I think the catalyst for our disposal of communal property happened when Reagan cut taxes and spending – which, to a very large degree, was very rewarding for the middle class, and, as I mentioned, ‘mostly a good idea’.

But instead of thoughtfully and marginally re-evaluating our approach to communal welfare (small ‘w’), it became very conveniently and totally villianized.

(BTW, for our readers, I wanted to point out that Dr. Bob has a PhD from Harvard in Healthcare Policy and Management, and advises on regional heathcare government policy.)

I would add that the majority of Americans who vote with their “pocketbook” don’t also realize the effect of moving previously communally purchased goods (via govt. taxation) into the realm of individually purchased goods (via markets). With health care, education, retirement, elder care, child care, and the like all becoming “buy what you can afford” items rather than things we share in, we have created a downward spiral of both sentiment for and presence of communally purchased goods. When combined, these items provide an implied tax rate much higher than those “socialized’ countries (ie all the other OECD countries, which are all democracies, and all capitalistic but choose to provide some basic services to all citizens for reasons of both economic and social efficiency).

Linked to ideas of “big wasteful government” and socialism, such ideas have been demonized during the majority of the past 20 years (12 of which under republican administrations that favored supply side subsidies (Reaganomics, trickle down, oil, the list goes on)). This in turn has led to the wealth divide you so aptly point out. The real danger is that we have lost our focus on the need for things like education, health care, and social supports. Perhaps it is that people are being controlled by both fear and misinformation, no doubt due in some part to their inability to reason deductively about the arguments being used. I say this not as a criticism to one party or the other, but only in the face of real data that the United States lags behind the economies of other countries, lags behind the well being of other countires, lags behind the educational attainment of other countries, all while saddling its citizens with incredible debt for things that those in other countries enjoy as a civic good.