is a feature of the MAGA GOP.
White supremacy is not merit-based. Trump administration is kakistocracy
And yet again we see why the Democrat party has lost the working class of all ethnics groups.
Yeah, when working class is defined by low education levels.
It is amazing how the Brahmin Left can't seem to figure out that snotty arrogance is not a winning strategy for attracting the working class voter. Supporting Republicans does not make one a white supremacist (especially considering it is the DEMOCRAT party that is obsessed with race and actively practices antisemitism) nor does it make someone uneducated. There is a vast difference between actually being educated and being steeped in the Left wing propaganda that increasingly has taken the place of education in academia. The Brahmin Left is steeped in propaganda...not educated.
Nobody knows what “merit based” means - they make it mean what they want. If it means “most demonstrated current capacity” that would be a terrible uniform basis for hiring or advancement. Otherwise every MLB draft selection would be spent on college pitchers and every CEO hired would be 65. If it means “best sense of future promise”, that would also be a terrible uniform basis because of low “hit” rate. If it means “highest floor, least likely to fail”, that would also be a terrible uniform basis because of insufficient upside.
Actually merit is pretty easily demonstrated...and DEI/affirmative action have demonstrated that they FAIL to achieve it as they push meritless race and gender based ideological positions. Example: When a job search is set with the goal of "hiring a woman" and male applicants are told by the search committee that they might as well not even apply as the only way they will get the job is if no QUALIFIED woman applies...that is demonstrably hiring without consideration of merit...because gender as the sole deciding category is clearly NOT a basis for hiring based on any possible form of merit.
I guess I still do not know what you mean by “merit”.
Because you don't want to
An outstanding essay!
I would only quibble with a few key points:
1) Social Democratic policies did not create the economic growth of the 1947-73 period. More accurately, they redistributed the gains from that growth in popular ways.
https://frompovertytoprogress.substack.com/p/upward-mobility-in-the-usa-1947-1965
2) The neoliberalism of the 1980s and 1990s was much less successful in rolling back Social Democratic policies that you claim: government spending on social programs and regulations are both significantly higher today than in 1980.
But I strongly agree with all the rest.
P.S.
Ruy,
Glad that you found a new home!
Social Democratic governance was dramatically associated with economic growth as well as redistribution during the,1947-1973 periods. Indeed, the social-democratic model thensuccessfully demonstrated that high taxation, extensive public services, and robust worker protections could coexist with, and even accelerate, sustained capitalist growth rather than stifle it.
ResearchGate
I assume that you are quoting your own article "Cooperation and Political Economic Performance in Affluent Democratic Capitalism,” here.
That article that you wrote was actually about the time period 1960–1989.
Though there is some overlap, it is clearly not the 1947-73 time period.
And in the article you used "social democratic government" as an independent variable, not policy. Those two are not the same.
You cannot claim that governments in 1960–1989 influenced economic growth for an earlier period. That is simply not plausible.
The phrases "associated with" and "could" are doing an awful lot of work in that sentence you wrote. There is no evidence that Social Democratic policies CREATED the economic growth of the 1947-73 period (my original comment).
The policies that you listed were overwhelmingly implemented at the very end of and after this period. Just look at social spending and taxation as a percentage of GDP in that period. It was much lower than 1973-2026 (although less of an increase of taxes in USA).
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/social-spending-oecd-longrun?time=1930..latest
https://ourworldindata.org/taxation
If your theory was correct, we should have seen a big increase in economic growth in the 21st Century compared to 1947-73. That is obviously not true.
You, of course, are a whiz at parsing out cause from.correlate (a!though you only deign to share such sophomoric facets of your economic growth savvy as low taxation and spending).
Less exceptional intellects will be impressed by such commonllace economic knowledge as this: Across the 1947–1973 period, the Scandinavian economies experienced historically unprecedented rates of expansion in real GDP and GDP per capita, driven by high capital accumulation, rapid industrial modernization, expanding international trade, wage restraint and active Keynesian macroeconomic management. With the added drags on growth that emerged with OPEC and other 1970s suyplly shocks, the Scandinavian nations did famously shift toward a greater emphasis on economic growth policy that moderated earlier redistributive efforts.
Adding in snark, misspelled words, and liking your own comment does not give evidence to your point.
I already gave you data to show that your original comment was incorrect. The increase in Scandinavian social spending as a percentage of GDP came at the end and after this period. It did not decline in the 1970s.
Again, look at the data. Public social spending as share of GDP in 1960 was under 10% in all Scandinavian nations. In the 1960s it shot up, and the growth rate did not slow down until the 1990s.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/social-spending-oecd-longrun?time=1930..latest&country=SWE~NOR~DNK
And you just changed your point:
Previously you said that they had “ high taxation, extensive public services, and robust worker protections.”
