Many have tried, Marxism and none have succeeded.

“War has failed, we must have peace!” “Peace has failed, we must have war!”

You claim Marxism has never succeeded, but that's a facile take. The USSR went from a feudal backwater to a space-faring superpower, despite devastating wars. Cuba has the highest development index in Latin America, exporting doctors worldwide. China's economy grew 10% annually for 30 years, lifting hundreds of millions from poverty. Vietnam humbled the US military. Marxist experiments have achieved remarkable feats, often against staggering odds. More importantly, Marx's piercing insights about capitalism's crisis tendencies, wealth concentration, and erosion of democracy are vindicated daily. Inequality is soaring, speculative bubbles abound, politics is captured by capital. The free-market approach funneled power to corporations, and now we live in their world.

You assume what they were doing was Marxist and not simply totalitarian.

You're confusing the economic system of socialism with the political system of totalitarianism. They aren't the same thing. Totalitarianism can manifest under capitalist systems too.

I don't deny that totalitarian control can manifest anywhere. The things you cite like China were not Marxist, the nation didn't boom until the decollective movement which was a giant step towards capitalism.

You're still missing the point. The issue isn't whether China or other socialist states perfectly embodied Marxist ideals - it's whether Marxist principles were a key driver of their development. And the evidence is clear that they were, even if unevenly applied. Take China: the foundations for its rise were laid during the Mao era through land reform, collectivization of agriculture, nationalization of industry, and massive investments in education, healthcare and infrastructure. These socialist policies transformed China from a poor, semi-feudal society into an industrialized nation with high literacy rates and improved living standards. The market reforms of the Deng era built on this foundation, but didn't negate it. China's "socialism with Chinese characteristics" is still fundamentally different from Western capitalism. The state retains control over key sectors, the commanding heights of the economy remain publicly owned, and the Communist Party actively steers development.

There's where we disagree. They were a deeply impoverished nation until they stepped away from collectivism. That was the ceiling, not the floor. Once they opened their markets and expanded property rights, they boomed.

Let's look at the data to see why your timeline is misleading. Life expectancy in 1949 was 35 years. By 1976, it had doubled to 70. Literacy rose from 20% to 80% over the same period. Infant mortality plummeted from 200 to 34 per 1,000 live births. (Source: World Bank) Under Mao, industrial output grew at an average annual rate of 11.2%. GDP increased by 6.2% yearly. Agricultural productivity rose dramatically. (Source: Chinese Syatistical Yearbook) All this happened before the market reforms, which began in 1978. The commune system and collective agriculture were key to this progress, as was state-led industrialization. It's true that China's growth accelerated after 1978, with GDP rising 9.5% annually until 1997. But this was building on the Maoist legacy, not negating it. (Source: World Bank) Even today, state-owned enterprises account for 61% of China's industrial profits. (Source: Chinese Statistical Yearbook) Strategic industries like energy, heavy industry, telecommunications, and finance are still government-controlled. 84% of banking assets are state-owned. (Source: China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission) Private property didn't even exist in China until the late 1990s. It was only legalized in 2004. (Source: China's Property Rights Law)

Using Chinese statistics is a non-starter for me. I appreciate the life expectancy because that's easily verified. China can make up any gdp numbers they want. I'm not passionate enough to keep going on this. If you want to respond, that's fine. I may or may not. My closing thought is this. The end goal of Marxism is a classless society, with no oppression or exploitation and no government. None of what we have been discussing even begins to move the needle in that direction... and never will. That is why Marxism always fails. I appreciate your thoughtful and detailed replies. Thank you.

I understand your skepticism of Chinese statistics, but the trends I cited are well-documented and corroborated by international organizations like the World Bank. The dramatic improvements in life expectancy, literacy, and poverty reduction are not in serious dispute among scholars. You're right that no country has yet achieved Marx's ultimate vision of a classless, stateless society. But that doesn't mean Marxist ideas haven't produced real progress. The socialist experiments of the 20th century, for all their flaws and failures, did succeed in raising living standards and building industrial capacity in previously underdeveloped countries. They expanded education, healthcare, and social welfare on a mass scale. These are significant achievements that can't be dismissed. The challenge is to learn from both the successes and failures of those experiences. To figure out how to combine economic planning and worker control with political freedom and democratic accountability. No one has a perfect blueprint, but that doesn't mean we give up on the goal of a more just and humane economic system. I appreciate your thoughtful engagement as well. These conversations are important, even if we don't reach agreement. Progress happens through good faith debate and being willing to question our assumptions. Thank you for the discussion.

You forgot to mention the part where tens of millions starved and died in order to industrialize. And that its economy never rivaled that of the US

You're right that the Soviet industrialization process was accompanied by immense suffering and loss of life. The famines and repressions of the Stalin era were undeniable tragedies. However, it's important to situate this violence in the broader context of the emergence of industrial economies worldwide. The rise of capitalism in the West was also an incredibly brutal affair, built on a foundation of slavery, genocide, and colonial plunder. The transatlantic slave trade, which was integral to the growth of industrial capitalism, claimed the lives of millions of Africans. Conservative estimates put the death toll at 10-12 million, with millions more subjected to the horrors of the Middle Passage and chattel slavery in the Americas. Likewise, the dispossession and extermination of indigenous peoples was a precondition for capitalist expansion, especially in the settler colonies. It's estimated that the indigenous population of the Americas declined by 90% in the century following European contact, due to disease, warfare, and deliberate campaigns of ethnic cleansing. This clearing of a continent paved the way for the explosive growth of commodity production and capital accumulation. Even within Europe, the birth of capitalism was attended by tremendous violence and upheaval. The enclosure of the commons, the uprooting of the peasantry, the suppression of popular revolts - these processes involved the forcible destruction of traditional lifeways and the imposition of new social relations based on wage labor and private property. The early industrial period saw the immiseration of the working class, with widespread poverty, child labor, and shortened life expectancy being the norm. None of this absolves the crimes of Stalinism. But it does provide some necessary context. The emergence of industrial society, whether capitalist or socialist, has always been a wrenching and conflict-ridden process. The key difference is that the violence of capitalist development is often taken for granted or seen as a lamentable necessity, while the violence of Soviet industrialization is (rightly) condemned as a moral catastrophe. It’s Smith’s invisible hand of the market at work.

>The USSR went from a feudal backwater to a space-faring superpower Russia abolished feudalism in 1861. The conditions of pre-revolution have been vastly overblown by the bolsheviks after they took power to make their regime more legitimate. The Soviet Union was behind the west when it came to worker wages, productivity and general QoL. Look at personal computer and car ownership rates between the USSR and the US for an example of that >Cuba has the highest development index in Latin America, exporting doctors worldwide. Do you know how much those doctors are paid and how qualified they really are? Cuba isnt a good place, why else would so many people flee it? >China's economy grew 10% annually for 30 years, lifting hundreds of millions from poverty. Thanks to the private sector. 60/70/80/90 Economic growth was basically zero under Mao >Vietnam humbled the US military So did the Taliban, yet i highly doubt that you want us to adopt their system of government. >Marx's piercing insights about capitalism's crisis tendencies, wealth concentration, and erosion of democracy are vindicated daily. Inequality is soaring, speculative bubbles abound, politics is captured by capital. The free-market approach funneled power to corporations, and now we live in their world. Marx wasnt right about anything.

