Three quarters of Greeks think that government plans to cut the country's huge budget deficit are "socially unfair" because they are aimed at low-income earners, a poll has showed.North Americans need to understand the various meanings of the word "socialism", especially when used in the European context. In North America the word is frequently used as a propaganda buzz word, almost a curse word, with little other meaning except that it has something to do with government involvement. But in Europe, because socialism often carried the connotations of social/economic justice, the word has often been adopted by capitalist and even fascist parties in order to provide a veneer of legitimacy to European governments.
In Greece the ruling party is labeled as socialist, but is in fact a capitalist party that has promoted some limited welfare type programs. Most politically aware people identify such parties as "social-democratic" to distinguish them from genuine "socialist" parties in the Marxist sense, i.e, parties which promote extensive public ownership of the economy that is managed by working people. Social-democratic parties may also support government ownership of a few important industries, but the private ownership class is always the politically dominant class in such countries.