I think you miss one important point: the goals of Social Democracy were largely met. All rich countries have reasonably comprehensive welfare states. In the US, Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid are not only alive and well, but they've grown more generous over time. Non-discrimination was codified in law.
Economically, in some countries, and in some states in the US, Social Democracy objectives have been over-achieved. Welfare benefits have become generous enough that non-employment is a viable alternative to working-class employment for some. Employment security has been formalized in methods that make employment unattractive to employers. In France and Italy, it is nearly impossible for employers to fire workers unless they commit serious misconduct, or the survival of the company is in jeopardy. In California, there is an entire legal industry dedicated to suing employers over violations of the state's Byzantine employment regulations - to take one example, an employee who begs to work through a mandated lunch break can sue an employer who consents for massive damages and penalties. This over-achievement has reduced prosperity and swallowed all government spending capacity, at the expense of new infrastructure projects, maintenance of public works, and national defense, let alone any significant new social initiatives.
Politically, I think you're right that Social Democrats lost influence within the Left. Another way to say this is that the Left lost confidence in Social Democracy in favor of performative virtue-signaling. The issues you identified are real and important, but I think you miss another important one: Left parties in the US and especially in Europe have supported giving more and more power, with less and less democratic accountability, to technocratic and especially transnational groups that are deeply committed to the unpopular policies you identified. This leads the Democratic Party in the US, and left-oriented parties in many other western countries, to support agendas that are very unpopular with clear majorities of voters. The Democrats remain politically viable because Republicans, given the chance, have shown themselves to be largely uninterested in good government, and incompetent in execution.
I generally agree, however I don’t think it’s correct to state that the Republicans in general, as opposed to Trump specifically, are uninterested in good government. The mass migration we’ve been seeing from blue states to red states is almost entirely due to people fleeing bad government for good government at the state level.
OK - I didn't intend that last item to apply at state levels. At the national level, though, Republicans have done little that might be considered good, aside from securing the border. George W. Bush made the last big push for federal involvement in education, with the ill-considered and ineffective No Child Left Behind act. He treated important federal agencies as sinecures - "Heck of a job Brownie" wasn't primarily responsible for the poor response to Hurricane Katrina, but it showcased the ineptness of FEMA, which had been considered a well-run and effective organization. He prioritized tax cuts over fiscal responsibility, using the specious argument that we were at risk of runaway budget surpluses that would pay off the entire national debt. He started two ill-advised wars - Democratic presidents have as well, but Bush's were larger, costlier, and more clearly against US interests.
Congressional Republicans, in the meantime, have come up with essentially no positive agenda. Their last attempt was repeal of Obamacare, which turned out to not be a priority at all - they never even introduced legislation. At the national level, Republicans have shown they are unworthy of power, and deserve to be out of power for 20 years while they figure out an agenda. But Democrats insist on pursuing a deeply unpopular agenda, and keep putting Republicans back in office.
At the state level, some Republican-led states seem to be doing well, at least in comparison to Democrat-led states. So I'll give you that.
It’s as much of a mistake to conflate the Trump lead GOP of today with the old Bush/Cheney led GOP as it is to conflate the DSA lad Dems of today with the old Bill Clinton lead Democrats.
You should check your facts on Obamacare repeal. The GOP introduced plenty of legislation to repeal it. They even got some of that passed in the House. It got bogged down in the Senate.
I’ll also add that neither party seems to be particularly interested in the messy compromise (I.e. sausage making) required to pass legislation. Both seem more than content to let the Executive maximize the power Congress has ceded to it over the years. Of course this only applies when their side is in charge.
Anyone who tolerates a giant menacing banner of the sitting president’s face at the department of justice building can fairly be assumed to be uninterested in good government. Though who knows what is actually in their hearts!
One reason welfare benefits such as disability have become competitive with working class wages is that wages have sunk to the level of poverty. As we saw during covid large increases in wages and working conditions pull a lot of workers back into the work force.
Not sure you can social security is "alive and well" when it's going bankrupt in six years while Medicaid costs have grown 50% since 2019.
If you'll read that article I referenced, you'll see that Social Security is fine. The problem is that thanks to Reagan, after 1983, Social Security payroll taxes just went into the general fund. At the time that article was written, 2013, the total amount stolen was $2.7 trillion. By now it's probably close to $4 trillion. The first and only thing Congress should do is pay that money back. It should be apparent that people in the mass media hate people on Social Security just as much as the .01%. Oh yeah, they *are* the .01%.
