Commentary
Act I—Back From the Future
I’m from Argentina, and when I hear New York City’s mayor-elect, Zohran Mamdani, speak about “democratic socialism” as a path to “social justice,” I feel like someone who has already watched the entire movie. I’ve watched the prequel, the sequel, the reboot, and even the director’s cut. Different actors, different scripts, different settings—but always the same finale.In Argentina, that film ran for more than a century under constantly changing, always appealing titles—“Inclusion,” “Equality,” “Solidarity,” “Rights”—and always with the same results. Rising inflation, expanding welfare dependence, collapsing incentives to work, and entire families living off government aid for generations, because earning a wage was no better than, and often no different from, receiving a welfare check. A once-prosperous nation slowly drained itself of productivity, individual agency, and opportunity—all while the narrative insisted it was heading toward a happy ending.
Act II—‘Democratic Socialism’: A New Genre?
The problem with this latest installment in the franchise, “Democratic Socialism,” isn’t the title itself—it’s the structure behind it. Adding the word democratic doesn’t change the genre. It doesn’t make the movie any less socialist or any less destructive. Its logic depends on the assumption that the state can play the role of the good guy.But history, including and especially Argentina’s most recent history, tells a different story. Every time the state tries to play the hero, the finale is always the opposite: more control, less individual agency, weaker incentives to work, and an economy increasingly dependent on political decisions instead of individual choice.
Act III—The ‘New’ Plot of New York’s Remake
A smiling mayoral candidate wins the election by promising price controls, rent freezes, and higher taxes on “the rich” to fund “free” buses, day care, health care, and supermarkets. The message sounds generous, modern, humane—the kind of character audiences are primed to love.But here comes the plot twist: There’s no such thing as a free lunch. State resources don’t materialize out of thin air, but come from taxes that suffocate the productive sector, discourage investment, and ultimately punish the most vulnerable. Someone always pays the bill—and in this script, that “someone” is the city’s taxpayers.
Act IV—The NeverEnding Story
In Argentina, every four years, a candidate would rise to power by promising to “tax the rich,” regulate businesses, and shield the population with endless subsidies—cheap electricity, “free” TV, controlled food prices, discounted bus fares.Surprise, surprise, the real burden always fell on the working class—prices rose, salaries shrank, savings evaporated, and businesses either shut down or fled. New sequels kept coming out—new faces, new slogans, new posters, but always the same script, with the same consequences. The only difference is that the outcome was worse with each remake, as the economy deteriorated a little more each time.
Act V—Even More Villains Join the Cast
Some movies have more than one bad guy—and Argentina always had one too many, except for the real villains. Everybody (except politicians) was to blame—the rich, business owners, the stock exchange, the IMF, the United States—anyone could be accused of “ruining the economy” and “causing inflation.” And time and again, landlords were cast as the perfect antagonists, as evil speculators who supposedly wanted nothing but to exploit tenants.That’s how politicians in Argentina came up with the so-called Rent Law—a regulation that controlled rental prices and conditions. It initially looked like help for tenants, but then came the plot twist: Landlords withdrew their properties from the market, prices rose, and supply collapsed.
Construction, one of the country’s key job-creating industries, came to a screeching halt. Eventually, even the housing market went underground, with most landlords switching to Airbnb and other short-term rental platforms to escape price controls and the severe distortions created by exchange-rate regulations.
Act VI—Coming Soon: ‘The Bureaucratic Monster’
In this latest sequel, Mamdani might manage to implement his program—but someone will have to run it. And in politics, that “someone” always turns into something bigger: new departments, new agencies, new offices—a state that multiplies like a monster you keep feeding.More bureaucracy always means more spending, more gatekeepers, and more opportunities for corruption. A bloated state doesn’t just spend more; it hands out more favors, demands more obedience, and inserts itself into every corner of private life. What begins wrapped in the rhetoric of “social justice” always ends the same way: a bureaucratic monster that expands—and never stops eating.
Act VII—‘The Warning’ (Finale)
The final scene shows a society that begins to feel entitled to things being “free” and so demands even more free things, again and again. But as this mindset spreads, the link between cause and consequence fades. Value becomes invisible. Responsibility dissolves. And something much darker takes its place: a culture that stops rewarding merit and begins to believe that comfort is a right and effort is optional.It is an illusion that looks ideal on the surface but always ends with fewer opportunities, deeper dependency, and a poorer future. Over time, it reshapes incentives, expectations, and even character—until dependency feels normal and freedom feels expendable. The final scene leaves us with the real lesson:
“Democratic socialism” destroys not only economies but also the very cultures that sustain them.
From the Foundation for Economic Education