The Nation’s Kai Wright: Race Is Why U.S. Doesn’t Have Socialism

The Nation’s Kai Wright said on Saturday’s “Melissa Harris-Perry” Saturday that the reason the United States does not have socialism is due to race.

First, host Melissa Harris-Perry said she tells her students that there is a one-word answer to the reason why there is not socialism in the United States, which Wright suggested the reason is that the structure of capitalism was sorted by race, dating back to the days of slavery.

“Could it be race?” asked Wright. “We could go way back if we’re talking about capitalism in the first instance. The whole system globally was built on slavery. The modern economy was built on cotton which was built on financing, financing slaves.

“And so from that moment forward, we’ve been in a discussion about capital capitalism in the United States that has, in fact, sorted people by race. And so when we get back to sort of the public investments that we make in people and that part of Democratic socialism that has been challenged and difficult particularly in modern times because, coming out of the great society, coming out of the mid-20th century, we have had a politics that makes those public investments give a ways to black people,” he added.

Follow Trent Baker on Twitter @MagnifiTrent