The demographic projections for Social Security are certainly not favorable. At the risk of telling you what you already know, under current law, when the trust fund is depleted, benefits will be reduced but not eliminated. It will be interesting to see what legislative action is taken. I can see three main possibilities, all of which will be politically fraught:
(1) Benefits are reduced to match current payroll tax collections.
(2) Payroll taxes are increased to maintain current benefits, or something closer to it.
(3) Money is appropriated from the general fund to make up the shortfall - in which case we'll let Arabs and China support our retirees.
As of 2013, Congress had stolen $2.7 trillion from Social Security. Inasmuch as much of the national debt has been borrowed to pay Social Security recipients, Congress owes considerably more. Even Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders will deny this. That article I referenced - and 17 other articles by the same author, linked to it, provide all the documentation you need to ascertain the truth. I don't know how this scandal could go on like this for decades except it proves even the "liberals" don't give two shits for working people.
No, Social Security has not grown more generous. That's a ridiculous assertion and shows you have no idea what you're talking about.
I appreciate your willingness to engage respectfully. From 1940 through the mid 1980s, Social Security got more generous in that monthly benefits per recipient increased. Until 2000, Social Security recipients who earned income were penalized by having their benefits reduced; now there's no penalty for recipients who have reached full retirement age. Over the last 8 decades, benefits have gotten more generous because more participants live to collect them, and they generally live longer.
Or were you thinking of something else?
I would also look tge growth of Social Security Disability. Recipient numbers and costs have increased disproportionately as recognized disabilities for things like bi polar disorders and social phobias have expanded. States have been active at getting troubled individuals onto Social Security Disability to avoid utilization of programs that require contributory funds from states.
The Republicans have legislated every monkey wrench they can think of for Social Security. Half the people who apply for disability die or go homeless before they're finally accepted. There are ways to standardize criteria for disability and still be fair. But Republicans don't care about fair. All they want to do is make Social Security look bad.
Some groups live longer than others and some types of work are more prone to injury and are difficult to do after 50. I don't see many retirees doing hard labor.
That's because hard labor, like hanging Sheetrock, leaves people too fucked up to work into their old age. If you bothered to ask anyone in that business, they would tell you the same thing. An enlightened country might invest in research into how to extend people's productive lifespans, but America prefers just to chew them up and spit them out.
Bravo. This should be required reading for every US high school Senior.
It is more than a little ironic that as European Social Democracy appears to be dying, US Dems seek to import it. Perhaps because Biden's redistribution of wealth was largely up, not down.
Under Biden, confused billionaires were saved in the SV Bank Bailout. Understandable, because the world's wealthiest could not possibly comprehend FDIC limits.
Toss in $7500 tax checks, for needy Americans, buying $80K luxury EVs. Likewise, if you had Dem connections, a pulse, and could scratch out a Climate business plan on the back of a Bar napkin, Biden's Green Dollars rained down like manna from heaven.
The piece de resistance was the attempted forgiveness of trillions in college debt. Because who could possibly be more deserving of US tax dollars than young, MDs, DDSs, JDs, MBAs, PHD engineers and their ilk, surviving on $125K annually, on their way to a 1/2 million dollar middle age paycheck?
While US Dem Socialists were discovering the wealthy and well educated in need, what began in 2017 Italy seems likely to hit the European Big 3, like a ton of bricks. Polling shows the former East Germany voting AfD by more than 40%, next month. That is predicted to spark a Spring French Le Pen victory. The French have all but imprisoned Le Pen in a tower with an Iron Mask to prevent her ascension, but she is probably unstoppable.
From there, England's Farage seems likely, if not invincible. To truly comprehend the situation, it helps to have visited Europe pre 2010 and recently. The change often defies description.
Last week the WSJ, a champion of Open Borders since Reagan, ran a piece detailing British pamphlets handed to asylum seekers. They explained rape and sex with children are illegal. They contained sketches, complete with info on how to check a passport date of birth, pre coitus. If this is not the bottom, what would be?
I came out of South-Central LA so voting Gop has never occurred to me and I still won't. But I finally abandoned the Democratic has a bad deal over Immigration. I graduated high school diploma and all with a fourth-grade reading level... Not too much hope out there for that I suppose. But I managed to claw myself into an apprenticeship in a construction Union. Which 2 years later died with take a 50% cut in pay or we replace you with Illegals. We didn't they did... that Union no longer exists. While the Democratic Party proclaimed (Loudly) Immigrants don't take American Jobs. Really?
