Do you think you can be a socialist and

[Swedes]

1. Pay for your child to be independently educated?
2. Buy a house in right catchment for the right school?
3. Feign religion to get your child into a faith school?
4. Object to a lottery system for school places with urban areas (ignoring all convenient environmental issues)?
5. Vote Tory? (because some people seem particularly confused)

I think the fairest way of achieving a more even distribution is not through taxation and subisidies/ handouts to those who happen to be at the bottom end of the pay scales (see- special housing for "key personnel" (who happen to be so poorly paid that they can't afford to live near their work sometimes) nor working families benefits to top up substandard incomes, which are patronising and demeaning to the recipients.

What we actually need a far more compressed pay structure, so for example that a teacher working 70 hours a week is not earning a very small fraction of what a management consultant with a similar level of education, and working the same number of hours, but arguably achieving less, earns. This would be the only to balance out our society suitably. It would not be popular in the short term with higher earners, but until it happens, the vast majority of us who earn and manage on peanuts are going to feel f*cked over and disenfranchised.

Didn't Ruth Kelly the former education secretary send her child to a private school?

Yup- her dyslexic 10 yr old I believe. Surprising, considering that every school in the country can be all things to all children.

Except if their mum is the former education secretary.

Courses for horses is my motto. Any kind of parti-pris in either direction is just blinkered, in my opinion.

Cushion - certainly not a telling off. I think you are a conservative with a social conscience.

ha ha just read xenia's budget.. pay everyone 200 pounds a week whether they work or not and stop tax before 10k and after 100k am not quite sure how that balances .. what a weird world that would be - why would you get out of bed for anything less than 10k when you get paid for staying in bed? How completely bonkers.

Why when we pay billions and billions in tax to support the poor do we still have homeless people?

because, rebelmum, all poverty is relative. And that's actually where Xenia's budget falls on its face in an unregulated capitalist market- after a very short adjustment period, a loaf of bread (hyperbole alert!) would cost £10,000.

Because the homeless are not just homeless because they are poor; a large proportion are mentally ill; and once you are homeless (mentally ill or not) it is very hard to claim benefits, access health care, get a job etc. and climb out of poverty.

Aren't we paying to take care of the vulnerable isn't that was socialism is about? mentally ill people fall under that umbrella surely?

Yes but if you can't access the help, you can't benefit from it.

perhaps the system that we pay for isn't working..

Not for everyone, no; targetting of benefits and resources is one of the main challenges of the welfare state. But that's certainly not an argument for cutting back. If anything, we need more resources in order to target help to the right places. It's very similar to the NHS, and of course it's all tangles up together really; education comes in there, too.

[point of order: should I say "target to" or "target in" or something else; or is target a noun not a verb anyway? I work with too many Americans.]

Yeah right that must be it they don't have enough money... plenty of money though to pay for computer projects that fail, billions, plenty of money to pay family to do ghost work, plenty of money to pay beaurocrats, .. even plenty of money to give doctors a 30% pay increase and helicopter in doctors from abroad to cover out of hours shifts ..

I'm surprised how willingly we hand over money and power without question and don't care when it's wasted and abused.

The more we hand over the more we have to work, the less time we have for ourselves and our children and for what? We don't even get a bloody pension, I would prefer to keep the money in my pocket and spend it wisely.

Swedes, I have to disagree as I think a tory with a social conscience is just someone who thincertain things should be done because it makes them feel better. That's not me at all.

I think Polly Toynbee's book, Hard Work; Life in low-pay Britain should be compulsory reading for all 16yr olds. Every adult who gives a sh*t should read it too.

A universal payment gets rid of the incentive to cheat on benefits and claim disability when you don't have it. It also pays parents who stay home and those who care for older people. It's a very fair system. It is not a particularly right wing one either.

The left always claim sole concern for those less fortunate but the right have similar concerns too but don't think they have to take the moral high ground about it all.

I don't believe there is anything wrong with someone earning more than someone else or that we have an aim to ensure everyone looks the same, eats the same, has the same IQ or even earns the same.

Personally I prefer to read Chomsky.

Xenia, I don't think many people disagree with your last statement.
Socialism isn't about redistribution of wealth to the conclusion that everyone is financially equal; That's Communism in my mind. It's about making sure we have a decent level of minimum standards. Drawing a line and making sure anyone who falls below it, is helped back up again.

Yes, it's about higher taxes for those who earn more. I'm all for a 50% band though in reality, those who earn,say, upwards of 100k only make up a small percentage of the workforce (around 5%, I think) so I'm unsure how much revenue this would raise.

I think Pragmatic Socialists, (I've decided that is how I shall describe myself from now on! ) believe that state intervention/ownership is warranted in areas were concerns over profit making need to be removed from daily provision. Health and education being the obvious but also the police and fire services.
Of course, the irony is that relience on state funds creates more budget constraints that are seen in the private sector.

The road to hell is paved with good intentions

What we actually have is a power that can go to war with any country at a whim, murder and kill masses, lie cheat and steal tax payers money, mis-spend, mis-appropriate, mis-direct funds, empower social workers to steal babies in order to meet adoption targets.. we have homeless, vulnerable mentally ill people on the streets while millions are paid in incapacity benefit. Instead of removing poverty we sustain it.

Give Government more funds? You're quite deluded.

Really, rebelmum? Linguists talking about syntax and sh*t is bad enough but when they try and apply it to 'the universe and everything'.
Maybe it's all well over my head.

Are you refering to his political writing?

Cushioncover I'd like to join your Pragmatic Socialist Party

Well it isn't perfect, but what's the alternative? A working alternative I mean, rather than an idealism.

FWIW, I think government corruption is massively over-hyped. I don't think there's a conspiracy to take away babies, just sporadic cases of bad practice. And I think that the benefit system is in a mess and isn't actually helping those who need it most. But like with the NHS, we're currently trying to fix 'an amputation with a ban-aid' (to coin a phrase)

What do you suggest then? I'm always interested in solutions.