Letter to the Editor: Capitalism and socialism co-exist in America

Last week an independent voter shared with me a concern that some people fear that socialism (business run by government) will ruin America.

So let us first examine two definitions – one for capitalism, and one for socialism – as these seem to be the foundation for the concerns being voiced today.

In very broad strokes, capitalism is based on private business dominating the economy for the purpose of generating wealth for the owners or stockholders by extracting it from working people who are paid only a small fraction of what their labor produces. Socialism turns this around so the class that...