And not once but twice I have had to train my own H1B replacements when the Companies replaced the whole section with outside Contractors. Doing Jobs Americans wouldn't do? Jobs Americans can't fill? Really? I got 2 weeks' pay and an Immigrant got my job. But according to the Democratic Party they're all here to pick fruit... and do jobs Americans "Won't Do" Really? Or H1B's are all the best & brightest and don't take American jobs. I won't even mention the silly illusion that we can import millions without causing rents to go up.
I will say has a child of South-Central LA that yelling Racist at anybody & everybody you disagree with doesn't help. And I will say the DEI presentation at my work at the time made things worse, much worse. Starting the presentation with all Whites are inherently Racist and should shut up & listen didn't really help things. Caused troubles we didn't have before? Yes. Help not really.
On the TG thing? Personally, I don't care. But the left spends a lot of time proclaiming that teens who commit Armed Robbery & Murder have undeveloped brains and aren't aware the consequences of their actions... But kids younger, much younger are aware of the consequences of gender reassignment? Anybody see a contradiction in terms there?
In the end a plague on both sides, not that it matters Voting hasn't accomplished anything in fifty or more years... And that don't look like to change.
TBT. While I would quibble with the economic causes of the decline of social democracy presented here; the cultural causes are spot-on. The Brahmin Left lives in a world of luxury beliefs that normal citizens do not enjoy. But they are like fish swimming in water having no concept of what water is. The economics of social democracy were inevitably headed for decline after the industrial and post-industrial era of the mid-20th century. Social welfare states, ala the Great Society, only hastened their decline. The end of Bretton Woods confirmed it. There was no wealth being created, just redistributed. Feminism and its morphing into identity politics derailed the political momentum of social democracy by making who you are more important than what you do. The Information Age has completely obliterated their original working class foundation and raison d'être. The Left is now lost in the wilderness of their own making. Buona Fortuna!
It is worth noting that Samuel Gompers, generally considered the founder of the American labor movement was adamant that the focus should be on the workplace-both wages and protection from arbitrary actions by management-and not on the larger social issues. This is why we have the Labor Day holiday rather than working class celebration on May Day, like in Europe. This has changed in recent years beginning with the advent of the CIO and accelerating with the takeover of the labor movement by the public sector unions. Of course, the public sector unions are hypocritical on this. Just try threatening their rice bowl in the interest of some social justice initiative they claim to support. The teachers' unions are probably the worst.
Excellent overview. I would add another factor that has led to the demise of social Democrats (which I think a a better term than "social democracy"). The Brahmin Left has rejected the social Democrat's belief in the power of government to smooth the rough edges of capitalism in favor of broad, centralized government power over the economy and the social welfare state. We've seen this transformation before - for example Harold Wilson's labor policies in the 1960s and mid 1970s - which were, subsequently, roundly rejected by British voters. The opportunity for the Republican party is to advance a political philosophy centered around individual rights and prosperity (vs "affordability"). A philosophy that believes in capitalism and free markets, but also the need and wisdom of targeted government regulation. That believes in equal opportunity and merit, but also believes government can play an important role in providing safety nets for the needy and elderly. That advances policies directed at ensuring safe and well-run communities and promotes ecomonic policies that work with private entities to invigorate commerce and industry. These were all features of the successful policies formerly advanced by social Democrats. I agree with Ruy that the Braham Left will not soon relinquish power within the Democratic party. They control the institutions and the finances. So Ruy and like Democrats have two choices: to continue to push the rock uphill, or to migrate to the Republican party and become a strong voice for policies supported by the working class.
But GOP has long been in the hands of a Brahmin Right, though never before under the thumb of such a corrupt one.
Republicans shifted slightly in the direction of workers during Trump re immigration but I've yet to see broad policy on the issue that will turn into increased wages and a return of lost jobs, (read Stephan Edwards comment above). Much or Most of the Republican party remains anti tariff, ship jobs overseas, and open borders bring on low wages.
When Republican support a huge increase in pre distributive min wage with a Cola, and a strengthened social security by scrapping the cap, I'll consider changing my registration. My health insurance which is a tax free benefit is valued higher than most people in my neighborhood make in salary. Only the highly compensated take advantage of socking away many tens of thousands per year in 401Ks or SEPs. Tax incentives are strongly tilted towards benefiting the wealth, and that's a Republican policy.
Our healthcare system is horrible. Rs were supposed to have a better plan than Obama care, instead they make the poor and simple minded jump through more hoops in hopes that they simply won't even try to get Medicaid.
The Democrats are pretty bad, and I'm open to voting Republican again, I'm also ready for a third party.
