Below are arguments for and against Marxism and Capitalism written by me, Vulcanities, and my friend, Maximus of NRI.
These were originally in Maximus' bulletin: The Weekly Marxist: Participation Through the Roof! | Politics and War. I felt that it was an exceptionally good conversation and needed to be highlighted so I made an entire bulletin devoted to it.
If you are here to witness a clash of the titans and want to see some punches thrown, I'm going to have to disappoint you as none of that will occur. These are incredibly cordial and polite paragraphs and rebuttals that should be highlighted because of this fact alone. If you came to watch a fight I'm going to have to redirect you to our partners ESPN+ and their UFC285-Heavyweight-Title Fight- Jones v Gane.
Without further ado here they are:
Below is my original comment inquiring about what Maximus thought of global trade in relation to Marxism:
Vulcanities:
"What are your (thoughts) on the global supply chain in relation to Marxism. I think prior examples throughout history have made it abundantly clear that if communism (or systems associated with it) we’re to succeed (which I still point out it has not succeeded) it would come from a strong global trade system. I know someone who lived in Soviet Berlin and told me that because the Soviets only traded with Cuba (and a few other countries) and Cubas shipments took forever a banana in Soviet Berlin was 80 times as expensive as a banana from Regular Berlin. Yes, 80 times. Do you think that this Global Trade Problem is a non-issue? If you believe it is an issue how does your country (address) it?"
Maximus:
Of course, our fellow Aequitas legend and writer sent in his thoughts, much appreciated!...To the point...
Global trade is an interesting topic, because in modern society, the vast majority only know how to view it from the capitalist perspective: multi-national corporations, global finance and banking, etc.
If given a Marxist touch, the global trade would not cease, rather, it would improve. Without the nation-states and their nationalistic tendencies imposed by the bourgeoisie, tariffs and embargoes would be lifted, supplies and goods could flow freely across the planet. The idea in mind is industries that can produce what the world needs at the highest possible quality and have it available to the whole world equally.
Separate companies for certain commodities, such as restaurants, would not cease to exist, they will instead be democratized, and their assets placed first and foremost towards the workers, and then quality. So yes, you can still get your Chick-Fil-A Spicy Chicken Sandwich in a Marxist society.
As for that relation to someone in Eastern Berlin, first and foremost I apologize for what they had to experience in that part of their life. The key factor to be understood is that this was under the bureaucracy of the Warsaw Pact and Eastern Bloc: these organizations had already deviated from the Bolsheviks significantly, and Lenin was little more than an image to promote Soviet Nationalism.
A banana should never cost 80 times more one place than somewhere else, that’s absurdity. But at the same time, do you wish to justify the food prices of the modern era compared to the minimum wage that the working class receives in relation to hyperinflation? I would scarcely think so.
The global trade problem is a matter of the corporate system, and how countries are dependent on them for their economies to survive. A good example of this is China: The reason Zero-Covid could not persist for the CCP was because large corporations threatened to leave the country and find labor elsewhere, so China had to push aside the protection of the people in the name of profit. Zero-Covid cannot work as a national policy, and not under a capitalist economic system constantly in need of profiteering.
As such, the idea of how we address it in our country cannot be understood in that context: only on an international level, led by the global working class, could such a new, democratized and socialized market ever be achieved.
Vulcanities:
Here’s the issue with the final paragraph of your response to me. When your country is led by the millions directly instead of the few a few things are going to happen. 1. People through human nature are inevitably going to want to profit themselves so this system would break back into capitalism, the natural order of things, very quickly. 2. In a system led by the “working class” where and how are the limits set. If the working class runs the show the working class wants to get more of this and more of that to better provide for themselves. They would almost immediately lose revolution fever because they’ve lost all incentive. As soon as they get what they need for themselves they don’t need the system to improve to much anymore. The lasting criticism of this system is that Marxists fail to understand basic human nature. Humans don’t believe, most of the time, in microeconomics for the good of all. Yes, you hear about sweeping macro economical changes but those affect everyone and are widely publicized. Micro- economics where most day-to-day transactions happen is not driven by those same factors. It’s driven by human need. I doubt everyone in your system so fervently believes in your system that even when there behind closed doors they are actively practicing it. This is a large reason as to why systems like these have never worked. I know a system that has prevailed though, it’s called capitalism and while not the greatest thing since sliced bread (which you can thank capitalism for) it’s surely a system that will last. At least we can say that much for capitalism.
