r/Social_Democracy Apr 04 '25

A Social Democratic Platform for 2025

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A Social Democratic Platform for 2025

  • The United States of America should have a universal healthcare system, and unjustifiably high drug prices should be reined in.

  • Workers' rights should be strengthened: Implement paid family leave, sick leave, and annual leave policies. Implement a ban on "captive audience meetings" (compulsory anti-union meetings organized by businesses). Implement a ban on "at-will employment" (the right of businesses to fire workers for arbitrary reasons). Increase the minimum wage. Strengthen overtime protections. Reduce the length of the standard workweek. Striking workers should no longer be excluded from accessing SNAP benefits. For some of the relevant legislation that has been proposed, see the "Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act."

  • Higher education should be affordable, and tuition-free in many cases. End the practice of usury against students and eliminate interest from student loans altogether. Restore and strengthen student loan forgiveness programs.

  • Support livable communities by promoting affordable housing, urban revitalization, and mass transit: Efforts to "decommodify" housing should be made to tackle the issues that contribute to the housing crisis. The supply of housing, especially denser, mixed-use, and mixed-income housing, should be increased. Zoning reform is necessary because of zoning laws that make it excessively difficult to build housing that is sufficient for affected communities. Rent control policies should be implemented. Limits should be placed on the speculative and corporate ownership of housing properties. The agenda for livable communities should encompass the idea of "walkable cities" in order to reduce car dependence and ideally promote civic engagement among other potential benefits. Public transportation systems (buses and high-speed rail in particular) should be greatly expanded.

  • Early childhood education should be affordable or at no cost for low-income parents, working parents, and parents who are pursuing education or participating in training.

  • Revive the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau (CFPB), and restore and strengthen consumer protections.

  • Progressive tax reform should be a top priority in order to address extreme economic inequality (wealthy conservatives seem to be increasingly emboldened to amplify a destructive agenda, extensively funding various right-wing activities and taking more direct roles in the government, in opposition to progressive policies as well as liberal norms) as well as to gather the revenue that is necessary to fund the programs that are included in this platform.

  • The Intellectual New Deal: The United States should elevate its priorities in the sciences and humanities by supporting an ambitious program to employ experts, students, researchers, writers, scientists, artists, and others in the pursuit of culture, knowledge, scientific advancement. (The Intellectual New Deal could be considered to be a vastly upgraded form of currently existing programs such as the National Institutes of Health and the National Foundation on the Arts and Humanities.)

  • Expand investments in domestic industry and alternative energy sources (solar, wind, and nuclear energy in particular) as part of a broader and environmentally conscious national industrial policy.

Elections and related issues:

  • Voting rights: Implement Automatic Voter Registration. Make Election Day a federal holiday. Implement a standard minimum of days for early voting.

  • Campaign finance reform and related issues: Enact strict limits on election spending by individuals and businesses; labor unions should remain exempt from limits on election spending. Ban the secretive practice of "dark money" in election spending. Ban members of Congress and other top members of the government from stock trading.

  • Statehood should be granted to American Samoa, Guam, Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands, and Washington D.C. (The benefits of statehood would confer their residents the full rights of American citizenship, such as voting in U.S. presidential elections and voting for actual representatives in Congress, ideally making our country, with its immense resources, more responsive to the issues that people in those places have.)

  • The Senate should be abolished. The Electoral College should be replaced with a more direct and democratic electoral system. Undemocratic systems that enable right-wing power grabs should be remedied; this is especially urgent because the Republican Party poses a multifaceted threat to the well-being of the United States and the human race. (See: the victories of Bush-Cheney 2000 and Trump-Pence 2016 in the Electoral College despite getting less votes than their Democratic opponents.)

  • The cap (which was implemented in 1929) setting a harsh limit on the number of representatives that serve in the House of Representatives should be reformed or eliminated in order to make members of Congress more responsive to their voters/constituents, especially since the population of the United States has grown a lot since about a hundred years ago, making the population of each congressional district substantially larger and essentially more removed from their representatives.

  • A "proportional representation" system should be implemented as the electoral system for Congress.

  • "Score Then Automatic Runoff" (STAR) voting should be implemented as the standard voting mechanism.

  • For some of the relevant legislation that has been proposed, see the "For the People Act."

