First posted on Instagram
More than 200 people filled the University of Georgia Chapel in Athens, Georgia, on Wednesday, October 21, 2026, for a capitalism-versus-socialism debate hosted by Young Americans for Freedom at the University of Georgia, part of its "Freedom at 250" debate series in collaboration with The Daily Wire. University of Georgia international affairs professor B. Bryan Barber moderated. The debate pitted Tim Denson, a former Athens mayoral candidate endorsed by Athens Area Democratic Socialists who identifies as a democratic socialist, against Daniel Di Martino, a Venezuelan-born economist and fellow at the Manhattan Institute who sits on Young America's Foundation's advisory board.
Denson, a team leader at Advantage Behavioral Health Systems' Homeless Day Service Center, argued that the current system is failing Americans and pressed the case for democratizing the workplace, using Walmart as his example: the workers, he argued, should own the business, be paid better, have better benefits, and be able to vote collectively on the future direction of the business, on their pay, and on prices. He said he had worked with people who died overnight in their tents "because of the way our system treats people," and said he grew up in a home marked by housing instability. He rejected putting the argument in rigid capitalism-versus-socialism terms and acknowledged that Venezuela is a socialist country, while arguing that factors beyond socialism are behind its problems.
Di Martino answered from his own experience of Venezuela. "I care about [this debate] because I lived both sides," he said. "When I lived in Venezuela, we needed to carry packs of cash to buy whatever we needed. ... That's what socialism was for me." He argued that socialism means government control over the means of production, which threatens democracy, saying: "In Venezuela, they never banned newspapers, they just couldn't buy paper. How can you have a democracy when the government itself controls your economic activities?" He said he was surprised Denson identified as a socialist while recognising Venezuela as a socialist country, given conditions there, and argued that democratic control over major industries would mean government-run grocery stores, oil companies and hospitals. He also argued that wealth should be created, not divided, pointing to Elon Musk building Tesla and SpaceX, and said the idea of workers owning the means of production was a large part of communism in the Soviet Union.
Di Martino's sharpest line of the night drew the exchange to its point: "It's very easy to be a socialist in a capitalist country. It's illegal to be a capitalist in a socialist country," he said. "The point of this is: this has already failed." Denson responded that constant economic growth under capitalism drives wealth inequality and worker exploitation, and that workers should have a say in a company's future; when Di Martino noted that multiple SpaceX employees became millionaires overnight after the company's public debut in June, Denson argued that was simply a stock share programme that created wealth without translating into actual power.
The two men did agree on one thing: eliminating parking minimums, the zoning requirement that buildings provide a certain number of off-street parking spaces. Di Martino said parking minimums raise housing costs in New York, and Denson thanked him, saying he had "took some big hits" on the issue in the mayoral election. In the audience-question session, one attendee called the debate "a spectacle" and questioned whether it could deepen division; Denson said he did not think it was a productive form of discussion, while Di Martino disagreed, saying: "If I thought this wasn't productive, I wouldn't be here. But it is productive. ... And I care about this because Venezuela was destroyed."