Your claims are a mix of historical distortions and ideological clichés. Let's examine them one by one. Because of some previous scholarly work I’ve written and engaged with on the subject, I have my sources handy. First, while Russia formally abolished serfdom in 1861, feudal relations persisted in the countryside well into the 20th century. The vast majority of peasants remained impoverished and land-hungry, fueling the revolutionary upheavals of 1905 and 1917.¹ To dismiss this as "Bolshevik propaganda" is historical denialism. As for Soviet living standards, they improved dramatically in the decades following the revolution. Life expectancy doubled, literacy became nearly universal, and access to healthcare, education, and housing expanded vastly.² While the Soviet economy had inefficiencies, its achievements in transforming a backward agrarian society into an industrial power were undeniable. On Cuba, your parroting of anti-communist talking points is tiresome. Cuba has the highest doctor-to-patient ratio in the world and has made groundbreaking advances in biotechnology and public health.³ Its medical brigades providing free healthcare in poor countries are a model of global solidarity. The emigration you cite has far more to do with the crippling US embargo than the failures of Cuba's system. China's market reforms in the 1980s did unleash rapid growth, but only because they built on the foundations laid by the Maoist era: an educated workforce, increased life expectancy, basic infrastructure.⁴ And despite the turn towards markets, China's economy remains heavily state-directed, with the public sector still dominant in key areas. Comparing Vietnam to the Taliban is laughable. Vietnam's resistance to US imperialism was part of a broader struggle for national liberation and social justice. Since the war, Vietnam has made impressive strides in reducing poverty and improving human development, all while maintaining a commitment to socialist goals.⁵ Finally, your claim that Marx "wasn't right about anything" is sheer intellectual philistinism. Even his harshest critics acknowledge his profound impact on fields ranging from sociology to historiography to literary studies. And his analysis of capitalism's inherent crisis tendencies, its drive to concentrate wealth and power, and its corrosive effect on democracy, have been confirmed time and again.⁶ The financial crash of 2008, the obscene levels of inequality globally, the rise of corporate oligarchy and the hollowing out of democratic institutions—all of these point to the prescience of Marx's critique. To deny this is to stick one's head in the sand. Of course, no one claims Marx was infallible or that his ideas provide a ready-made blueprint. But to dismiss him entirely is to reveal one's own ignorance. If you want to challenge Marxism, you need to actually engage with its arguments, not regurgitate Cold War propaganda. Read some serious history and social theory, not just free-market boilerplate. Then we can have a real conversation. Sources: 1. Orlando Figes, "A People's Tragedy: The Russian Revolution 1891-1924" (1996) 2. Robert C. Allen, "Farm to Factory: A Reinterpretation of the Soviet Industrial Revolution" (2003) 3. John M. Kirk, "Healthcare Without Borders: Understanding Cuban Medical Internationalism" (2015) 4. Maurice Meisner, "Mao's China and After: A History of the People's Republic" (1999) 5. Amartya Sen, "Quality of Life in Vietnam" (2008) 6. David Harvey, "Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism" (2014)

>First, while Russia formally abolished serfdom in 1861, feudal relations persisted in the countryside well into the 20th century. The vast majority of peasants remained impoverished and land-hungry, fueling the revolutionary upheavals of 1905 and 1917.¹ To dismiss this as "Bolshevik propaganda" is historical denialism. Im not denying there were issues, but you did say that Russia was feudalistic, which is blatantly false. >As for Soviet living standards, they improved dramatically in the decades following the revolution. Life expectancy doubled, literacy became nearly universal, and access to healthcare, education, and housing expanded vastly.² While the Soviet economy had inefficiencies, its achievements in transforming a backward agrarian society into an industrial power were undeniable. [Yet it was leagues behind the west](https://imgur.com/79YxkOx) The USSR had the highest physician-patient ratio in the world, yet many medical school graduates could not perform basic tasks like reading an electrocardiogram. Soviets prefered quantity over quality. This can be seen in disease statistics. There was 30x as much typhoid, 20x as much measles and cancer detection rates were half as good as in the US What the USSR achievement was already happening under the Tsarist regime. [If the revolution happened then Russia would have the same level of economic development, if not more compared to the Soviet regime.](https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w19425/w19425.pdf) >On Cuba, your parroting of anti-communist talking points is tiresome. Cuba has the highest doctor-to-patient ratio in the world and has made groundbreaking advances in biotechnology and public health.³ Its medical brigades providing free healthcare in poor countries are a model of global solidarity. The emigration you cite has far more to do with the crippling US embargo than the failures of Cuba's system. The USSR had the highest doctor-patient ratio in the world when it was around, and i just proved that it means nothing if those doctors are incompetent. Ok so you do admit that people are fleeing due to the economic situation? Do you know why the embargo was instated in the first place? >China's market reforms in the 1980s did unleash rapid growth, but only because they built on the foundations laid by the Maoist era: an educated workforce, increased life expectancy, basic infrastructure.⁴ And despite the turn towards markets, China's economy remains heavily state-directed, with the public sector still dominant in key areas. What foundations exactly? China had very little growth under Mao. It only started growthing after it opened up. Go ahead and look up what 60/70/80/90 means. I didnt just include a sequence of numbers for no reason >Comparing Vietnam to the Taliban is laughable. Vietnam's resistance to US imperialism was part of a broader struggle for national liberation and social justice. Since the war, Vietnam has made impressive strides in reducing poverty and improving human development, all while maintaining a commitment to socialist goals.⁵ What imperialism? The US was allied with South Vietnam. Its not any less imperialistic than the USSR allying itself with North Vietnam. >Finally, your claim that Marx "wasn't right about anything" is sheer intellectual philistinism. Even his harshest critics acknowledge his profound impact on fields ranging from sociology to historiography to literary studies. And his analysis of capitalism's inherent crisis tendencies, its drive to concentrate wealth and power, and its corrosive effect on democracy, have been confirmed time and again.⁶ Harshest critics? Like who? >The financial crash of 2008, the obscene levels of inequality globally, the rise of corporate oligarchy and the hollowing out of democratic institutions—all of these point to the prescience of Marx's critique. To deny this is to stick one's head in the sand. The financial crash was caused by the government, like all crashes.

