Relatively ancient and inactive
Ultimo, Sweden isn't truly a socialist country. It's considered a country which successfully took the 'middle way'. While most of the businesses and such are privately-owned, which is not how a socialist state would function, at the same time, high taxes allow for free education and security for its citizens. If your company throws you out, for whatever reason, you'd still be making 75% or so while you look for your other job, and there's a culture of shame of being unemployed. I think that this security can make people much happier, and indeed, Sweden ranks as happier than the US by most indicators. Where the government plays a large role, amazing things can happen. I've been to Stockholm, and they have bicycle paths along major roads. A pretty simple way to stave off obesity, cut emissions, etc, isn't it?
It must be noted that while I believe Sweden is the closest to socialism, all of Europe is more or less like this, especially in Scandinavia. Denmark shares Sweden bicycle culture is also largely a welfare state in that it supports those without a job, and I believe that education is free there as well. Norway is a bit different, because of its geography; a lot of people are scattered. I haven't been to Oslo proper, so I can't tell you much about that, but I believe Norway also heavily subsidizes unemployment and allows for free education. At the same time, they might not even need to tax people heavily, because they're a major energy exporter to Europe, and all that wealth is spread among less than 5 million people. Also, I highly recommend the Norwegian fjords for travel; I took a bus tour and only spent three days there, but it was amazing. Ignore the cities (boring), go for the nature (waterfalls, lakes, mountains, roads built right near a sheer drop into the abyss with a beautiful view, etc)
Now, my argument for socialism. First of all, people arguing against it like to bring up that there has never been a truly prosperous socialist country. I believe that this is because there have never been enough socialist countries. A socialist economy is inherently less efficient than capitalism, because it would have less control and the employees would have less incentive to work, because they are paid
something anyway (compared to people starting new companies in the US, who usually don't get an income until after a few years). For this reason, a socialist country cannot have free trade with a capitalist country. The socialist country's economy would crumble, as happened when the USSR disintegrated. So socialist countries have to trade, for the most part, with other socialist countries. During the Cold War, these included the USSR and Eastern Europe (and, technically, the Asian 'communists', but those were really bad at making stuff). Eastern Europe was traditionally the most economically underdeveloped portion of Europe, and throughout the Cold War the USSR supported a lot of bad, weird leaders, like Nicolae Ceauşescu, to maintain political power in the region. Still, I read a few articles recently that showed that a lot of people in Eastern Europe had nostalgia for socialist times (exacerbated, of course, by the crisis, but still). The socialist bloc didn't have access to cheap labor in Indonesia or India, and were self-sufficient in most ways (except agriculturally; the USSR had to buy grain from the US).
Factors working against the USSR during the Cold War included the devastation brought upon by WWII, and the needed reconstructing of so much of the infrastructure; the climate, increasing the cost of maintaining its infrastructure and reducing crop yields; its vast size (3x the size of the US, I believe), requiring more resources to facilitate travel and creating travel infrastructure like railroads, etc. Despite this, it managed to compete in the military and high-tech fields with a country trading with the rest of the world and exchanging ideas with the likes of France, Western Germany, and Great Britain (also, the US got most of Germany's scientists after WWII, so that definitely helped). The USSR also managed to give its citizens a decent living, and the economy developed until, after Brezhnev got into power, the economy started stagnating (I heard it was because it was becoming more complex).
So, the USSR was a rather imperfect picture of what a socialist country could develop into. If it wasn't competing with the US (really? 40k tanks, 10k nuclear warheads and a few dozen thousand missiles), or if it was a bit more democratic, or if it had a better system of checks and balances, it could've been much nicer. Plus, the 'efficiency' of capitalism can actually be questioned when you look at the products themselves. Back in Russia, we have a 40-year-old Soviet refrigerator that's still running. In the US, products break down often, are sometimes sabotaged to get you to buy more, and are often replaced even if in fine working condition (cars?). Because of this, I think that it's possible for a socialist country, running maybe 20% behind capitalist countries in efficiency, to provide its citizens with the same services as a capitalist country.
There's also the argument that a socialist country is capable of controlling emissions and usage of resources, which I believe in. Fossil fuels are running out, fusion isn't invented yet, and a socialist country could make the transition to a less-energy-using economy better (in the political sense. It's not happening in the US, is it?). Same with controlling emissions or overpopulation (proof on the second one: One child act in China).
Anyway, this isn't really as fancy a response as I imagined it should be, but I think it's fairly comprehensive and debate-inducing
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