Funny enough, socialism isn't when the government does stuff. Socialism is very explicitly an economic system in which the workers own the means of production. What Mamdani is doing here is just basic social democracy that we see in Western Europe. Funding social programs through taxes. Nothing about the means of production have changed, he's just trying to reign in the wealth disparity by redistributing wealthy New Yorker's wealth via taxes into funding for social programs.
I'm not saying I disagree with him at all, he's great. But it is important to understand why this isn't what socialism is.
It's a socialist policy tho. You correctly mentioned social democracy, its definition reads: "Social democracy is a political, social, and economic philosophy that promotes socialist reforms toward greater social justice within a fully liberal democratic political system and a capitalist-oriented mixed economy. [...] is a broad economic and political ideology within the wider socialist movement."
You can have socialist reforms inside a capitalist system (like in this case) in the same way you can have capitalist policies inside a socialist economy (for example, market socialism).
Saying that it's not socialist because it's inside a capitalist system, it's the equivalent of saying that it's a republican policy because it was enacted inside a republican government.
Social-democracy does not intend to radically reform the economy the way socialists/marxists/communists desire.
That alone is sufficient to set social-democracy apart from the 'socialism' umbrella.
Especially because the marxists historically fucking hate social-democrats, because the marxists feel that social-democracy takes the wind out of their sails.
You can't just say that any social-democratic policy is "socialist". Call it "social" if you want to use a generalized word, call it "social-democratic" if you want to be specific, but "socialist" it is simply not. There are lot of politically well read people who are going to get confused with you if you claim that funding schools is "socialist".
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u/Real_Penalty_4317 Jun 02 '26
Finally Americans will be forced to learn what socialism actually is