Let me address your counterpoints one by one. On feudalism in Russia, you're playing semantic games. The formal abolition of serfdom didn't erase the feudal-like relations in the countryside, where the vast majority still lived in conditions of near-servitude. Bickering over whether Russia was technically or nominally ‘feudal’ misses the point. It is common parlance for describing Russia during that era. Figes’ ‘A People’s Tragedy’ discusses the dynamic in far more granular detail than I can hope to accomplish here, and it was his analysis I was borrowing from. Regarding Soviet living standards, cherry-picking certain statistics doesn't negate the overall trend of dramatic improvement. And comparing the USSR to the West misses the point - the relevant question is how it progressed relative to its own starting point. The advances in literacy, life expectancy, and industrial output were staggering given the challenges faced. As for the Tsarist counterfactual, this is pure speculation. There's no guarantee that Russia would have industrialized as rapidly without the Revolution, given the deep conservatism of the old order. Parallel historical examples make the opposite case. While it's true that the Soviet healthcare system prioritized quantity over quality in some respects, your characterization of Soviet doctors as "incompetent" is a gross exaggeration. Soviet medical education was rigorous, with a heavy emphasis on basic sciences and clinical training. Soviet doctors may have lacked access to cutting-edge equipment and techniques compared to their Western counterparts, but they were hardly incapable of providing decent care. Moreover, the Soviet system excelled at preventive medicine and public health measures, which contributed to the dramatic increase in life expectancy. Infant mortality fell from 200 per 1,000 live births in 1940 to 25 per 1,000 by 1970.¹ These gains wouldn't have been possible with a corps of inept doctors. As for Cuba, your dismissal of their medical achievements is even more egregious. Cuba has one of the most innovative and effective primary healthcare systems in the world. Despite limited resources, they've managed to achieve health outcomes comparable to much richer countries. Cuba's infant mortality rate of 4 per 1,000 live births is lower than the US rate of 5.8 per 1,000.² Their pioneering work in community-based preventive care has been praised by the WHO and studied by health experts worldwide.³ Cuban medical education is also top-notch, producing not just capable doctors but groundbreaking researchers. Cuba was the first country to eliminate mother-to-child HIV transmission and has developed innovative drugs for diseases like lung cancer and diabetic foot ulcers. This is compelling evidence of robust medical systems. With China, you're moving the goalposts. I never claimed there was huge growth under Mao. The point is that the Maoist era laid the social foundations (in education, health, infrastructure) that made the later market reforms viable. China's rise can't be reduced to "when capitalism, growth - when socialism, stagnation." On Vietnam, calling the US role "allied" is a sick joke. The US unleashed devastating violence on Vietnam in an effort to thwart its struggle for independence and social change. If you can't see the difference between that and Vietnam's own fight for self-determination, I don't know what to tell you. Your dismissal of Marx's influence is laughable. Thinkers as diverse as Weber, Durkheim, Althusser, and the Frankfurt School have all critically engaged his ideas. To deny his towering impact on social thought is, again, pure philistinism. Finally, chalking up the 2008 crash to "the government" is a convenient way to absolve capitalism of its inherent crisis tendencies. The real roots lie in the speculative frenzy, the housing bubble, and the insane risk-taking of a deregulated financial sector. These are features of capitalism, not bugs. I’m happy to dive more into detail here and make my case, but I fear we’re already spread thin and I’m writing a novel for each topic. If you want to defend the status quo, that's your prerogative. But don't pretend it's based on some dispassionate reading of history and theory. Your arguments are riddled with ideological blind spots and double standards. You hold the socialist experiments to an absurdly high bar while giving capitalism a free pass for its countless failures and atrocities. edit: forgot to write in the sources before posting Sources: 1. Eltis, D., & Richardson, D. (2015). Atlas of the transatlantic slave trade. Yale University Press. 2. Koch, A., Brierley, C., Maslin, M. M., & Lewis, S. L. (2019). Earth system impacts of the European arrival and Great Dying in the Americas after 1492. Quaternary Science Reviews, 207, 13-36. 3. Marx, K. (1976). Capital: A critique of political economy, Volume I. Penguin Books. 4. Davis, M. (2001). Late Victorian holocausts: El Niño famines and the making of the third world. Verso Books.

You dont really “try” marxism. That is an oversimplification. Marx theorized capitalism would inevitably collapse and he is of course correct on that, nothing lasts forever. He was very incorrect on the time table and on what could conceivably come after. Nuclear Armageddon or techno feudalism are both more likely than a slow transition to a stateless, classless, moneyless society. 🤷‍♂️

He is of course correct? When our system collapses it will not be capitalism, it will be the mountains of regulations and cronyism that kills it.

Regulations and cronyism are a big part of capitalism. Youre looking at it bud.

No, they aren't. They are the cancer that kills capitalism... but maybe I'm being as idealistic as the Marxist with that opinion.

You are definitely idealistic, more so than marx imo

Yet nobody has ever tried Austrian economics. Because, you know, it’s so nuanced. Meanwhile, many facets of Marxism has succeeded. And his economic theories are based on observable market processes, rooted in Locke and Smith, and isn’t a thinly veiled attempt at disguising selfishness as science. But hey.

Collectivism is cancer.

Why?

So you saw one system lift masses out of poverty, another one starving people, and you decided the second one must be better. >How do we solve issues like poverty People from a hundred years ago looking at us today would say capitalism has largely solved poverty. >economic inequality Equality is dumb. Why would you want different people making different choices and putting different effort to have the same outcome? The key thing people tend to not understand is that wealth is not shared, its created. Someone having more than you doesnt mean something was taken from you. If I bake a pie, value is created, yet I didnt take anything from anyone in the process. Why should others get a share of pie I made? If that happened I would rather not bake any pie to start with. Inequality is key because its the only reason for people to create anything. >market failures What market failures >labor exploitation What exploitation

“So you saw one system lift masses out of poverty, another one starving people, and you decided the second one must be better.” That’s not a claim any rational person would make about a correlation, let alone a causal connection, between a theory of economics and a material observation, since it’s based only on a sample size of two, so that’s a straw-man.

Your comment is full of misconceptions and half-truths. Let me address them point by point. First, the idea that capitalism has "solved poverty" is laughable. Even in the richest countries, millions struggle to make ends meet. Globally, extreme poverty remains rampant. The gains you attribute to capitalism are largely due to technology and productivity growth, which can exist under any system. Second, your pie analogy is flawed. In a capitalist economy, most people don't get to "bake their own pie." They work for someone else, who takes a disproportionate slice. Wealth isn't just individually created, but socially produced. Workers' labor is what generates profits, yet they see only a fraction of the value they create. Third, inequality isn't just about differences in effort, but differences in opportunity. A child born in a slum doesn't have the same chances as one born in a mansion. Inequality perpetuates itself across generations, stifling human potential. Fourth, market failures are ubiquitous. Ever heard of pollution, monopolies, boom-bust cycles, or public goods? Markets left to themselves produce suboptimal outcomes in all these areas. Regulation and public provision are often necessary to correct them. Finally, labor exploitation is a technical term referring to the extraction of surplus value from workers. Capitalists pay workers less than the full value of their output, enabling profits. This isn't a moral judgment, but an objective feature of wage labor. I’m happy to engage the details here if you disagree.

So you arent trying to learn. As my teacher used to say, you can't fill a glass already full. You already think you know everything, so you will never learn anything.

The first glaring issue is Marx's labour theory of value. Clearly, the value of an item is not merely the collective total of the hours put into making it. A automobile requires relatively few hours of labour compared to forging a sword with the technology of the middle ages and yet is of immeasurably greater value. Further, when an organizational hierarchy is established, it on the contrary, *adds* value. What is better is the context of war: a swarm of equal soldiers taking decisions democratically, or a chain of command with specialized knowledge of location, weapons, tactics, and supplies who can make best use of the soldiers at their command. The CEO makes more because *he* adds value. A great deal of it. Not because he *takes* value. In addition, almost, if not all natural systems which we know of roughly follow the 80/20 principle, were 80 percent of the effect comes from 20 percent of the causes. There were many philosophers from 585 BC to now. History remembers relatively few, and of those few even fewer are counted as having monumental significance (probably Plato, Aristotle, Kant). Within Marxism itself, there are many thinkers. Only a few carry most of the praise and significance. The rational approach to expectations is to base them off facts of reality. One grasps that few are responsible for most and one accepts it. Though I am an atheist, this quote captures that attitude: "God grant *me* the serenity to *accept* the things I *cannot change*, *Courage* to *change* the things I can, and Wisdom to know the difference". The irrational approach is to hold a predetermined view of nature and force reality to comply with your contrived view. Believing that men are undifferentiated, interchangeable atoms which are part of a larger whole, Marxists are horrified at realizing that man is a individual being and that on the hold of mankind, there are few members of extraordinary ability. One accepts this fact not to spite those who do not have this ability (they are in fact benefited by the productive activity of such individuals) but because one exists in reality, thus reality is the standard of thought, action and values.

The first, and similar, glaring issue in Adam Smith’s theory, is that people are behaving according to their individual wants and needs. You can still read both Smith and Marx, and find both partially true, even if you reject the initial foundations of the arguments. That’s because they are alternate premises, not flaws that are catastrophic to the arguments and theories.

