That is a feature not a buck. The meaning of life should not be given by the society as a whole, but should be created or taken from a different place than the politcal power that creates the economy and with that a significant part of the living conditions. The separation of the authority, that can use violance to enforce the rules it has created - the state - and those who offer advice to meaning of life - religious groups - is a necessary condition for a truly pluralistic country.
It is a heavy, perhaps a terrible, burden for humans to be free in this decision, but your society has to become a prison or a hell, when you want to take this burden away from the people, who have found all their different meanings on their own so far.

And as those people with all their different views on the world somehow have to interact as the world has become much too small, that everybody can live on his own, and the fruits of cooperation have become so sweet, that nobody wants to miss them, people need to communicate with each other in a language, that is as free as possible of the beliefs of the individual. The words of this language are the numbers before the sign of your currency.
Yes in this language, a person is equal to a vessel of work, but would you really want to have it different? Do you want, that all, what you really are, is part of the deal, and when your way of life isn't the way of life the others want it to be, then you are out? Social democracy will subordinate the means of life under political control. But politics is just another battle for the resources to be divided, and this battle fight is about much more than just your work, no, your whole way of life is on the table. Maybe you figure your chances and take them, as you have at least a vote in the election, but the slip of paper fetishism doesn't help you, when what you want isn't the majority view.
I won't go along with social democracy, that submits too much of the essence of human being to the battleground of politics to fight the fight, just to prevent to have less valuable causes fought on the other battle ground, that we call market.

Merging some dying car makers and purchase a couple of stocks to take the divident is of course no big deal, so no problem with that. Except of course, that when the state holds large parts of the stock market of its own country, the dividend payments will be extremely pro-cyclical. The state will get much out of the stocks, when it has anyhow high income from taxes, and will get little, when there a little taxes. Maybe you take provider of electricity, trains and some anticyclice stocks, then it may work - a little bit.
Health care is as well uncritical, as there will be only extremely few people, who generally don't want to be healthy.

Der Amerikaner ist die Orchidee unter den Menschen
Volker Pispers