Sorry For the long comment but hopefully you understand the point I’m trying to express. Thanks!
P.S: great newsletter sort of reminds me of early editions of the OOW keep it up!
Maximus:
Not to rain on your party RoManic, but human nature is actually a garbage argument for, anything really. It's a mystic psychic that we don't fully understand, and is fully capable of generous and wholesome activities: but when it comes to improvement of society, suddenly we become barbaric and greedy a-holes? Humans were not made by nature seeking profit, we were made seeking cooperation as tribal communities. The idea of profit wasn't a factor of our society until the global market was created as a product of the Industrial Revolution.
Humans, like most animals, were made social creatures, not meant to exploit each other. That trait evolved with economic development as intelligent beings, and isn't intended to continue. If anything, capitalism is more opposed to this "human nature" than Marxism.
Marx also predicted the claim that universal laziness would overtake under his societal layout: it's practically in the Communist Manifesto itself. But in that mindset, capitalism ought to have been trashed from the start: those who toil get hardly anything, and those who sit idly gain all the wealth. There is no positive incentive under capitalism. Marxism holds the incentive of progressivism, of the imagination, of the desire to march forward as one, whereas under capitalism, the vast majority have no motivation because they see no future beyond their subsistence lives: they only work because without it, they would only be worse off.
The incentive to labor under capitalism is not to go up, but to stop from sliding further down.
The incentive to labor under Marxism is not to risk falling, but the desire to go up further, not just individually, but socially.
As for the argument that capitalism has prevailed, you're ignoring history as a whole: when capitalism first came around, it had critics in the form of aristocracy based in the feudalist system that had so far lasted centuries. Just as capitalism replaced feudalism, something will inevitably have to replace capitalism. Capitalism naturally destroys itself: it grinds resources at rates that cannot be sustained, produces economic collapses and drops people into poverty on a regular schedule (notice how we get recessions every decade or so?), and places profit over everything else, including human life.
Capitalism had its respective place in history to improve the lives of people from feudalism. But that place in history is over.
Vulcanities:
You bring up good points but there are two things I feel need to be addressed:
- We aren’t in the industrial revolution anymore. We must remember that Marxism was created in the Industrial Revolution for the Industrial Revolution. Just as capitalism has evolved so to does your idea of Marxism have to. Capitalism understands that their are issues in its system. Find me one person in America who doesn’t think the system is rigged. You can’t. However, we evolved from our times in the Industrial Revolution. We don’t work people to the bone. People don’t always make 5 cents a day in some sweat shop (Looking at you China) in America. That doesn’t happen anymore. It’s in large part because the system has evolved and I have high hopes that it will continue to do so. It’s in large part because of light socialist “band aids” as economists call them. There is a yin and Yang balance to the two systems. However, Marxists seem to love the idea of not working within the system to accomplish good, like the progressives of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. When they accomplished necessary reforms by working with capitalists instead of against good things happened. We got child labor laws and a solid work week. Now it’s a little different than saying “Let’s lead a revolution (that no one has incentive to join) to help out poor old doomed America from itself even though we refuse to do anything to save it.” Now excuse me if that’s a gross exaggeration but this is just from what I’ve experienced. Marxism in its full has no place anywhere. Capitalism in its full has no place anywhere. However a capitalist system with minor socialist band-aids is a proven way to achieve greatness. Instead of keeping Marxism in the steel age evolve it to fit the current infrastructure already in place. That doesn’t mean override the system it means work with it. Don’t swim against the tide is the words I’ll leave this section with.