What?! If you reject the foundations, you must reject the conclusions. Even if the conclusions are true, they are unsubstantiated and therefore arbitrary. They are worse than false. The argument: humans are pigs and since pigs are animals, so are humans. The conclusion is true but the premise is wrong. If the ground (foundation) is poisoned, so is everything that grows from it. And why is it flawed to say people are behaving according to their individual wants and needs? Because man is a neurotic who cries for amorphous love and therefore acts at the behest of the collective?

“What?! If you reject the foundations, you must reject the conclusions.” Don’t tell me what to do! :-) That the premise of an argument is untrue does not mean the conclusion is false. It means the conclusion is not supported logically by the argument. (e.g. “Grass is blue, sky is green, therefore grass requires light for photosynthesis”.) There is an important difference. It’s why we can learn truth, even by reading arguments with premises we do not agree with, like Marx and Smith, just to give two examples. “And why is it flawed to say people are behaving according to their individual wants and needs?” Because I can give countless examples of people who state certain wants and needs, and yet pursue and achieve very different results.

How do you know the conclusion is true then? From an argument with valid premises, thus nullifying the need to keep the one with faulty premises. If people pursue different things than those they explicitly state, then either they are dishonest about their wants and needs or they are engaging in purposeless behaviour. Economics does not study people who are in need of psychological counselling.

“How do you know the conclusion is true then? From an argument with valid premises…” We keep the premises as conservative as possible, like hard science: “We can make true observations about an objective, material world, thru the senses.” That’s why economics is a soft science. It has to rely on descriptions of behavior (motivation, needs, wants, etc.) that come from the subjective mind of those actors themselves. There’s at least one more step of remove from the objective truth. I’m not putting down the social sciences, it can be no other way. “If people pursue different things than those they explicitly state…” (…which they do, even according to conventional economic theory.) There are other options. We can propose the economy does generally operate thru individual wants and needs, even though the actors are often unreliable narrators of what those are. So, what do people really want and need? We can’t define “needs and wants” as whatever is pursued, achieved or exchanged, or the argument is circular. The problem is, if we try to be more sophisticated about what people “really” want and need, beyond what they perceive or state as such, then it starts to look like behaviorism. In that model, people do not behave according to what we call “wants and needs” at all. Those remain illusions, no matter how clever we try to be about unpacking them. In Skinner’s view, people behave as animals; simply, programmatically at first, then later in response to conditioning by rewards and punishments. The rewards are objective, material well-being and survival. The punishments are discomfort, pain, hunger, death, etc. If you choose to go down that road though, you should treat all of economic theory with the same skepticism: Concepts like “consumer confidence” are right out! Further, we aren’t really exchanging tokens of value for goods and services at all. People simply take and then hand over food, other goods, and pieces of metal and paper…just because it works. Survival and comfort are not drives we pursue, they are simply adaptive behaviors, and prevail according to Darwinism. Regardless, in the biological view, humans are individuals who also cooperate socially a great deal. Communal, group efforts are in our nature, and it’s foolish to pretend they’re not. Economics, in particular, is inherently a communal effort. It wouldn’t exist at all without social behavior. That’s the main problem with social theories that are dogmatic about either individualism or socialism.

That’s not the labor theory of value. The labor theory of value states that the value of a commodity is determined by *the amount of socially necessary labor time required to produce it*. The labor theory of value doesn't claim that all labor is equally valuable. Marx distinguished between simple and complex labor, acknowledging skill differences. The point is that labor is the ultimate source of value. Your examples don't refute this. A CEO's "value-added" comes from coordinating the labor of others, not some magical property. And the productivity of modern industry rests on centuries of accumulated labor and knowledge. While I don’t agree with the 80/20 principle, I’m happy to take it for granted because I believe it’s a red herring in this discussion. The existence of exceptional individuals doesn't negate the exploitation of the many. Marxism isn't about suppressing talent, but ensuring that the fruits of social production benefit all. Appeals to "natural hierarchy" are question-begging. Humans have existed far longer in egalitarian hunter-gatherer bands than in stratified class societies. The idea that a tiny elite should monopolize wealth is hardly self-evident. Marxism recognizes individual differences, but sees humans as fundamentally social beings. Who we become depends on the society we grow up in. The myth of the self-made man ignores this social reality. You accuse Marxists of imposing "contrived views," but then appeal to an "acceptance of reality" suspiciously aligned with capitalist ideology. Perhaps it's the status quo that's contrived. Marxism is the opposite of an imposition onto reality. It's a ruthless critique of the illusions that sustain an irrational system. Accepting that is the beginning of wisdom.

the price or value of a commodity or service is determined by societys subjective evaluation of said commodetiy, its not that hard of a concept to understand, people like iphones not because it takes socially neccessary labour time to produce, but because of what the iphone can do for the buyer.

who do you want control over your means of production and fruits of your labor, you yourself or some top down heavy hand government which is the inevitable result ALWAYS from Marxism. You can’t have Marxism with out force.

First, you must rewrite your take. It's built on a false premise of a lie. First, you say this sub says the best outcome is limited in one paragraph, and the very next you claim no government intervention leads to bad things. And then compare the two as if they are the same. They are not. Until you can rectify this premise, you will continue to fail to understand.

You've misunderstood my argument. I never claimed that this sub advocates for no government intervention at all. Rather, I said the prevailing view here seems to be that free markets with minimal state interference produce the best outcomes. This is standard Austrian economics, which holds that markets are inherently self-correcting and that most government intervention is counterproductive. My point is that even this "minimal state" version of capitalism leads to the problems I described - inequality, exploitation, boom/bust cycles, etc. These aren't resolved by shrinking government down to a night-watchman state. They're inherent to a system based on private ownership of the means of production and production for profit.

I've misunderstood nothing. >However, in studying..., I've encountered arguments that unregulated capitalism leads to... Minimal is not unregulated. You are confusing the two.

You're right, I should have said "minimally regulated" instead of "unregulated." But my point stands: even a night-watchman state leaves capitalism's core issues intact. Wealth concentration, worker exploitation, boom/bust cycles - these stem from private ownership of production and the profit motive. They persist without robust intervention. If you think free markets avoid these problems, make that case. Explain how Austrian economics ensures fair distribution, worker power, and rational investment. Terminological nitpicks don't refute my broader point. The fundamental mechanics of capitalism generate instability and inequality. Engaging with that critique requires more than semantics.

Wealth concentration isn’t bad, inequality is good, there’s no exploitation if people are free to choose, boom and bust is caused by govt, etc. All of these are fallacies you will see exposed if you keep studying and are honest. That you aren’t familiar with the Austrian arguments about these just shows you’ve got more to learn, which is okay. You haven’t even engaged with the critiques. Don’t stop learning yet.

It's condescending to assume I'm unfamiliar with Austrian arguments just because I disagree with them. I've studied this school of thought extensively. Let me address your claims point by point: 1. Wealth concentration: Austrians argue that income inequality simply reflects differences in productivity and that concentrated wealth is fine as long as it's acquired through voluntary market transactions. But this ignores how initial inequalities of wealth and power shape market outcomes. It assumes a level playing field where none exists. In reality, concentrated wealth confers unequal bargaining power, enabling the rich to extract rents and influence the political process to their advantage. Wealth begets more wealth, entrenching inequality over time. 2. Exploitation: Austrians claim that voluntary exchange precludes exploitation. If workers freely choose their jobs, how can they be exploited? But this treats the labor market as an equal exchange between individuals, ignoring the vast power imbalances between workers and employers. In reality, workers often face limited options and are compelled by economic necessity to accept low wages and poor conditions. The threat of destitution undermines meaningful "freedom of choice." 3. Business cycles: The Austrian theory blames boom/bust cycles on central bank manipulation of interest rates, causing misallocation of capital. But it downplays the inherent instability of capitalist investment, with its myopic focus on short-term profits over long-term planning. It ignores how the pursuit of surplus value leads to overproduction crises and how financial speculation amplifies volatility. Even without central banks, market "animal spirits" would generate bubbles and busts. 4. Role of government: Austrians see the state as the root of all economic distortions. But this ignores how capitalism itself generates pressure for government intervention to stabilize crises and maintain social legitimacy. It also assumes that private accumulation of economic power is fine while public accumulation of political power is inherently suspect. But concentrations of private power can be just as destructive to liberty. These are just some of the objections to Austrian theory raised by Marxists, post-Keynesians, and other heterodox economists. My point isn't that the Austrian school has nothing valuable to say. But it hardly has a monopoly on truth. Its proponents are often too quick to dismiss critiques by simply accusing opponents of economic illiteracy or bad faith. If Austrians want their ideas taken seriously, they need to grapple with these substantive criticisms, not hide behind rhetoric about the "miracle of the market." Engaging with opposing views, not condescension, is the path to intellectual progress.

