Capitalism vs. Socialism (w/ Chris Freiman & Matt McManus)

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What’s the best economic system for achieving prosperity, while maximizing liberty and autonomy? Capitalists give one answer, socialists another.

Capitalists say that free markets not only produce wealth, but that wealth then empowers workers to have more say over their conditions and more freedom to exit from bad working situations, as well as experiment with different workplace organizational structures.

Socialists might counter that capitalism concentrates so much power in the hands of owners and bosses that workers have little or no say in their circumstances, and lack the resources to exit or organize.

To dig into this debate between socialism and capitalism, I’m joined by two guests today. First is socialist, and frequent ReImagining Liberty guest, Matt McManus (@MattPolProf). He’s a Lecturer at the University of Michigan and the author of, among other books, The Rise of Postmodern Conservatism.

Taking the capitalist side is Christopher Freiman (@cafreiman), associate professor of philosophy at William & Mary, and author of Unequivocal Justice and Why It’s OK to Ignore Politics.

ReImagining Liberty is a project of The UnPopulist, and is produced by Landry Ayres. Podcast art by Sergio R. M. Duarte.

Music: Finding the Balance by Kevin MacLeod | Link | License