- Your evaluation of society under Marxism is flawed, I believe. You say that under capitalism (though I believe this view is outdated and relates to what I said in the section above) people who toil get poor while the those who don’t get rich. In large part this speaks to a broader misunderstanding by the American people as to what Capitalism is and what it should be. Capitalism is an evolving system that will favor the rich over the poor for society’s benefit. To explain this would take me a while so I’ll wait on it. Capitalism should be an evolving system that seeks to grow the opportunity’s of everyone. It goes back to me motto “Work, Opportunity, Freedom!” Through work you will gain opportunity and through opportunity comes greater freedom. Capitalist should work towards this goal though I understand it doesn’t happen always. Like I said we’re evolving. Let’s look at Marxism though. There are no ”appropriate“ examples to examine Marxism buy so I won’t use one rather I will go off what the system you’re describing says. Marxism isn’t a system that wants you to rise. Marxism is a system that wants everyone to stagnate out of a toddlers misguided sense of fairness (I’m sorry for the strong language but I believe it’s apt). If Marxism ever were to work effectively you would see another mindless class of workers who get a say in their country but because they are a mindless class of workers don’t really use it to their advantage. Workers don’t have time to consider the vast economic effects of something like global trade. No they consider what meal they need next. They don’t have time for something like that. I don’t blame them. Plus most workers aren’t educated and don’t need education. It seems like Marxism agrees with this because what institution penalizes idiocy and drives unfairness more than School, the eternal enemy. Marxism doesn’t want an educated working class running the country, no it would seem they want an uneducated mass. But why? Well look at Russia. I know you don’t like comparisons to it but here it is. They started with good intentions by lo and behold as soon as workers got a say it was taken away because they were easily controlled by educated power hungry officials. When in reality to make something like Marxism work you need everyone to be highly intelligient. But to make someone highly intelligent you have to go to school. This series of thinking is circular and leads us back to square one.
I hope you don’t view any of these comments as insults please let me know if I have to dial things down. Thanks!
If you took the time to read through these hopefully you came out with a better understanding about what each system espouses. I mainly put these in a separate bulletin because I wanted to know what you guys think about such a heated issue as this. Let me know down in the comments. Thanks!
Replies
Before I respond, I would like to make the suggestion to chunk your paragraphs: reading a long wall of text without any breaks hurts the eyes a lot, and causes the points to get lost.
That said, here we go:
But you cannot say the industrial revolution has no impact anymore. Marxism and Capitalism alike were created in the same time period, but Marxism was no less made capable of evolution. In fact, the crises of the 20th century, and now into the 21st, have only proven Marxist views correct, and also allowed us to make necessary revisions to the ideology, without removing the revolutionary attribute.
Your idea of Marxism and Capitalism working in unison however, is a wet dream: A wet dream we call Social Democracy. Of course Marxists don't work in the system: because the system does everything in its power to screw them over. Like I said, Capitalism had its place in improving life, but the reformists aren't a win-all solution.
Capitalism is a system that is hellbent on profit, and with the worker's simmering with rebellious anger, it had to work with the reformists to stop revolution. Once that revolutionary fervor has died down, and it has any effective narrative against Marxism, then it has free reign to toss those reforms out the window: "Sure the system is trashing people's lives, but the other alternative is communism, which is far worse."
As such, the only effective way to perpetuate real change is the abolition of the system that cannot afford to. Marxism has no reason for labor laws or social welfare to be repealed: capitalism needs that money to fund its war machine armies and ensure that it places wealth into the bourgeoisie rather than proletariat, because the proletariat does not support war, but war is such a lucrative business.
On your second point, Capitalism does evolve, with new technology and new ways of thinking: but do these changes benefit the masses?
Ignoring the fact that capitalism's motto sounds eerily like the sign at the entrance to Auschwitz (Arbeit Macht Frei, Work sets you free), what does work do for those in the factories that produce our goods that sit on shelves unbought for their rising prices, on the farms that make our tons of food that go uneaten for similar reasons, and even in places like hospitals (referring to nurses, especially now in the Pandemic) and schools: capital keeps their lives going, but it never gets any better for them. Their freedom only keeps going down, alongside that of the minorities and the persecuted (half Asian here, living in Florida has become almost a threat to me at this point because of DeSantis' political agenda).
And your idea of Marxism not wanting an educated working class, that is, to say the least... absolute blasphemy.
If anything, Marxism wants the working class to be MORE educated, more able to make knowledgeable decisions, especially in politics and economics. School is not the eternal enemy, it is the eternal ally. It is the key to ensuring that workers can focus on greater aspects, instead of what they will eat for dinner that night: hunger, a focus for around 38 million Americans every day.
School in contemporary times has had capitalism and fascism alike attempt to hijack how children and teens are educated on history, politics, and the economy, to suppress leftists and progressive ideas, but this only antagonizes the younger generation further.
Sure, you don't need a PhD in Russian Literature to work in a car factory, but until there is an equal and free field of education, grade-level and university, that allows security of labor, income, and prosperity to the masses, something capitalism has neglected to provide, the idea of replacing human labor with robots and AI will always mean mass unemployment, and the loss of the worker's final power over the bourgeoisie: and low and behold, dystopia.
