What we did in class on Thursday was a very unique, and somewhat fun, activity to help us understand the differences of socialism and capitalism. When we walked in to class, we all received different amounts of wealth a.k.a star bursts. Some people got no star bursts at all while others received 10. I only got 3 star bursts meaning that I was a middle class citizen. Ms. Bailey explained to us that we would play Rock Paper Scissors against each other and the winner received one of the loser's star bursts. In the beginning of the game, most people went and gambled for more star bursts while others hid theirs so that they wouldn't lose any. After awhile I noticed that Ian and Pat formed a gang and tried to go around stealing people's star bursts. Even though that may sound unfair, everything was allowed. As more and more of the star bursts went to the same people, the thievery got worse. At one point Doug was cowering in fear in the corner while he was repeatedly attacked by Pat and Ian. I even noticed, first hand, what it was like to be robbed. Catherine asked me if I could play Rock Paper Scissors with her and I agreed. I ended up winning and when I asked for a star burst she said she didn't have any. Then, later on in the game she asked again and this time I lost. Instead of calling things even Catherine took my star burst and ran off. Before I could go after her Ms. Bailey called the game to an end. After looking over what happened during the game, I thought that, overall, it was really fun to laugh when Pat and Ian failed to rob someone. I also liked the thrill of gambling for more star bursts. The entire purpose of this game, however, was not just to fool around but to simulate a capitalist economy on a much smaller scale. To simulate a socialist economy, we all got the same amount of star bursts and that was it. We didn't do any games because everyone had to have the same amount. Overall, I though that both activities were great ways to simulate socialist and capitalist economies.
Marx and Smith both had similar priorities, which were to help the poor, however, they both had extremely different ways about going about this. Marx, wanted go make a complete communist economy where the wealth is evenly distributed to everyone. This way everyone would be equal and social classes would be eliminated. Smith, however, wanted to have a free market economy. He thought that by having free commerce it would help the poor significantly. Although that is a brief overview of their theories, it's still not everything that there is.
The two theories are both good but out of the two, I personally like a capitalist economy, I would chose communism. There are many reasons why communism would not work, but I am going to focus on why it is good. In a communist economy, you can be completely positive that no one is poor. I think that both would work, but you can be happy knowing that everyone is equal. One of the reasons why I don't like a communist economy, is that fact that some people deserve more than others. Some people work harder than others yet if it's a communist economy they stay equal to someone who's lazy and doesn't want to do anything. That's the only reason why I could never stand a communist economy.
I really thought that the Socratic seminar was interesting. Everyone brought different ideas to the table and everyone thought differently. I noticed that when we talked about the activity we did Thursday, half the people didn't like the rich while others, like Doug, liked the rich people. What I thought was funny was the fact that the people who liked the rich were the rich people in the activity and the ones who didn't were poor or middle class. I heard Pat say that it was every man for himself and I thought that was interesting because he was all by himself, before him and Ian formed their gang. I think he said that only because he was alone and that's how he felt. I also heard Pat say that it felt like he would never be rich. I understand where he is coming from. If you start out rich you have less of a hill to climb than someone who wan't as lucky. For people who are born into a poor family, it seems almost impossible to ever be successful and most people quit and don't try because of it and that's why their family stays poor. Lastly, in the discussion of communism, I heard a very good point from who believe was Catherine ( I could be wrong.) She said that communism would never work because it is human nature to want more and to get ahead. That is 100% true. Not everyone, but, a lot of people are really greedy and that's the main reason why communism wouldn't work.
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