If you become familiar with the concept of economics, the economic system in a socialist society, you will be surprised. There are no markets, no satisfaction of demand, no competition, nothing. There is a consumption plan where the "elders" decide how many pairs of socks you need and which ones, how much pasta and sugar, as well as toilet paper, medicines and watches! And nobody cares about your taste, desires, plans. This is socialism. But if you get acquainted with the economic model in the communist state, I'm afraid your eyes will twitch and you will be tormented by a couple of days of sleepiness
That is not socialism, that is dictatorship. If one person decides what you will wear and how many socks you will have, how could that be a democracy? Do you really believe that someone else deciding how many socks I could have could ever be democracy? Impossible, hence it is not socialism neither, it could be considered communism instead.
What western nations run by capitalism doesn't tell you that socialist nations like Spain, France, Norway, Finland, Sweden, even UK in some things (and ruthless capitalist in others) all are run by socialistic values, free healthcare, free education, free meals to kids at school, all paid by taxes, those are socialist values, and yet you can still elect a capitalist or a militarist or whatever else you want, because it is democracy, and you can go buy any sock you want, nobody would stop you from doing that.
Very correctly noticed about non-compliance!
But there is a nuance - this is how socialism was built by the USSR and its henchmen, in the form of a dictatorship, with a total dictatorship, with a restriction of rights and freedoms! Namely, by “feeding” people with a beautiful idea (you must admit that socialism is a quality idea), they perverted the implementation and built an objectively terrible world of terror and violence, where a person was only a resource for achieving the goals of a handful of dictators! Imagine what the inhabitants of the USSR were brought to, that for an attempt to sell JEANS, people were actually sentenced to capital punishment, i.e. death penalty by firing squad! No, I have not lost my mind, and not under drug intoxication, this is REALITY from the USSR, "the country of developed socialism" (here is an example
https://lovetalk.ru/groups/interesnie-fakti/djinsi-kak-prestuplenie-kak-eto-bilo-v-sssr /, Google will translate). This was the face of "Soviet socialism"! And the price of "free", in the USSR, education, medicine (by the way, of a disgusting quality for the most part), was work for a beggarly salary. For example, about the same jeans - the average salary in the USSR was 120-150 rubles / month, and jeans cost 200-250 rubles, and someone had to bring them from Western countries.
I will add that the countries you mentioned did not build 100% socialism, but they took a lot of it and implemented it into their system, and they did it much better!