I do thank you for allowing our points to be heard, and notice how I have allowed yours to be as well. I read opinions, from both sides, but at the same time, being critical of both of them, more often than not, has Karl Marx at a higher standard, morally and statistically, than Adam Smith and Jeff Bezos.
Once more I have to say the way you're depicting Capitalism is flawed. Capitalism in it's pure form is literally impossible to achieve. Marxism in it's pure form is also literally impossible to achieve. Capitalism with help from other systems, because it is flexible, is a system that works. It's not a wet dream, it's a reality. Marxism, I would argue, is more of a wet dream than anything. You've definitely been asked this before but, name an example of a Marxist country that is still in operation today. Marxism, the untested and much dreamed about, is the dream. A dream that I would say is more hot than wet because of the many times it has historically gone smoldering to the ground. Maybe my interpretation of Marxism is confused and wrong so I'll ask you in your next response if you have one to explain what it means from your point of things?
First off the idea that Capitalism is tossing any meaningful reforms away as soon as the people aren't looking is flawed and unfounded. I'm struggling to remember a time when we tossed child labor laws out and made it legal again. I'm struggling to remember a time when we decided to make a 24 hour work day legal again. I'm struggling to remember...I'm struggling to remember...I'm struggling to remember... Maybe I'm just suffering from Class III Memory loss but I doubt I am.
Secondly, on your point of Capitalism and War I think your mistaking Capitalism with America. I do not agree with America's many imperialist wars. There definitely was war profiteering in Afghanistan and places such as that. Suprise, bad people exist. I don't endorse these people and I don't think their capitalists. However, there are many Capitalist countries who have not gone to war to suppress their people and profiteer on war. America is part of a whole not the sum. WWII America is a great example of Capitalism in harmony with war. We were able to boost people's lives at home by providing them with jobs and also able to win a war against a terrifying transgressor.
Let's focus on your thoughts of food with Capitalism. Capitalism creates an abundance of food. Marxism if implemented in the way you're describing will create to little. I don't know about you but I prefer wasting food to having none. Marxism, if implemented in the way you're describing, would be to consumed by equality to focus on actual labor. People wouldn't want to be on a farm all their lives without an incentive. Someone in Marxism has to tell them that they need to work there. It's why we saw people like Mao Zedong implement policies that sent well educated cities people out into the fields where they had absolutely no experience. In a few quick years China was engulfed by the biggest famine in their history that killed an insane amount of people. But, it was equal right? Those city folks who were way more educated and thought they were better than us had it coming right? These are very illogical conclusions to reach when you are running a country of hundreds of millions of people right? So, in the end all I don't think that Capitalism has the greatest management of resources but then again, I'm not liking my alternatives. Plus, I'm willing to keep improving this system so that I can say to people that we have something to be proud of here. I don't want to start fights and I don't want to complain I want to be proud of the system I created. So, if we all truly believe that Capitalism grossly mismanages resources, well, capitalism will allow you to find a solution to that and then implement it.
I'm not white either, I can sympathize with the inequalities you are facing in America. Once again though I say, why is America made the cover of this all. It is a part of the whole and not the sum. Plus, I believe you are confusing Democracy's failings and Capitalisms failings. Its common and I don't fault you for it but I believe it needs to be addressed. When you say Desantis' and his political agenda are hurting you, I fail to see the relevance to the system and idea of Capitalism. That is a whole different conversation that should not and cannot be discussed in conjunction with Capitalism as a system.
On Marxism and education,
How do you justify then, some people being smarter than others. You can't lie and say we're all equal and that there is no such thing as natural smarts. It's just not true. I know I have a way higher intellect than a certain percentage of the population. I'm basing that off of standardized scores, basic human interactions, and a multitude of other factors. Mostly though, I can attribute my intelligence to education. By this way of thinking me getting an education is a violation, somehow, of someone else's right to be just as equal as me. I've talked to devoted Communists (thankfully you aren't one, you're a Marxist) who can't stand the fact that I showed them a point or did something that may have shown a higher intelligence, even if it was temporary. "It's not fair!" as one of my siblings commonly exclaims. Yes, it's not I'm sorry but this is the way of the world. Some people have better ideas than others. I could not have done the things Einstein did. However, in Marxism Einstein would have been shewed off. "You're too smart, you're making us feel bad!" He would have been put to work as some common field laborer. He would have died a common field laborer. Nobody would know what E=MC2 means. It would be irrelevant. Another advancement of mankind wiped off the smug face of the earth like a bug being snatched out of the air. So, you see, Marxism and Education are incompatible. One praises the person who tries the hardest the other, kindly, asks you to stay in your place.
