Germany is socialist, North Korea is communist.  How are they different?

Flint wrote:

I call my car a horse, what's the difference?

Raise your bonnet and look inside.  Notice no bees in your bonnet.

 

glatt wrote:

Germany is socialist, North Korea is communist.  How are they different?

Well, aside from deep cultural differences, we got this...

Is Germany Socialist?
The prospect of calling Germany a socialist country is rather frightening. After all, the Nazis were the Nationalist Socialist party. However, socialism and Nazism are two things so entirely different from each other that they should not be used in the same sentence. Today, Germany is a capitalist, free-market country that has many elements of socialism to help provide people with a safety net.

During the Cold War, Germany was divided into East and West, with the Soviet East being communist and falling into dire poverty, and the capitalist West thriving. The capitalist West did away with all price controls that were established under Hitler’s Nazi party and dramatically cut taxes. The result was that markets, which are remarkably good at regulating themselves, were able to thrive. Meanwhile, the German government established enough welfare programs to ensure that individual people were able to leave happy and productive lives.

Germany’s economic policies helped to ensure that when the East and West were reunited after the Cold War, the two economies would be able to integrate, and the East would be lifted out of its poverty. Germany today has very few regulations on business, but it does have anti-trust laws that allow the government to intervene if one company begins to monopolize an industry.

Germany’s chancellor, Angela Merkel, has promoted many socialist policies to ensure that Germany’s economy remains strong. Healthcare, education, and other social services are universally available. Meanwhile, low levels of government regulation on businesses help ensure that the free-market economy can thrive. Germany is a capitalist country with socialist policies. Those two aspects combined, capitalism and socialism, helped Germany reunite after the fall of the Berlin Wall and keep its economy strong.

...from: https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/democratic-socialist-countries

...and this...

North Korea is governed by a monarchic family clan; its 'socialism' has been broadly replaced by corruption (at the top) and informal marketisation (at the bottom); it flirts with race-fascism. ... North Korea is post-ideological and akin to The Godfather: a massive racket to shake down anyone, inside North Korea and out, to fund the self-indulgent lifestyle of a narrow elite. North Korea is what happens when Don Corleone takes over an entire country and can enforce his clan rule with a secret police rather than just capo henchman. Actually, North Korea is barely a country at all; it's an Orwellian gangster fiefdom.

...from: https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/if-north-korea-isnt-communist-then-what-it

So neither appears to be a good example of socialism and communism.

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I call my car a horse, what's the difference?

Primary difference is: when you stick the gas nozzle in the ass-end of your horse it don't kick the ever-lovin' shit out of you,

I can't think of any socialist or communist countries as those two terms were defined in high school civics class.
It seems most countries are a mixture of two or more of the multiple categories they throw around as if they know what they're talking about..

glatt wrote:

Germany is socialist, North Korea is communist.  How are they different?

In socialism, all work for a common good.  When socialism breaks down into communism, then all work for the benefit of the central committee of the communist party.  Communism happens when socialism (or democracy) fails.

In a prosperous country,boses work for the people (ie employees).  In a communist operation, everyone works for the boss.

Communism can exist in a nation or in a company.  To have communism, bosses must be dictators.  The worst dictators are so autocratic as to be called Kim Jung-un.  Less autocratic communism is Vietnam.  

That is what changed in China in the past 15 yeas.   Xi has become increasingly autocratic.  The communist party there is becoming more communist.  For example, Xi recently blamed Kruschev for a destruction of communism when he openly criticized Stalin.  That (as best I can tell) is not the Xi who was educated in America.

Meanwhile all democracies have some variation of socialism.  Some more than others.  Where some nation's  companies and governments are more socialist.  And others are more communist - dictatorships.
 

tw wrote:

Denial is how we handle what we cannot comprehend.

 
What a refreshing admission!

That  is what extremists do.  When they cannot deal with / admit to reality, then all replies are insults. And Big Lies.

Pithy are his routine commentary only intended to demean and destroy. As if those bereaved, pessimistic, and  disparaging comics are somehow funny.  Henry finds humor by demaning others.  Another characterisit of an exremists - who only wants to wreck shit. By his own admission, he wants to wreck shit. Then calls that 'Making America Great Again'.

 

Last edited by tw (7/17/2021 9:20 pm)

Bull.  You never beg.  Extremists order us what to believe.  And then want to wreck shit.
 

Last edited by tw (7/18/2021 10:03 am)

harassment can be a two-way street

tw wrote:

henry_quirk wrote:

 Yes, go, tw, go and wreck shit, do it now: I command it.
 

Are you also part of that 'tourist' crowd that visits Capitols?  Did you consider visiting the Reichstag?

 

 
I'm not fond of crowds.

Too many witnesses.