Bernie Sanders Quotes
Social Security, which transformed life for the elderly in this country, was 'socialist.' The concept of the 'minimum wage' was seen as a radical intrusion into the marketplace and was described as 'socialist.'
Sanders, Bernie. "Remarks on Democratic Socialism in the United States." Georgetown University, Washington, D.C. 19 Nov. 2015. Address.
The minimum wage has never come close to meeting this ideal criterion in any country of the world. At the same time, health insurance costs in the U. S. and some other countries has been increasing at a much greater rate than wages, making this ideal situation even more unattainable.
18 years later, his son—George W. Bush—made the “nutty idea” one of the main planks in his Presidential legislative program. After the younger Bush traveled the country selling his reform ideas, the public came down on the side of his father and rejected the President’s “nutty idea.”
Privatization is a proposal whereby individuals invest their own money in the Sock and Bond Market in an effort to get a better return than the government Social Security System produces. However, the initial cost is very high and the idea might be good for an individual hose investments pay off, but there could be no coverage for someone who invests poorly, is unlucky or whose investing agency goes bankrupt. There would be a lesser or no safety net which people would be guaranteed as they are with Social Security. In 2006 the George W. Bush administration tried to privatize the Social Security system. They failed in a major defeat for the administration.
Before America, many political thinkers believed that popular sovereignty and liberty are incompatible concepts—that the tyranny of the majority would trample liberty of all kinds of minorities: intellectuals, the wealthy, different religion, smaller religions, original thinking, cultural independence. However, Mandelbaum’s theory is that the social safety net, makes everyone wealthy to enough an extent that most will not trample others liberties for an even greater wealth. Inequality of wealth is tolerable if all have a modicum of a standard of living, but if some or many do not even have that, other’s liberties are less important than their own survival.
The argument here is that since the poor working class wages are so low, that they cannot save for an emergency, therefore the society must provide for welfare for those who might otherwise starve.
In effect this was one of the first organized systems of Social Security and disability insurance—one of the first social safety nets.
Bernard Sanders is an American politician who has served as the junior United States senator from Vermont since 2007 and as U.S. Representative for the state's at-large congressional district from 1991 to 2007. He is the longest-serving independent in U.S. congressional history, although he has a close relationship with the Democratic Party, having caucused with House and Senate Democrats for most of his congressional career. Sanders unsuccessfully sought the Democratic Party nomination for president of the United States in 2016 and 2020, finishing in second place in both campaigns. Before his election to Congress, he was mayor of Burlington, Vermont.