Though I generally agree with this analysis I also tend to be a bit more optimistic than RT. When a party wanders into mediocrity like the Dems have in the last 20 years and the country is in crisis there is an opportunity for an individual to emerge with the courage and intellect to reset the narrative. Think FDR or Teddy Roosevelt or Ronald Reagan or Bill Clinton for that matter. Maga is clearly not the path forward. Nor is the DSA. There is an opportunity here.
I would argue that we have that person in the White House.
Reagan and Clinton screwed the working class, no more of that thank you very much.
Not my point at all. They both took a directionless party and did something with it. Maybe you didn't like it but that wasn't my point.
I, too, am an optimist. But I fear that such a person is not yet in a position to take the reins. We may have more weak/corrupt/mislead leaders before such a person steps up. But I am also optimistic that such a person might not be evident initially.
In any case it is much better than Republican leadership that is actively destroying the country
Yes, and to fill that role we should be considering people with considerable experience in high level positions in the armed forces, such as Dwight Eisenhower then or James Stavridis now, but not Pete Hegseth.
I don't think we get to pick these people. I think they just emerge from the void. But no it won't be Pete!
With the current two party system, candidates are picked by the relatively small number of activists in each party, who tend to be extremists and have given us the likes of Trump and Vance and Biden and Harris.
Brilliant analysis! I'm sharing this one around, I know some people will be able to read the whole article. Too bad it won't effect the Leftists. Dedicated Lefties won't be able to read anything of this depth.
You underestimate pragmatic Leftist like Sheri Berman.
Consistent with his libertarian philosophy, Friedman advocated a passive approach by the Federal Reserve in the form of causing the money supply to grow at a constant rate. He was also skeptical about efforts by government to “stimulate” the economy with increased spending.
I suspect that he would have attributed the 2008 financial crisis to excessive meddling by government in the mortgage market.
I think Sandel was convincing in his 1996(!) article that things went wrong when liberalism stopped focusing on advocating for the principles that support responsible self-government — wrongly assuming that these habits were permanent. The change is indicated by JFK’s Yale commencent address:
"The central domestic issues of our time are more subtle and less simple" [than the large moral and political issues that commanded the nation's attention in earlier days.] “They relate not to basic clashes of philosophy or ideology but to ways and means of reaching common goals.... What is at stake in our economic decisions today is not some grand warfare of rival ideologies which will sweep the country with passion but the practical management of a modern economy." Kennedy urged the country "to face technical problems without ideological preconceptions" and to focus on "the sophisticated and technical questions involved in keeping a great economic machinery moving ahead."
The technocratic turn misunderstood the persistent need to reinforce the ethics and habits that alone make responsible self-government possible.
These points are spot on for social democratic parties in Western Europe, and why support for them has declined. Great post
Regarding the role of Milton Friedman. As a matter of political philosophy, he was a libertarian favoring less government regulation and income transfer — which is largely a matter of values.
But his major contribution to economics was his objective analysis of the role of a nation’s money supply on inflation and real economic activity. That is generally recognized by economists of all political persuasions as being correct.
I'd say that's debatable nowadays. Friedman's analysis essentially pinned economic output on the actions of the central bank, in an attempt to strip away the role of 'animal forces' Keynes had emphasized. (since the classical Chicago monetarists believed that legitimized a larger government role in the economy) It was part of the neoliberal movement to try and reframe markets as 'self-regulating' and 'rational', and it extended from theories of the business cycle developed by Austrian school economists, the most famous of which--Friedrich Hayek--was Friedman's mentor.
This was very popular throughout the 80s and 90s, but since 2008 I would say the consensus has been shattered. There has been an attempt to explain the debt-deflationary event of 2008 in monetarist terms, but the crisis very much revived the credibility of the 'pure' Keynesian focus on animal spirits--or rather, that monetary aggregates are epiphonema that are the result of the herd behavior of capitalists and capitalist forces, not the determinants of that behavior.
But in the long view, of course, the economist most vindicated by the course of the last century is Hyman Minsky. ;)
The working-class will never be fixed if Immigration from places that just want to come here for economic reasons, create their own parallel societies, become competitors to the citizens you are meant to protect, and then are allowed to claim minority status and benefits for a set of programs meant for descendants of slaves and no one else are allowed to keep coming. People who majorities and privileged in their own countries get to come here and join a long list of minorities. Well, before long we run out of productive people and businesses to tax to death. Our Immigration laws are discriminatory to Western Europeans and almost everyone who would fit into society much easier. The bond between citizen and state has been broken. The Hart-Celler Act aka chain migration must be repealed or overriden and we must start at a place of not owing anyone anything more than objective rule of law for everyone. Right now, we have a country that is 56% giver and 44% not so much. Math says that's a disaster.