Why Leftists Want Free College: Poll Shows Americans Between 18-24 Favor Socialism Over Capitalism

According to a poll conducted between January 16-18, either college or the move out of adolescence is warping young people’s minds, as 61% of Americans between the ages of 18 and 24 reacted positively to the word “socialism” while only 58% reacted positively to “capitalism.”

The SurveyMonkey online poll of 2,777 U.S. adults showed that the young age group was the only age group that favored socialism over capitalism; among Americans between the ages of 25 and 34, 58% reacted positively to capitalism, while 51% had the same feelings about socialism. The swing toward capitalism was more and more pronounced as the respondents got older; among those aged 35-44 the advantage was 56%-38%; among those aged 45-54 the edge was 60%-32%; among those aged 55-64 the difference was 63%-29%, and finally, among those aged 65 and over the advantage for capitalism was 69%-27%.

Last August, a Gallup poll found the percentage of Democrats who viewed capitalism positively plunged from 56% in 2016 to 47% in 2018 while 57% of Democrats viewed socialism positively.

As far as young voters, Gallup reported, “Americans aged 18 to 29 are as positive about socialism (51%) as they are about capitalism (45%). This represents a 12-point decline in young adults’ positive views of capitalism in just the past two years and a marked shift since 2010, when 68% viewed it positively. Meanwhile, young people’s views of socialism have fluctuated somewhat from year to year, but the 51% with a positive view today is the same as in 2010.”

As Walter Williams, professor of economics at George Mason University, wrote last August, pointing out the calamitous effect colleges have on young people:

One might be tempted to argue that the growing contempt for liberty and the lack of civility stem from the election of Donald Trump. That’s entirely wrong. The lack of civility and indoctrination of our young people have been going on for decades. UCLA history professor Mary Corey told her class: “Capitalism isn’t a lie on purpose. It’s just a lie.” She added that capitalists “are swine. … They’re bastard people.” An English professor at Montclair State University, in New Jersey, told his students, “Conservatism champions racism, exploitation and imperialist war.”

In the spring of 2018, as The Daily Wire reported, an article published by the National Association of Scholars presented evidence that roughly 40% of colleges across the United States were lacking a Republican professor. Mitchell Langbert, an associate professor of business at Brooklyn College, wrote, “The political registration of full-time, Ph.D.-holding professors in top-tier liberal arts colleges is overwhelmingly Democratic. Indeed, faculty political affiliations at 39 percent of the colleges in my sample are Republican free—having zero Republicans.” Langbert added that of the remaining 61%, most of them featured barely more than 0% GOP professors; he noted that 78.2% of the academic departments that he sampled had either zero Republicans, or “so few as to make no difference.”

There were exceptions to the pervasive prejudice against conservatism at colleges and universities, but notably, they were primarily either religious or military colleges.