Opening Statement Pro

Capitalism is one of the roots of our government system. It is a system that gives
us freedom of action. We believe this freedom of action is superior to having someone
regulate your life. Individual freedom is economic justice, where people can own their
own land and business. Socialism is a system that the government controls the ownership
and control of the means of production and distribution. Having freedom of action
benefits many individuals in a society. To have freedom of action gives a person the right
to start a business, have a say in how much money they can make, and be able pursue
happiness.
Individual drive for success is a prominent motivating factor in human being’s
existence. People feel more accomplished with them selves and work harder when they
strive for success. In a socialist society people tend to work less hard because they are not
furthering themselves or their career. People like Bill Gates are able to turn the idea of a
computer into a reality. He did not only further himself through his accomplishments but
he created the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which funds education and universal
health care that keeps people form poverty. Trade is also what helped Gates become more
successful. Capitalist freedom allows the economy to grow fast and expand with trade.
Trade with other counties is one way the U.S. has expanded their economy and their
culture. Companies are able to spread to other places in the world and make more money
for our economy. Trade also improves the economy because it creates more jobs, not only
for our country, but the counties where we have traded with. Fast food companies like
Mc Donald’s have 26000 locations in 119 countries. With the economy growing the
quality of life can become better for people because there are more jobs and people make
more money from those jobs. Having a government telling you what business you can
run does not motivate anyone to work harder. It is the drive for success that motivates
individuals to work hard. In the USSR, the government chose what jobs people had to
have based on the individuals skills. They didn’t even let people live where they wanted
to live. If someone wanted to move to another city they would have to fill out
governmental forms and if the government approved it they would have to be put in a
place to live. The USSR also collected the farm lands and made it a collective farm or a
state farm. The government controlled the production of food the farms made, causing 3
million to starve in Ukraine. In a Socialist society, the government owns the means of
production. It handles how many products are made and how much they are sold for.
In a Capitalist system however, companies choose what prices to sell things for
which improves the competitive market therefore advancing the society. When
businesses expand to other places in the world, those places can look at the culture that
the product originated from. Our economy expands from popular products that make a
name for their company, which in turn leads to over seas trade. When it gets that kind of
recognition then, other counties would want to buy the product to sell in their own
county. A brand such as GAP that has stores in 50 other counties has opened 15 Banana
Republics in the Philippines because the fact that people there like the style and the brand
is what people want. The style is a form of our culture in a piece of clothing. The
company doesn’t only help its self but also the economy in a place like Philippines to
give people jobs. The Philippines is a third world county and trade is able to help this
county. By helping it is reducing unemployed people in the county and also improving
the average of money people would make. A GDP per capita is the average of amount of
money a person makes in the county. With more jobs the GDP per capita rate would be
able to grow higher. GDP shows a general sense of how the people of the county are
doing money wise. Counties with high GDP are the U.S., Japan, and the United
Kingdom. All three of these counties have a capitalist based system. By using a free
market economy business are able to spark competition. With improving economic
growth and stimulating innovation capitalism is superior to socialism in achieving
economic justice.
Opening Statement Con
Pure Capitalism is an economic system in which investment in and ownership of
the means of production, distribution, and exchange of wealth is made and maintained. A
pure Socialist system is a theory of social organization that advocates the putting of the
ownership and control of the means of production and distribution, of capital, land, etc…
in the community as a whole. Both alone don’t have the potential to achieve economic
justice. Capitalism is not superior to socialism rather it must work with socialism to have
a system of economic justice. A pure capitalist and a pure socialist society don’t exist
today. Instead counties have implemented different regulations and freedoms. The United
States has regulations on cigarette companies that were regulated by the government as in
no advertisements, in 1990’s individuals sued companies for the risk of smoking and so
the government made them pay for the medicals bills. This regulation was known as the
tobacco master settlement agreement.
You need to have a system where people are able to be conformable with the
money they make. A person being able to have their freedom of choice is not the only
thing they need. People need a safety net for the people who can’t work or if the system
fails. A person doesn’t need or shouldn’t have every thing regulated.
Like in the USSR which tried to follow a strict socialist system where the
government regulated the distribution of goods and people weren’t able to buy a house or
work where they wanted. The USSR controlled many things as well as the businesses.
The USSR took land from framers and made a collective or state farm. The USSR
decided of what the farms made, the farmers either made to much of one thing and to
little of the other, which caused 3 million people to starve in Ukraine. This doesn’t mean
that a socialist society is bad, the ideas of happiness for the people is adopted in other
forms.
Today we have adopted some socialist principals in the U.S. We have welfare and
we give money to people who aren’t able to support them selves, or are to poor to get the
money they need to have a decent life style. We also have social security where when
you retire and not able to work a job anymore the government sends you money so that
you yourself are still able to support your life. We do not have any pure capitalist system
we have a mixture of both. The government is able to provide loans for small business,
which can give a start to the business. Not only business but the government also gives
college loans and grants for students who can’t pay for the school at the moment. The
U.S. regulates the money for people who have a hard time supporting them selves.
America is one of the top counties with a high GDP per capita. GDP per capita is
the average a person makes in a county. A based socialist county that has adopted
capitalist qualities is China. In the beginning of the change to a socialist system China
underwent a period called the great leap forward when Mao Zedong lead the county and
focus on believing in socialist ideas. It was a complete failure when they stop producing
food, which cause a shortage in food later on. Mao had his people under go projects such
as making steel, which cause the county to suffer financially because Mao focus on his
projects and not their economy. Now China has a free market but still socialist. China is
4th in having a strong GDP rate and strength of their economy. We are saying that having
just purely on or the other is inferior. We are currently living in a combine economy with
both capitalist and socialist qualities. Capitalism would not be what it is today without
socialism our entire welfare system and social security is designed to keep people out of
absolute poverty. This is the principle of socialism. We are not auguring that socialism is
better than capitalism. We believe it takes a mixture of both. Socialism guides with the
aim of human happiness in mind, which in my opinion is economic justice. Justice is
defined as: the quality of being just or fair.