To turn to your example of the car worker,
If that car worker has a degree in mechanical engineering he should be in that role right? He worked hard at school, he wanted to pursue that job, and he would get it right? Well Marxism would say, "Wait, hold on, that's not fair! We have another applicant who hasn't worked a wink in his life as a mechanic who also wants to be a mechanic. To make this fair let's flip a coin and see who gets heads." You can see that overtime that job is going to be filled with about the same amount of uneducated and unqualified people as their are fully educated and qualified people. Marxism doesn't have a specified plan for hiring at all. Once again education and natural ability plays no part in Marxism,
I doubt it ever will...
I really enjoy these conversations as they make me continue to ponder and think on my views. I have to adjust at certain points and expand on my knowledge here. I wouldn't be mad if you ended this line of debate here, but I certainly wish, for both our sakes (so that we both may learn and grow more) that we keep this line of debate and discussion open. Thanks!
I enjoy this discussion too, it's the first place where someone has not only been civilized about it instead of insulting, but you present very good points alongside your arguments. To continue...
Of course in their pure forms they are impossible to achieve, but in the realm of Marxism, I believe you are mixing it up with the earlier developed Utopian Socialism, which Marx created his idea to realize in the form of Scientific Socialism (i.e., Marxism's formal name), which took the egalitarian ideas of Utopian Socialism and combined it with the basic foundations of reality.
The idea that Marxism has never succeeded in the past can only be refuted in truth by a phrase I'm sure you've heard before: "True communism has never been tried." And this phrase is right on point: Upon a revolution by the workers, reactionary forces in league with the bourgeoisie, or a bourgeoisie of their own, immediately seek to hijack the revolution, and seize control for themselves, as what became of the USSR. That or the revolution gets crushed from the outside, as was the Paris Commune of 1871. As was well stated by Leon Trotsky in his "Fascism: What it is and how to fight it":
Due to the mistake of not arming and preparing the working class for this counterrevolutionary resurgence, there has been no state capable of allowing Marxism in any real form to properly develop, and thus, there is no evidence that it could not succeed.
On your next paragraph, perhaps we have not yet resorted back to 19th century levels of exploitation, but that is not to say capitalism is letting reforms go free: welfare is being cut back in Scandinavia, the richest country on Earth can't feed all its people because it doesn't do anything if it doesn't make a profit out of it, workers in key sectors are still working inhumane hours (Railroad workers in the U.S. are currently given somewhere around ZERO days off, not for holidays, not for family, NOT EVEN FOR A ROUTINE DOCTORS APPOINTMENT (i.e., if they left to go see their doctor for their normal annual check-up, then the company is within its self-given rights to fire them), the so-called "Essential Workers" of the Pandemic era that were thrusted into the path of the Coronavirus were pushed into such without any form of pay raise, but rather stagnant or dropping wages. Billions of dollars worth of money in social welfare and other domestic sectors is being slashed, and funneled into weapons; the mass-slaughter of Russian conscripts, and quite possibly Chinese soldiers in the not-so-distant future.
Moving on, capitalism and imperialism, regardless of morality of the people in charge, are naturally intertwined. Why did Europeans seek out global empires? They needed resources to fund their massive industries and armies, and the racial atrocities of the centuries past became one of multiple side-effects of this.
You cannot discuss America alone and ignore the world, because capitalism is the order of the current world, and America has been at the helm of it since 1991, regardless of the actions of her enemies: if a country does something the White House doesn't like, America slaps sanctions on them, and just like that their country is impoverished. Russia only manages to survive because of how vast and full of resources she is: resources America and NATO could really use against China. The problem is, Russia is in the way of those juicy resources... it'd be a shame if... a proxy war broke out that could justify an attack on Russia...
As for the Second World War, I'm not sure why you'd try to justify improvements of life from jobs that came from the deaths of 60 million worldwide, plus another 10 million from the Holocaust. That just seems barbaric. And of course there are countries that haven't gone to war to profit for themselves: Either its because they're too weak, or because Mr. Big Mac would come freedom-ize them for "disrupting world peace", after, let's see...
Serbia in 1999...
Iraq in 2003...
Libya in 2011...
