Gar Alperovitz and Thomas M. Hanna write an article in The Nation which addresses the taboo subject of public ownership.
Proposals for public ownership will of course be attacked as “socialism,” but conservatives call any progressive program—to say nothing of the modest economic policies of the Obama administration—“socialist.” However, many Americans are increasingly skeptical about the claims made for the corporate-dominated “free” enterprise system by its propagandists. A recent Pew Research Center poll found that a majority of Americans have an unfavorable view of corporations—a significant shift from only twelve years ago, when nearly three-quarters held a favorable view. At the same time, two recent Rasmussen surveys found Americans under 30—the people who will build the next politics—almost equally divided as to whether capitalism or socialism is preferable. Another Pew survey found that 18- to 29-year-olds have a favorable reaction to the term “socialism” by a margin of 49 to 43 percent.
A far better solution is the Capital Homesteading Act, which employs effective financial mechanisms to simultaneously broaden private, individual ownership in the FUTURE building of our economy, which will result in the rebuilding of our crumbling infrastructure and the building of the FUTUE economy, wherein EVERY American has the opportunity to become financially self-sufficient and affluent through the income source of stock ownership dividends. This is an approach that broadens private, individual ownership of corporations and empowers the individual and individual choice and financial self-sufficiency, and generates the expanded wealth to create a tax base to support the legitimate functions of government. It solves the problem of CONCENTRATED OWNERSHIP of the productive capital assets of corporations among the 1 percent of the population, and is a far better alternative to “public ownership,” which results in government by the wealthy evidenced at all levels today, government policies that redistribute income in one form or another, and totalitarian government. The end result of Capital Homesteading policies is that citizens would become empowered as owners to meet their own consumption needs and government would become more dependent on economically independent citizens, thus reversing current global trends where all citizens will eventually become dependent for their economic well-being on our only legitimate monopoly –– the State –– and whatever elite controls the coercive powers of government.
Support the Capital Homestead Act at http://www.cesj.org/homestead/index.htm and http://www.cesj.org/homestead/summary-cha.htm
http://www.thenation.com/article/168026/beyond-corporate-capitalism-not-so-wild-dream#
