Capitalism = Wealth. Socialism = Poverty

Poland becomes capitalist in 1990 and the economy Zooms. 

Venezuela becomes socialist in 1999 and is impoverished. 

We know that these are "correlations with causation". The cause of the Zoom for Poland, the cause of the impoverishment for Venezuela, in each case, the causes were the policies followed. 

We know this because we study the individual examples. And because we have plenty of other examples out there. 

Eg: The difference between North and South Korea. Eg: The difference between the old East Germany and West Germany. North Korea, East Germany, both run as Socialist economies, both grindingly poor. South Korea and West Germany, both run as Capitalist economies, both wealthy. 

We also know that in every single country that socialism has been tried, it's failed. The people have got poorer. The economy has tanked. Repression and dictatorship abound. 

Then there's China. Socialist until the late 1970s. Then more capitalist. Aka, run by allowing market forces to operate. That was what raised hundreds of millions of Chinese out of poverty. Not socialism. But the exact extent to which the authorities allowed market forces, capitalism, to operate. That was the exact extent to which they prospered. 

I saw the effects of socialism when I first arrived in socialist China in 1976. The only vegetable you could get in winter was cabbage. Bread was unavailable. Shoes and clothes were rationed. Rice was rationed. Meat was rationed. Then Zhao Ziyang began the "Four Modernisations", the Chinese version of Market Forces. Lo! China prospered. 

Yet, in New York's Times Square, yesterday, we saw crowds of people calling for more socialism. For more Communism. For more of the "Bolivarian revolution". For Maduro do be released. For America to become socialist, communist even. 

There's no teaching some people. Some people are immune to the lessons of history. Some people will never learn the lessons of history, not matter how much you tell them. I think we just have to live with that reality and simply not let them near the levers of power. Because we know, to a moral certainly, what happens to a successful economy when you turn it Socialist. In a word: Penury. In another word: Ruination.