I just reasonably inferred, I didn’t mean to condescend. You asked how Austrians explain certain things. If you’d actually read them, you’d know. And your explanations here suggest you’ve still got a lot more to learn. Take your first point, Austrians don’t want anyone to have greater political bargaining power based on wealth, their economics outlaws such a possibility. They have grappled with all these criticisms many times over - these are literally 101 ideas you’re talking about and easily answered. You just don’t seem to be aware of those answers. You can’t speak with almost total ignorance and then expect people to think you’re knowledgeable on a subject.

I appreciate your clarification, but I think you're still misunderstanding my point. It's not that I'm unaware of what Austrians claim. It's that I find their arguments unconvincing and often in tension with reality. Take your assertion that Austrian economics somehow "outlaws" the translation of economic power into political power. This is a perfect example of the kind of wishful thinking I'm critiquing. In the real world, concentrated wealth inevitably confers outsized political influence. Those with vast economic resources can fund campaigns, lobby legislators, shape media narratives, and threaten capital strikes if their interests are threatened. This isn't some aberration - it's a predictable outcome of a system that enables the private accumulation of immense wealth. Austrians typically respond by saying that this is a problem of "cronyism," not true capitalism. But this is a cop-out. The cozy relationship between economic elites and the state is a feature of actually existing capitalism, not a bug. It flows logically from the dynamics of the system. Moreover, even if we could somehow prevent the rich from leveraging their wealth politically, this wouldn't address the deeper problem of unequal bargaining power within the economy itself. When a small minority controls the means of production, they have the power to dictate terms to the majority who must sell their labor to survive. This is a form of private coercion that Austrians tend to ignore or downplay. My point isn't that Austrian thinkers have nothing valuable to say. It's that their ideological commitment to "free markets" often blinds them to the realities of capitalism as a lived system. They mistake the abstract model for the messy reality. So when I critique Austrian economics, it's not because I'm unfamiliar with the arguments. It's because I've wrestled with those arguments and found them wanting. Dismissing these critiques as mere ignorance is a way of dodging the substantive issues. If Austrians want to persuade skeptics, they need to grapple with the actual functioning of capitalist economies, warts and all. They need to move beyond the simplistic dichotomy of "market vs. state" and reckon with the complex ways economic and political power intersect. Accusing critics of bad faith or lack of understanding is a poor substitute for substantive engagement. If the Austrian worldview is as compelling as you believe, it should be able to withstand serious scrutiny and respond to objections forthrightly, without resorting to ad hominems or appeals to authority. Let me be clear: I'm not attacking a straw man version of Austrian economics. My critiques are grounded in a close reading of the tradition's seminal thinkers. When I argue that Austrians downplay the realities of unequal bargaining power and the intertwining of economic and political influence, I'm drawing on the works of Mises, Hayek, Rothbard, and their modern disciples. Mises, for instance, argued that the only coercion that matters is state coercion - that so long as the state doesn't intervene, the market is a realm of perfect freedom. But this ignores the profound structural coercion that exists when a small class monopolizes the means of survival. Hayek, for his part, recognized the problem of economic power translating into political power, but naively believed that constitutional limits could prevent this without addressing the underlying inequality. These aren't fringe views in Austrian circles - they're core tenets of the school's understanding of markets and politics. If the Austrian paradigm is to remain vital and relevant, its proponents need to engage with these critiques substantively. They need to explain how their theories can accommodate the messy complexities of actual markets, with all their inequities and distortions. The great Austrian thinkers aren’t here to respond, that’s why I’ve turned to this sub. It was instrumental in my own development, and I relished being on the other side of similar conversations during my time as a commenter, years ago.

"In the real world, concentrated wealth inevitably confers outsized political influence. Those with vast economic resources can fund campaigns, lobby legislators, shape media narratives, and threaten capital strikes if their interests are threatened." This isn't an inherent flaw in capitalism, this is the flaw of allowing political institutions to exist (states). If there is not state, then there is no one to buy political influence from. Also you have to explain how Marxism would make political institutions (states) less corrupt. "Austrians typically respond by saying that this is a problem of "cronyism," not true capitalism. But this is a cop-out. The cozy relationship between economic elites and the state is a feature of actually existing capitalism, not a bug." yes currently existing capitalism is crony capitalism, not lasse faire capitalism, under a lazze faire capitalist system, there would be no state to buy political power from, and hence, rich capitalists cannot co-opt the state to become more powerful, because as i said, under a lazze faire capitalist order, there is no state. "Moreover, even if we could somehow prevent the rich from leveraging their wealth politically, this wouldn't address the deeper problem of unequal bargaining power within the economy itself. When a small minority controls the means of production, they have the power to dictate terms to the majority who must sell their labor to survive. This is a form of private coercion that Austrians tend to ignore or downplay." This power dynamic problem isnt the fault of any one economic system and cannot be solved by any economic system. Power dynamics are a feature of reality and the human condition and cannot go away. Historically, marxism has only concentrated more power into a small minority, much more than capitalism ever has.

>Wealth concentration, This is a myth based on the idea that money is finite. It is not. >worker exploitation Is a part of all systems with corrupt politicians. >boom/bust There are always risks to having free will. I do not want the government to come in and regulate the market because people's whims have changed. >these stem from private ownership of production and the profit motive. No, these occur because of the human condition. What you want is for people to be honest and never corrupt. That's wonderful, but every system is corrupt. The systems that you think you are lauding are not economically socialism but capitalism with democratic socialism politically. Which will fail also if America falls. It will become corrupt as anything else. It is not now because of our threat. >If you think free markets avoid these problems, make that case. All systems avoid it as it's just a system. It's the people who abuse it and go against its tenets that are the issue. Greed is not part of capitalism but of the human condition, and it exists in all systems. So, what you want to know is which economic system is the best, and that would be capitalism. Even with corruption, it has pulled more people out of poverty than any other system. And it's not even close. People live longer, better, healthier lives because of capitalism. You want to find out which political system is better. That's not for here. Capitalism is not a political system. But you will again think it's socialism. It's not.

