I am sorry, but the late socialist Soviet Union is a really bad example here - you want to compare 2 democracies with different economic attitudes, like the US and Germany (today).
The Soviet Union had a lot of problems that prevented the people there from the life they deserved. There were many monkey businesses from the US side, too.
Gorbachev tried to fix it and steer the system from a shitty corrupted communism to a more western socialism. Unfortunately for him the russians and honestly the rest of the world, he failed.
Remember it's never either this or that. The best system takes the good part from every attitude. The rigid, dichotomic attitude of the last century is the root of the problem, not communism or capitalism.
The Soviet Union had a lot of problems that prevented the people there from the life they deserved. There were many monkey businesses from the US side, too.
Gorbachev tried to fix it and steer the system from a shitty corrupted communism to a more western socialism. Unfortunately for him the russians and honestly the rest of the world, he failed.
Remember it's never either this or that. The best system takes the good part from every attitude. The rigid, dichotomic attitude of the last century is the root of the problem, not communism or capitalism.