A microcosm of socialism’s inevitable failure
Bookworm on Apr 20 2009 at 1:26 pm | Filed under: Socialism
Got this in an email from Richard Baehr:
An economics professor at Texas Tech said he had never failed a single student before but had, once, failed an entire class. That class had insisted that socialism worked and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer.
The professor then said “Okay, we will have an experiment in this class on socialism.” All grades would be averaged and everyone would receive the same grade so no one would fail and no one would receive an A.
After the first test the grades were averaged and everyone got a B. The students who studied hard were upset and the students who studied little were happy.
But, as the second test rolled around, the students who studied little had studied even less and the ones who studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too; so they studied little. The second test average was a D! No one was happy.
When the 3rd test rolled around the average was an F. The scores never increased as bickering, blame, name calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for the benefit of anyone else.
All failed, to their great surprise, and the professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great; but when government takes all the reward away; no one will try or want to succeed.
Could not be any simpler than that….
Related posts:
- Fear of death and the failure of secularism
- A microcosm of everything that’s wrong with too much government
- The significant failure in Obama’s speech
Email This Post To A Friend
14 Responses to “A microcosm of socialism’s inevitable failure”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
I’d like to think this actually happened, but it sounds too much like the parable of Twentieth Century Motors in Atlas Shrugged. Are there any specifics to be cited that could be used to verify it one way or the other?
Looks like it’s probably a parable. I like it though.
http://www.snopes.com/college/exam/socialism.asp
I doubt the university thought police would allow such experiments to go on, Book. They would have shut it down once they heard the students gossiping.
It is an experiment that is true in its conclusions, but no university will allow such things. For it teaches the students too much, Book. Too much.
A couple of articles that I think are on topic.
1. Concerning the inevitable result of socialism in the USA.
I’d thought Steven Chapman of the Chicago Tribune was a leftist, but this is an incredibly fair article on the Tea Party Protest. GREAT points, an encouraging read.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/04/19/the_truths_behind_the_tea_parties_96054.html
2. Russia
This article is just plain-out frightening about what happens to such a society when socialism itself collapses. Mark Steyn made all the same points in “America Alone”, which is a wonderful read; my favorite conservative book of the last few years.
http://www.worldaffairsjournal.org/2009%20-%20Spring/full-Eberstadt.html
Hi, MikeD!
To be fair to Texas-born Steven Chapman, he has always billed himself a “libertarian”. I would think that the Tea Party Protests were exactly his cup of tea. The most popular flag there was “Don’t tread on me!” (I really need to get me one of those by Memorial Day).
What, you might be asking, is socialism?…
Bookie has an answer worthy of your time: Got this in an email from Richard Baehr: An economics professor at Texas Tech said he had never failed a single student before but had, once, failed an entire class. That class……
I was pretty sure when the professor wasn’t named that the story was a parable. However, for every one of you who was forced, in school, to work with a random group to prepare a project, you know from experience that some worked, some coasted. I started as a worker, realized I didn’t like carrying coasters on my back, and became a coaster too. And because this was all New Age schooling, where the results were graded on feelings (because San Francisco pioneered so many educational trends), it didn’t matter. But I’m definitely a loner when it comes to work. The only time I’ll work with a group is when they all have a dog in the fight, such as a group of lawyers preparing for trial, all of whom risk malpractice or mere humiliation.
It didn’t work for the Pilgrims either.
Danny L #5
>> The most popular flag there was “Don’t tread on me!” (I really need to get me one of those by Memorial Day).
Awesome, Danny. And I was thinking the same thing. Nothing like TWO flags waving outside in the American breeze.
- The Stars And Stripes.
- And the “Don’t You Dare Fricking Tread On Me, Obama, You Freak, DO YOU HEAR ME?” Flag. OK, I’m embellishing.
Socratease, the reason it sounds like Ayn Rand’s story about 20th Century Motors is because that’s the way socialism is always going to work. There isn’t another story to tell. But damned fools like Barack Obama are always going to think that human nature is infinitely malleable, and they are just the ones to do the hammering.
I have taught for 31 years and have NEVER assigned a group project, specifically because of my experience with them as a student. I was the guy who actually CARED about my grade, so guess who did most of the work?
We’re constantly being urged to get with the program and institute “cooperative learning” techniques, but I’ll be retiring with my personal record intact.
MikeD…we’d better get to it, as it appears that many sites are sold out of these flags.
Be careful to get the yellow (Gadsden) flag carried by America’s first Marines or snake on 13-bars and stripes (Navy Ensign) flown by the American navy. The white Culpepper Flag is also a (beautifully designed) revolutionary flag but it was briefly flown by Virginia Confederates, so it could be used against us by the Left nutroots.
My two flags will fly side-by-side across the street from a two families of hard-core Obama supporters.
The old Marxist slogan “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need” is a noble ideal. According to Acts, early Christian communities took care of one another in exactly that way.
But with a very important difference. Among the early Christians, the help given by the able to the needy was done voluntarily. Under socialism it’s no longer voluntary. Under socialism, if you are among the able, the state decides how much you will give and to whom it will be given.
There is no longer anything noble in that. It’s just a lousy deal for those who are able.
There is of course never “equality of rewards” under *real* socialist governments: it’s just that the rewards are in different form (free dachas, access to special stores, government-supplied cars & drivers) and are allocated in substantial part according to political criteria. No one should assume that what Barack & his friends want is really “equality of rewards”…they want to ensure that the rewards go to *people like them*. This is really all largely about *horizontal* class struggle rather than *vertical* class struggle.
As a side note, there is far too much “equality of rewards” in the typical American corporation today. Far too many companies are compensating for the economic problems with across-the-board salary freezes and cuts. This will hae implications when they lose their “A” players and are left with the mediocrities.