The question of whether the Nazis were socialists is a recurring one, and a recent Reason article argues the answer is mixed. On economic policy, the Nazis embraced statist central planning, as reflected in the party's full name and its Four Year Plan, which was modeled on Soviet Five Year Plans. The article cites historians Adam Tooze and Götz Aly, noting that government military spending reached about 20% of GDP before World War II and that the regime created a massive welfare state funded partly by plunder and "soak the rich" taxation.
However, the article identifies a key ideological difference: the Nazis believed in racial hierarchy, with the state serving "Aryan" Germans while targeting Jews, Slavs, and others for slavery or extermination. Socialism, by contrast, is egalitarian, urging workers of all backgrounds to unite and condemning discrimination. This distinction matters in theory, but the article argues it is greater in theory than in practice, since socialist governments have often persecuted minorities despite their stated ideals.
The source concludes that the Nazi economic system was far closer to socialist central planning than to capitalism, even though most means of production remained privately owned. It also notes that the difference between Nazi and socialist practice narrows once socialists take power, a point with implications for current debates over democratic socialism and statist nationalism.