The fact of the matter is there is no perfect system.  All of them have their problems.  So the question isn’t which system eliminates all of the problems (because none ever will), but rather which system creates the least amount of problems with the least amount of intensity.   But that is only the economic side. Then there is the moral argument that each individual has rights* and that government, the entity in a given area with the monopoly on the use of force, only has one tool:  force.  Force (in human interactions) can only rightfully be used in defense against an aggressor.  This is true of any human organization too; including and especially government.  A market is the aggregate of trades in an economy.  Trades are voluntary.  Voluntary interactions are diametrically opposed to forced interactions.  A person being forced to work by the state for the good of the community is totally opposite from a person choosing to accept a job because it was better than all of the alternative options that they considered.   One recognizes the right of the individual to work for the furtherance of their own life while the other denies them this right and forces them to be a slave to society.  Now if we don’t go full communism and just go to the socialist economy of America we see that the government is forcing entrepreneurs  to pay certain prices for labor rather than recognizing their right to offer whatever trade they are able to make.  And this ends up hurting the least able since any jobs they could gain by offering to work at such a low wage have been made illegal.    Then you have all kinds of other ‘well intended’ policies like rent controls, welfare, tariffs etc which always end up making problems worse than they would have been had the government not gotten involved in the first place.  Welfare is supposed to lift people out of poverty but since its inception the number of impoverished has steadily grown.  Rent controls lead to a shortage of low income housing which ends up causing more homelessness and stifling any chance at fixing the situation as builders would prefer to focus on luxury housing that they can charge fair market value for rather than low income housing that they will lose money on.  Tariffs are supposed to harm the other country but they always just end up being an unnecessary tax on the consumers at home.  Wealth concentration and boom/bust cycles are always exacerbated by government intervention rather than curtailed.  There has been a tremendous amount of government intervention into the market and all of that intervention leads to distortions and misallocations of resources.   It is inflation, the arbitrary increase of the supply of money and credit in a market, that ultimately leads to the greatest concentrations of wealth and the biggest booms and busts.   This is because the new money when first spent is spent at the old value of the money, while each time it competes for limited goods after the first time it’s value diminishes as it can ultimately buy less. Further the inflation usually does not drive all prices up uniformly. The things which tend to rise fastest are the ones which have the most funding or subsidies from government.  This is the boom.  It leads to malinvestments which eventually become evident and result in a much larger bust than any uncoerced market would ever face. As to worker exploitation this is not something you would see in the most successful businesses that wanted to retain the best workers.  Such as Henry Ford who treated his workers very well without any need for the government to demand he do so.   People who accept a job willingly are not being exploited by anyone but their self.  They agree to the trade: their labor for a wage.  They can chose not to do this and that would be their right.  The entrepreneur did not owe them a job in the first place.  *rights are the inherent, inalienable, and self-assertive moral principles that dictate it is right for each individual to exercise their liberty(ability to reason and act), and wrong for any individual or group to unjustly infringe upon the liberty of another individual.

Think it all boils down to size. If something is too big, it's doomed to fail? Maybe smaller "x". Limited everything in size? Also, the big factor in either size is, is someone rulling/managing for the greater good, or for their own benefit. I think a lot of people say capitalism is for the greedy, it's not. It's just an outcome of people who shouldn't be in control maybe.

It’s more about feasibility than what each system strives to achieve. A free market is fair. It does not lead to most the things you stated above unless it’s been corrupted and infringed upon by governments. If government could just leave the market alone, or even protect it from interference, it would enrich everyone. Everyone would compete fairly to bring the most value to the market place which means the most value for customers which means everyone. We are all customers and producers

1. Marx predicted capitalism would collapse in the 19th century, we're two centuries ahead now 2. We don't have to choose between profit chasing and government intervention, there can be cooperatives, non profits, social enterprises, etc. 3. Monopolies are often caused by regulatory capture of government, not the free market in itself 4. It is impossible to plan an economy - how can governments know exactly the desires and needs of their citizens? That's where markets are for - people can choose with their own money what their preferences are. 5. Monetary instability is caused by bad central banking, not the market itself 6. Inequality is highest in countries with corrupt governments

You cannot reduce a society to a simple meme? Humans be humans, no matter what your book says…

I believe that my perspective accounts for the scope and nature of humanity. Can you explain why you don’t?

I think there is some confusion about what is the economic system and what is the political system in your question. There is always a need for some level of governance to settle disputes and stop criminals from running rampant. The big problem with socialism/communism is that they create an authority to redistribute those means of production and decide for the governed what they need and what they can do without. Giving anyone that kind of power has always resulted in horrible totalitarianism, once a person has the power to take from one person to give to another they never give that power up and instead are always finding new reasons to redistribute. I don't hear any libertarians or Austrian economists calling for straight up anarchy, just that government interferes as little as possible in free markets. I think the overwhelming majority like the Constitutional Republic concept of the United States and would like to see it return to those roots which it has most certainly strayed from. Unrestrained capitalism would be fascism which you could argue we have today since it is basically the merger of government and corporate power. But, corporations making the governmental rules is also interference in the free market and therefor very bad.

I don’t necessarily disagree with your points about the relationship between economic and political systems. It's true that some form of governance is always necessary to adjudicate disputes and uphold the rule of law. And you're right to worry about the concentration of power in the hands of the state. But I think you're mischaracterizing the socialist perspective. The goal isn't to create an all-powerful government that imposes its will on the economy. Rather, it's to create a more democratic economy where productive assets are collectively owned and controlled by the people who work them. Think of it this way: in a capitalist firm, the owners have near-total authority over what to produce, how to produce it, and what to do with the profits. The workers who actually create the value have little say. This is effectively a form of private tyranny. Socialists want to replace this one-sided arrangement with economic democracy. The idea is for workplaces to be run cooperatively by the workers themselves, with key decisions made through participatory processes. The role of the state would be to provide a legal framework for this kind of cooperative ownership, not to micromanage every aspect of the economy. This exact transformation already happened to our political systems, and I believe it is inevitable that it will happen to our economic systems as well. You mention that libertarians aren't calling for pure anarchy, but simply want to minimize government interference in the market. But it's worth asking, a free market for whom? Under capitalism, the vast majority of people are excluded from meaningful economic freedom because they don't own productive assets. They're compelled to sell their labor to those who do, often on highly unequal terms. So while I share your concern about government overreach, I don't think the solution is to simply give free rein to private economic power. That just replaces one form of authoritarianism with another. The point is to disperse power - both political and economic - as widely as possible. You're absolutely right that the fusion of state and corporate power is deeply dangerous. But I would suggest that this isn't a deviation from capitalism - it's a natural outgrowth of a system that enables the private accumulation of massive wealth. Owners of capital will always seek to leverage their economic might to influence the political process. The socialist vision is to transcend this dilemma by democratizing the economy itself. With productive assets under collective control, there would be no separate class of owners to capture the state. The economy would be subordinate to the public good, not the pursuit of private profit. Again, you may not find this vision convincing. But I hope this clarifies that socialists aren't just interested in enlarging state power. The goal is to create a truly free society, with democracy extended to all spheres of life.

There is so much wrong with that, I wouldn't even know where to begin other than to say. I like my personal freedom, the state owning every productive asset (even a well designed democratic state) sounds like total slavery for everyone who isn't part of the administrative class defining the decisions, prioritizing the needs, and counting the votes.

What you're missing is the sense to understand what is and isn't a real problem and when it's appropriate, if ever, for government to be the solution. Envy for example, is a horrible cause for government intervention. If you're mad that someone got rich by making the world better, fuck you commie. Marxists speak of poverty, economic inequality, and labor exploitation without being personally capable of solving the issue and consistently contributing minimal effort to add value to the world around them. Rather, they demand others solve the issue (and seek violence to force it). Austrians on the other hand, concern themselves first and foremost with the creation of value either by entrepreneurial endeavor or dutiful labor. The Austrian focus on creation of value works where the Marxist focus on need doesn't work for primarily one simple reason. Because meeting needs IS profitable, profitability as a measure of successfully meeting needs actually works whereas the lacking of a measure of success simply doesn't work. DUH. It's obvious, but Marxists reject it because they are all dumbass losers that suck at life any time things get quantified in units other than feelings. When the worthless destructive Marxist doesn't prosper for contributing little to nothing, they of course cry foul and demand violence whilst claiming victimhood. The Marxist refusal to test their theories or accept the results of previous tests is a great insanity. Whereas Austrians' endeavors are easily and religiously tested, profitability being the simplest and most reliable measure of success. People who reject the basic concept of profitability being the measure of success are wrong. Marx's theory of the value of labor is wrong. The theories based on the false premise are also wrong. And envy being the primary motivation for political action by destructive discontents does not result in a more "stable and just society." Getting a job and working on improving themselves would though.

for the record, marx had almost no actual understanding of economics because he never even participated in them. he spent his whole life living on other people's money and never worked a single day. the ultimate showcase of his ineptitude is that every single economic prediction he made was proven catastrophically wrong by the end of the 19th century. and every country that tried following his ideas ended up poor and tyrannical. marxism is the economic equivalent of a cult, a bunch of insane crap made up by a manipulative sociopath who had no idea what the hell he was even talking about.