Foreign policy and related issues:

  • The United States of America should have a humane immigration policy. This conviction stems from America's multicultural history, traditions (Exodus 23:9, Deuteronomy 10:18-19, Leviticus 19:33-34, etc.), and the intimate importance of migration in order to escape oppression and other unjust hardships.

  • The United States should support a one-state solution with equal rights in Israel/Palestine, including the right of return for Palestinians. To reconcile and ease the path to socioeconomic integration, Palestinians should receive reparations, as well as funds for Palestinian reconstruction supervised by various organizations to ensure its effectiveness. A "Truth and Reconciliation Commission" should be established to investigate human rights violations committed by all major parties during the course of the war in Gaza since October 2023 as well as preceding the war. Strategies to prevent further ethnic strife should be discussed, including programs to educate the population about aspects of the conflict. American relations with Israel during the transition under the plan for a one-state solution should be conditioned upon Israel's adherence to the terms of the transition; the terms of the transition should not be harmfully breached or used as a disguise for imperialism, colonialism, or apartheid.

  • U.S. relations with Cuba should be normalized: The status-quo is unjustly hypocritical (because of America's relations with other totalitarian nations such as China and Saudi Arabia), anachronistic (because it's a relic of the Cold War, during a time in which the United States made a number of poor and infamous decisions in order to protect American/business interests and stave off Communism), and seemingly counterproductive (because the Cuban government has remained in power, and human rights in Cuba could probably be promoted more effectively if the U.S. ends its embargo of Cuba and initiates a new era of relations between the two countries).

  • The United States should be committed to defending the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Taiwan and Ukraine, especially since these two countries are liberal democracies that are being menaced by substantially more powerful and totalitarian countries.

  • A U.S. Department of Peace and Development should be established to ensure global and domestic development along the lines of a progressive consensus that is to be reached; the United States should take a much more active and cooperative role in the world, including by contributing to solutions for the challenges that climate change poses; an economically and environmentally "just transition" should be explored in cooperation with civil society and governments throughout the world. (Some leftists want to see the decline of American influence, or soft power, in the world, but it would be much better if American influence was a progressive force in the world rather than suffering from a self-inflicted decline under reactionary leaders like Trump. A progressive USA will support left-wing allies in all countries.)

  • The annual budget for the U.S. Department of Defense should be reduced or not increased, at least for several years.

  • America's armed drone warfare should be ended because it is a terroristic policy (which seems to evades outrage partially because it avoids the use of our troops in direct combat/lethal/dangerous situations) that often results in atrocities including civilian casualties.

  • The United States should ratify the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR): It's up to a two-thirds majority in the Senate to ratify ICESCR, a United Nations treaty which many countries have already ratified (and which President Jimmy Carter signed), but has long been opposed by conservatives.

  • The United States should join the International Criminal Court (ICC). Because of opposition (mostly from conservatives/Republicans) to the ICC, the United States currently has this non-compliance in common with international pariahs like Russia, China, Israel, Saudi Arabia, and North Korea. Meanwhile, nearly all of our democratic allies (such as Canada, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Australia, and others) are at least formally adhering to the jurisdiction of the ICC.

  • The United States should issue official apologies for those who have been wronged and exploited by our country's policies. (Hopefully, this would encourage international goodwill, which has been wasted and abused by our leaders, toward the United States.)

Other issues:

  • A thorough investigation by Congress in cooperation with a Democratic administration should be conducted into the corrupt, illegal, unethical, or immoral practices, activities, and actions of the Trump administration. (Ideally, this investigation and efforts to publicize it would help the American public understand the gravity of what was happening to our country during Trump's presidency.)

  • Copyright reform: Reduce the length of copyright terms; expand the application of the fair use doctrine; promote licenses aligned with the principles of open access; establish a tax/fee on the private ownership of intellectual property by businesses (targeting academic publishers in particular).

  • The Universal Library: This is a vision to create a massive online/digital library, containing much of humanity's written intellectual and cultural heritage, for the purposes of education, enlightenment, and entertainment.

This subreddit's first political platform was posted in 2022, which you can read here: https://www.reddit.com/r/Social_Democracy/comments/x1s8um/rsocial_democracys_demands_platform/


r/Social_Democracy 15h ago

Soooo sensitive....

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r/Social_Democracy 12h ago

Man arrested with truck full of flock cameras. This is what patriotism looks like!!!

