They don't even really need Socialism. They just needed an LBJ Great Society or an FDR New Deal that was still in tact.

Enough so that the vaunted middle class was still a thing a plurality of people could easily reach. That, plus a bit of long term economic and ecological planning, and they could keep the gravy train rolling for centuries.

But there's no reasoning with greed. Ayn Rand's Objectivism killed Western Liberal Democracy.