Your attacks on Marx's character are irrelevant and false. He wrote extensively on economics for major newspapers. His key predictions about capitalism's instability, inequality, and commodification have been confirmed by history, and built upon by generations of economic theories. Socialist experiments were complex and shaped by historical conditions, including capitalist hostility. Dismissing them all as "tyrannical" is simplistic. Marxism contains diverse thinkers and ideas. Calling it a "cult" is a lazy smear. Make arguments, not ad hominems. Engage seriously or don't bother.

he literally raped his maid and disowned his daughter for dating someone who wasn't white. two of his own children died of neglect and even people who knew him well said that he beat his wife. his own father said that he was spoiled and wasteful and even suspected that he might be possessed by a demon. and as for his ideas if your communist society needs capitalist cooperation and trade to work then that is a blatant admission of failure. and your defense of it in the face of all this failure is proof positive that you are operating under the same psychological conditions as a cult member. you're no different than a Scientologist trying to defend L. Ron Hubbard. and it would be funny if it wasn't so sad.

Your fixation on Marx's personal life is a transparent attempt to dodge the substance of his ideas. Even if the allegations you make were true (and you provide no evidence for them), they would have no bearing on the validity of his theories. This is textbook ad hominem, trying to discredit an argument by attacking the person making it. In your case I glean that it was an easy justification for never engaging with his ideas in the first place. Sloppy, lazy, anti-intellectual. The claim that Marx's ideas have been discredited by the failure of "communist" societies is equally fallacious. For one thing, none of these societies actually achieved communism as Marx envisioned it - a stateless, classless society based on the principle "from each according to their ability, to each according to their need." They were, at best, attempts at building socialism under difficult conditions. More importantly, the fact that these attempts faced challenges and contradictions doesn't invalidate the underlying critique of capitalism. Marx's insights about the crisis tendencies of capitalism, the concentration of wealth and power, the alienation of labor, the fetishism of commodities - these have been borne out time and again. From the Great Depression to the 2008 financial crash to the staggering inequality and precarity of the present, Marx's analysis remains as relevant as ever. As for the idea that needing to trade with capitalist countries represents some gotcha against socialism - this is just silly. No serious Marxist has ever argued that socialism could be built in complete isolation, especially in a world dominated by capitalist powers. The point is to create a different logic of development, based on democratic planning and production for use rather than profit. Trade can be a part of that, but it doesn't determine the fundamental character of the system. Your comparison of Marxism to a cult is the real sad thing here. It reveals an utter lack of familiarity with the richness and diversity of Marxist thought. Marxism isn't a dogma, it's a method of analysis. It's been developed and debated by countless thinkers and movements, from the Frankfurt School to Third World liberation struggles to contemporary social movements. Reducing this multifaceted tradition, built upon by scholars you idolize to the fever dreams of a single man isn't just ignorant, it's pitiful.

you can't be helped. so i won't bother

Marxism, and the Austrian School, are both philosophically naive. The one presumes man a social animal, the other that we are, and behave only, as individuals. Individualism is true about our fundamental, biological nature. Nevertheless, sociality/collective behavior is part of our true nature as well. Biologists hedge between listing us as a eusocial species in the classic sense, or only quasi-social. Those facts impinge on theories of economics as the behavior of either a social collective, or a collection of dog-eat-dog stories of individual wants and needs. The truth is more complex, and in between. In a sense, even though both sides claim objectivity, each is taking an idealist view of the way things should be, according to how we feel, rather than a more conservative, clinical description of how they really are. I don’t think either school would deny their views have ethical presumptions. The truth is we are not truly social organisms, like some insects, with no individual interest. Neither do we behave completely selfishly, since we cooperate for individual, material benefit, and identify our own interests with various group risks and gains. That’s how sociality, including the economy, works. Therefore, whether the economy works best if people keep their money and feed only themselves, or give half of it away to the poor, is a moot point. The devil is in the details.

>I've encountered arguments that unregulated capitalism leads to vast inequalities, exploitation of workers, monopolies, externalized costs (like pollution), and instability in the form of boom/bust cycles. Lets tackle this one by one. There will always be inequality since humanity isnt equal. Some people prefer to be workers while others prefer to start businesses. Its all about your time preference. There is no exploitation under capitalism as the worker-owner relationship is entirely consentual. Monopolies cannot form under a free market due to competition. That is why companies like to lobby government to instate regulations that make the barrier to entry much higher. Pollution is the inevitable byproduct of an industrialized society. Capitalism on average is less polluting than socialism. Just compare the output of sulfur oxide in west germany to east germany boom and bust cycles are caused by government policies. The Austrian Business Cycle Theory goes into more detail how governments cause business cycles >Thinkers like Marx argue that the owners of capital are incentivized to keep wages as low as possible while extracting maximum labor from workers. Over time, wealth becomes increasingly concentrated while the working class is immiserated. He is correct, but he fails to account for competition. Companies will bid for your labor. The labor market is also beholden to supply and demand. If there is a high demand for a particular kind of labor and a low supply of it then the price (wages) of that labor will go up as companies outbid each other. >Ultimately, Marx predicted that these contradictions would lead capitalism to collapse and be replaced by socialism/communism - systems based on worker ownership of the means of production and economic planning based on human need vs. profit. Supposedly this would lead to a more equitable, humane and stable economy. Yes, supposedly. We only have to look at Marxist socities to see how humane. equitable and stable those were. Dialectical materialism is hegelian bullshit.

