“We must put an end to the garbage of socialism once and for all,” declared Argentine President Javier Milei during his speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference.
Milei used the occasion to celebrate Donald Trump’s election victory and hailed what he described as the “new winds of freedom.”
In his remarks, Trump described socialism as “one of the most serious challenges” facing the world today. He also pledged, “I will never let socialism destroy America.”
Milei and Trump share a strong opposition to socialism, a sentiment echoed by Allison Huynh, a highly successful Silicon Valley entrepreneur who fled communist Vietnam.
“Communism isn’t sustainable, and the will of the people is not for socialism or communism,” Huynh said. “It was a theory put out by Karl Marx, and over more than a hundred years, it has proven to be a failed strategy.”
History supports this view. During the Cold War, communist regimes maintained their grip on power through authoritarian rule, close alignment with the military, and severe restrictions on rights and freedoms.
These governments feared that access to information or free elections would lead people to choose representative democracy and a capitalist system, where individuals could retain the fruits of their labor.
Notably, after the Cold War ended, none of the former Soviet bloc countries, including Russia, remained communist, further underscoring the unsustainable nature of such systems.
In an interview, Javier Milei detailed why he despises socialism/communism, drawing on his expertise as a trained economist.
Milei holds a PhD and is a member of the Austrian school of economics, the same tradition in which this article’s author was educated through the Mises Institute.
Austrian economics, founded by Carl Menger in the late 19th century, focuses on individual choice, subjective value, and the efficiency of markets in resource allocation. Ludwig von Mises later brought these ideas to the United States, shaping their influence on modern libertarian and free-market thought.
Austrian economists advocate for limited government, individual liberty, and free markets, warning against the dangers of centralized economic planning and emphasizing the importance of private property rights.
These principles strongly overlap with American conservative values, particularly in their shared focus on personal responsibility, economic freedom, and skepticism toward government intervention.
Milei highlighted the primary reasons why communism and socialism fail, echoing arguments Ludwig von Mises made a century ago. Austrian economists explain that these systems lack the critical information needed to allocate resources efficiently.
In a free market, prices communicate essential data about supply, demand, and value, guiding decisions. When people choose not to buy something, they signal that the product isn’t worth its current price, prompting companies to adjust.
If a company can’t lower the price, it stops producing the product, avoiding wasted resources. To stay profitable, businesses are driven to create higher-quality, lower-cost products that people actually want.
Markets are dynamic, driven by a constant flow of information between buyers and sellers that fosters daily efficiency and innovation. By contrast, no government-run “Ministry of Pricing” could ever determine the right prices, quantities, or types of products to produce, leading to inevitable waste and mismanagement.
Socialism fails because it cannot gather or process the vast amount of information needed to manage society effectively.
In a free market, pricing information flows naturally from every transaction, allowing consumers to signal their preferences to sellers at no cost. Companies can immediately decide how to adjust their products or prices without waiting for a government task force or bureaucracy to intervene.
This process happens in real-time. A seller might lower prices, throw in a discount card, change the color, install a cup holder, or add extra incentives to attract buyers, constantly adapting to consumer needs.
By contrast, a government would require significant time and manpower to gather data, write reports, and implement laws. Even then, their recommendations might be outdated by the time they are enacted, leaving them perpetually behind in responding to what people actually want and need.
The final reason socialism fails is that it is unnatural. Even without formal education, a person instinctively knows to trade a fish for two coconuts rather than one—or to hold out for a pineapple if they don’t like coconuts.
This natural decision-making is rooted in individual choice and value, which socialism suppresses. In communist countries, strict laws criminalize capitalism, profit-making, and selling goods or labor at higher prices, with violators often facing imprisonment.
In contrast, capitalist systems allow individuals the freedom to sell their goods or labor at any price—even at a loss—without legal repercussions, because it’s their choice.
Socialism, however, demands not only draconian enforcement but also the elimination of choice. Without the profit motive, producers have no incentive to improve products, make them efficiently, or even determine what people truly want.
This leads to inevitable surpluses of unwanted goods and shortages of necessities. Over time, socialism breeds chaos, poverty, scarcity, and, often, violence, as it stifles the natural forces that drive innovation and prosperity.
