Capitalism, Socialism, and Communism

In class, an activity showing what communism, socialism, and capitalism are was conducted.  Everyone was given 3 Hershey kisses besides two other people who were given 10 Hershey kisses. The two people with 10 pieces of chocolate were supposed to represent the wealthy and the other people represented the poor. Then, the students were instructed to go around the room and play rock-paper-scissors with other people. If you won you would receive a piece of chocolate from the losing person, and if you lost you would give up a Hershey kiss. When you lost all of your pieces you sat down.  At the end of the game some people had a lot of kisses and some people had none.  Mrs. Gallagher then collected the candy and gave everyone 3 pieces so everyone got an equal amount of chocolate. The second round of the activity the students had the choice to play or not to play. At first the students said the game was fun, but then the game became extremely frustrating because you got what you had earned taken away and then everyone got the same amount. The purpose of the lesson was to show capitalism, socialism, and communism in a way that the students could understand them more. It was showing capitalism when you started out with your own candy and you got to choose who you were going to play against. Also, it shows capitalism when some people were winning while other people were losing. It shows socialism when Mrs. Gallagher collected the candy at the end of the game and redistributed 3 to everyone. The goal of socialism was to bring economic equality and aim for classless society. Lastly, the game shows communism because the students could refuse to play and would just agree to share candy without the need for teacher supervision.

Although Marx and Smith had very different approaches, they both seemed to want to help the poor. Marx approach was capitalism, socialism, and communism. He thought that the poor would benefit the most from a classless society. He thought this because the poor would be given equal opportunities as everyone else. Smith, on the other hand, created a theory called “the Invisible Hand”. The invisible hand theory is the theory that the government would not control the economy and the market naturally would take care of itself.  He thought this would help the poor because it gave them a chance to purchase higher quality goods for a cheaper price. They would be able to buy things they couldn't before.

Out of the two theories I think Smith’s is the best because it gives poor people new opportunities to buy goods they could not afford before.  Also, it gives people the opportunity to work for their own wealth and not have it taken away. 

Here is a link to a video further explaining the "Invisible Hand" theory:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulyVXa-u4wE&feature=youtu.be