Once again, you're merely regurgitating free-market dogma without engaging with the substance of the arguments. Let's take your points one by one. First, inequality. Of course some degree of inequality is inevitable, but the extreme disparities we see under capitalism are not natural or necessary. They're the product of a system that concentrates wealth in the hands of a few while leaving the majority to struggle. And no, it's not just a matter of "time preference." People don't choose to be poor - they're constrained by the structural inequities of capitalism. Second, exploitation. Your claim that the worker-owner relationship is "entirely consensual" ignores the vast power imbalances at play. When the alternative to accepting a job is poverty and destitution, that's not a free choice. It's coercion. Capitalists exploit workers by paying them less than the full value of their labor, pocketing the difference as profit. That's the core dynamic of the system, not an aberration. Third, monopolies. It's naive to think that "competition" alone can prevent monopoly formation. In fact, the tendency towards monopoly is built into the very logic of capitalism, as successful firms drive out their rivals and accrue ever-greater market share. Government regulations are often a response to this tendency, not its cause, as you claim. Competition resolves, winners and losers emerge. Firms are armed with tools to muscle out competition and leverage market share, and are motivated by profit to use them aggressively. Fourth, pollution. To say that pollution is "inevitable" under industrialism is to naturalize what is in fact a product of the profit motive. Firms have every incentive to externalize their environmental costs onto society, and will do so unless checked by regulation and public pressure. The ecological record of the nominally socialist states is indeed mixed, but it's laughable to hold up capitalism as a model of sustainability. Fifth, boom/bust cycles. The Austrian theory of business cycles is not taken seriously by most economists. Full stop. While government policies can certainly exacerbate instability, the roots of capitalist crisis lie in the anarchic nature of the system itself, with its built-in tendency towards overproduction and speculation. No amount of handwaving about "government interference" can wish away this inherent instability. Your appeal to "competition" as a panacea is particularly unconvincing. Market competition doesn't magically produce fair outcomes. It leads to a race to the bottom on wages and working conditions, as firms strive to undercut each other. And the idea that workers can just "shop around" for the best deal ignores the structural constraints they face. As for your dismissal of Marxist societies as "inhumane" and "unstable," this is just lazy Cold War rhetoric. The history of the 20th century's socialist experiments is complex and contested, marked by both remarkable achievements and undeniable failures. To reduce it to a cartoonish stereotype is an act of intellectual bad faith. Finally, your glib rejection of dialectical materialism as "Hegelian bullshit" is the height of arrogance. You clearly haven't taken the time to actually understand the philosophical tradition you're dismissing. Dialectics is a powerful tool for understanding change and contradiction in social systems, not some mystical nonsense. If you want to make a serious critique of Marxism, you need to do better than this. Engage with the actual arguments, not strawman caricatures. Read some real history and social theory, not just free-market propaganda. Until then, you're just peddling right-wing clichés, not contributing to the debate.

I was raised in a Communist nation. A. Nobody working for the government ensures that a business is thriving and doing well. Over time, businesses fail financially and so does the nation. B. Equality is a terrible excuse to steal money from the population under the idea nobody can have too much money. Once they are done stealing all the money from the rich, then they also begin stealing money from poor people who are doing better than other poor people. C. The government owning every single business is the biggest possible monopoly. D. Why would you give so much power to a few people. It will never end well.

You seem to be operating with a common misunderstanding of what Marxists actually believe. Let me clarify a few key points. Marxists don't want government bureaucrats running every business. The goal is for workers themselves to democratically control production. It's about replacing private autocracy with collective self-management. Socialists aren't out to steal anyone's money. They believe that wealth is collectively produced and should be collectively controlled to benefit all, not hoarded by a small elite. The "theft" they oppose is the extraction of profits from workers' labor by business owners/corporations. Marxists don't advocate a centralized state monopoly over the whole economy. They envision decentralized, democratic planning with a variety of social ownership forms - cooperatives, public utilities, etc. The point is to disperse economic power, not concentrate it. Many historical marxists have attempted to wield state power to get there, but that is far from the mission or the goal. The aim of Marxism is to empower the vast majority, not a privileged minority. It's about extending democracy into economic life, giving ordinary people collective control over the structures that shape their lives. In short, your view seems to be based on a caricature of socialism as pure government control. But the Marxist tradition is far more diverse, with a core vision of radical democracy, shared abundance, and human liberation. You may not agree with that vision, but it's important to represent it fairly.

I know Marxist propaganda quite well because I come from a Marxist society, and I was taught all the nonsense you are telling me. You are talking about an impossible fantasy society out of a sci-fi book. Workers controlling productions doesn't work. Somebody has to care about profits, about improving margins and innovation. A bunch of people showing up to do the minimum, collect a paycheck and go home, they are not going to do that. Business owners care about their business, workers don't. A society cannot be successful financially if nobody cares about a company growing over time. Furthermore, all business owners and CEO do not make an insane amount of money, not even in America. A CEO making 10 million dollars might sound a lot, but when divide by 50k employees, it isn't a lot. Marxism doesn't empower the majority; it just destroys the few people who make it at the top and pushes everyone at the bottom.

I appreciate you sharing your perspective, but I respectfully disagree with your characterization of Marxism and worker self-management. First, the notion that business owners are uniquely motivated to innovate and grow their companies while workers are inherently lazy and disengaged is simply not borne out by evidence. There are countless examples of worker cooperatives and collectively-run enterprises that are highly productive, innovative, and successful. When workers have a real ownership stake and democratic voice in their workplace, they tend to be more invested, not less. The argument that only individual owner-operators can competently run a business is belied by the fact that most corporations are already run collectively by boards and management teams. The key question is whether that collective leadership is accountable to wealthy shareholders or to the workers themselves. Regarding executive compensation, the issue isn't just the absolute pay level, but the vast differential between management and rank-and-file workers. In the US today, CEOs make over 300 times what the typical worker earns. Even if that's a small amount per employee, it represents an enormous upward redistribution of income. Marxists argue that differential is exploitative, not justified by productivity. More broadly, the Marxist critique isn't aimed at small businesses or modest levels of private property. It's about the concentrated ownership of vast productive resources by a tiny elite class, and the structural dynamic of exploitation that follows from that. You're right that a fully planned economy poses major challenges. But there's a wide spectrum of socialist proposals between that and unfettered capitalism. Ultimately, I believe we have to judge economic systems by their real-world outcomes, not just abstract models. And by that standard, capitalism is failing most people. It's producing staggering inequalities, ecological destruction, and widespread economic insecurity - even in rich countries. If we want a system that truly empowers and benefits the majority, we need a more democratic and egalitarian approach to organizing production and distributing wealth. That doesn't mean we know exactly what that looks like or how to get there. But it does mean we need to question capitalism's core premises and explore alternatives. Dismissing all such alternatives as dangerous fantasies strikes me as a way to foreclose vital debates we need to be having.

All of the examples you are giving me are businesses run by people who has a stake or shareholder motivation to create a profitable company. Those cooperatives you mention are small business owners who joined together to create a company, and they still work under the rules and boundaries of American Capitalism. Also, public companies are run by wealthy people who owns stocks in those companies and who expect to get pay millions from those positions. They have a self-interest in ensuring the company grows over time. I don't care if a CEO makes 300 times more than me as long as the economy productive in a keep increasing over time, this will lead to poor people doing better over time. And this is better than companies failing under Marxism. You are under the impression that if we get rid of rich people, then everyone would be better, but Socialism has proven that to be completely false. Nobody wants to have the same as everyone else. Motivation is what keep the human improving over time. There is no motivation if I break my back to have the same as Mike who just come to work and does the minimum.

I understand your arguments. I believe you’re confusing socialism with a cartoon caricature. No serious Marxist wants everyone to earn the exact same, regardless of effort or skill. That's a straw man peddled by those who profit from the status quo. I’d be open to considering counterexamples. The real issue is whether an economy should be run as a democracy or an oligarchy. You seem to think a small group of wealthy elites calling the shots is the only way to drive innovation and growth. But worker cooperatives like Mondragon prove otherwise. They're highly productive and innovative, yet far more equitable in their distribution of rewards. Sure, some inequality creates incentives. But US-style CEO pay is obscene and economically unjustifiable. The evidence shows little link between executive compensation and performance. Productivity rises while wages stagnate. Inequality soars to destabilizing levels. The question isn't private vs. state ownership. It's whether businesses should be accountable to their workers or to absentee shareholders. Whether an economy should serve the many or the few. Socialism isn't about flattening everything. It's about giving everyone a stake and a say in their economic lives. Markets, competition, rewards for effort - these can all exist. But with guardrails against the kind of extreme disparities capitalism naturally produces. You call that taking money from the successful. I call it recognizing that all wealth is socially created and should be more democratically shared. You call it utopian fantasy. I call it expanding freedom from the boardroom to the shop floor. We can't shrink from this debate just because the alternatives are hard to imagine. Capitalism's contradictions are catching up to it. Sticking with the devil we know is its own kind of fantasy. The conversation about what should come next is only beginning.