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r/Social_Democracy 8h ago

This Needs Fixed

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r/Social_Democracy 10h ago

Angie for Florida (September 7, 2026): "U.S. Senator Chris Murphy Endorses Angie Nixon for U.S. Senate in Florida" | "“Angie Nixon is proof that if we focus on the things regular people care about, Big Money doesn’t have to control our politics,” said U.S. Senator Chris Murphy."

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r/Social_Democracy 9h ago

Just saying…

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r/Social_Democracy 2h ago

The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled yesterday that the Constitution does not include a fundamental right to uncontaminated drinking water or a constitutional right to truthful information from public officials during a public healt

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r/Social_Democracy 14h ago

TIM O'HARE, MATT KRAUSE, MANNY RAMIREZ ARE UNAMERICAN

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r/Social_Democracy 6h ago

My visit with Martin Soto…

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I highly recommend you read every word and be so grateful for where you are sitting, lying, standing right now.

Because our Country is no longer the United States of America we grew up in and there is no telling where any of us will be tomorrow because this is just the start.

God no longer blesses America. There is no way a loving entity could condone any of this.


r/Social_Democracy 1d ago

decent human beings > greedy ass evil insurance companies

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r/Social_Democracy 12h ago

Covert CIA program said to be behind mysterious attacks on Galápagos/ Ecuadorian fishing boats.

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r/Social_Democracy 1d ago

Abdul El-Sayed: “It shouldn’t be this hard to afford a second bag of groceries. Shouldn’t be this hard to afford a tank of gas. Shouldn’t be this hard to pay your rent or afford a home. Should not be this hard to pay your taxes and know that money is going to be spent on you and your kids ...

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.. instead of dropping bombs or doing apartheid or genocide against somebody else and their kids”

Via Marco Foster @ MarcoFoster_

Dr. Abdul El-Sayed is the Democratic Party candidate running for the Michigan U.S. Senate seat.

Read more about his exciting corporate-free, improved Medicare For All campaign here:

Abdul El-Sayed – Michigan U.S. Senate Candidate 2026


r/Social_Democracy 10h ago

Woodlands Retirement Community honors Rosie the Riveter

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r/Social_Democracy 1d ago

Florida State Rep. Angie Nixon: Ever wonder why politicians like Rick Scott and Ashley Moody push to end Social Security? Because they own stocks. They own companies. They want you working until you die — for pennies, so they can profit on top of profit.

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Via Angie Nixon @ AngieNixon

Read more about her exciting people-powered campaign for the Florida U.S. Senate seat:

Angie Nixon for U.S. Senate | Change Can't Wait


r/Social_Democracy 15h ago

🕵️ FOLLOW THE MONEY - The Little-Known Indian-American PACs' Political Pipeline

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r/Social_Democracy 20h ago

Dem Candidate attacked at fairgrounds! THNX Really American

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r/Social_Democracy 1d ago

Republicans chose to spend $210 billion on ICE and CBP instead of funding childcare, healthcare, and housing. Remember that in November.

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r/Social_Democracy 1d ago

The US healthcare system is a scam

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r/Social_Democracy 1d ago

Congressman Jared Huffman & Bill Nye “the science guy” discuss the evangelical Christian nationalism movement behind Trump and their threat to our Democracy

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Interesting stuff.


r/Social_Democracy 1d ago

Palestinian children watching Lion King in Gaza

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r/Social_Democracy 1d ago

Trump-appointed judge leads ruling that US Constitution offers no right to clean water or truthful health-crisis information - MSN

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"A federal appeals court has ruled that the US Constitution does not guarantee Americans a right to clean drinking water, dealing a final blow to Jackson, Mississippi, residents who spent four years fighting to hold the city accountable over alleged lead contamination."


r/Social_Democracy 1d ago

Deb Haaland: I will always stand up for what makes New Mexico, New Mexico.

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Via Deb Haaland @ DebHaalandNM

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My favorite governor's race - learn more about former U.S. representative and Sec. of Interior Deb Haaland's campaign for New Mexico ⬇️; I can't wait to see her as governor!

Deb Haaland for New Mexico | Official Campaign Website


r/Social_Democracy 1d ago

Analysis Finds Up to 10 Million People Have Lost Healthcare Coverage During Trump's Second Term | Common Dreams

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r/Social_Democracy 1d ago

They're finally saying the quiet part of their insanity out loud.

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r/Social_Democracy 1d ago

And apparently he wants to rename New Mexico, "New America."

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