Afghanistan in 2001 until just a couple years ago...
Syria in 2012...
Ukraine going on right forking now...
Yeah I don't think America has a say in this whole "war crime" thing. It would be like accusing everyone in the room of murder, when all of them and you yourself are holding the bloodied daggers. Notice how all these happened after 1991 too: Once the USSR was out of the way, America believed it could do whatever the hell it wanted with the world: who would dare challenge them then, in the new "American Century"?
The mismanagement of food is capitalism's doing, no doubts there. America creates a surplus of food on a daily basis, and yet it goes unbought by all those starving: food that is throw out after expiring is then covered with toxic chemicals just so that animals and the poor can't eat the scraps! What savagery is this!? Marxism does not advocate for the loss of food production: Thanks to machinery, as well as the population that is INTERESTED in agriculture, we need only make that food available to the masses at prices they can afford, and then the surplus... remember that place called Africa?
And don't try to fight Marxism using Maoist actions: his ideas were purely built off of Stalinist dictatorship, and had little to no basis in Marxism. The decision to send the educated into the fields was idiotic, and since China didn't have the industrial means to mass produce food for her massive population, then a famine was inevitable regardless.
On to the racial issues of America, perhaps I was flawed in limiting it to America. But America is the natural one to bring up because she is at the lead of the capitalist world, and is a cultural melting pot. America is indeed just part of the sum, but sure is a grand majority of it. I bring up DeSantis and relate his policies to capitalism, because of the origins of such: capitalism does not discriminate who it exploits, but if it can create divisions amongst the population, then it can secure itself from a united revolution.
Racism in America can date back to at least Bacon's Rebellion, which included white and black men fighting side by side. After it was crushed, European empires started spurring the ideas of African-Americans being less than the white man, and so, racism took hold in antebellum America, and survives to this day, altered, yet just as rotten.
Racism nowadays finds its home in fascism, mainly because of its origins in Germany, and the idea of the German Aryan being the master race. White supremacists believe the same thing, and fascism gives them a political road to success. And from where do we see fascism springing up in America: Trump, DeSantis, Abbott, the leadership of the GOP is degenerating into fascism, whilst their opponent party seeks preservation of capitalism under "friendly" terms of cooperation with them.
Some of the only times the two parties do cooperate is in cases of spending on American Imperialism, or combatting the working class and their increasing anger towards the 2-party system.
On education, yes, there will always be smarter people than others. The society of egalitarianism is not robotic equality, not absolute equality, where you must be dead on the line with everyone else (A poisoned capitalist propaganda slogan, that is only further spread by memes): egalitarianism, and to extend Marxism, encourages uniqueness where it does not harm or exploit others. Perhaps it would help to remind you Einstein himself was a Socialist? A society cannot function without the educated, but in fact, the educated are often more a danger to capitalism than Marxism: the educated are analytical, and if you're analytical of capitalism, you'll find some pretty forked up sh*t.
This goes back to Mao Zedong: he placed the educated in the field because he was afraid they would challenge is rule. Challenge his rule... like... (gasp!)... A DICTATOR??? Education to question leadership is the foundation of democracy, and therefore Marxism. Suppression of the educated in any society is an immediate sign of some kind of bureaucracy forming, and as such, an immediate sign that Marxism is being abandoned, if it was even there to start with.
And therefore, I would argue those "communists" you talked to, are not communists at all, but misguided pseudo-leftists, quite possibly Stalinist, but I would need to know more about them to make a determination.
And your description of the car worker... Imma be honest, it makes no sense. If the person got the degree in mechanical engineering, then OF COURSE they should get the job. As for the one who really WANTS to be an engineer, then it's up to them to put in the education and work for it.
Marxism opens the doors to university education for the masses, but it cannot force anyone into it. The success of an individual will still depend on their own determination and willpower. All Marxism does is provide the tools that capitalism keeps behind a paywall.
And what of those who, even with everything Marxism provides, still refuse to educate themselves? Then they will be turned to the labor jobs that don't need a huge education: The difference being that they will still be able to live a life. No incentive then, you say? YES THERE IS: It's called that same higher education! If you don't want to be down there, don't put yourself down there! And besides, eventually automation will take over those lower jobs, so a higher education will only become more important: perhaps still not mandated, but increasingly necessary to have a job. People aren't born unable to learn, and all people can be made into educated, prosperous citizens, with effort, and the openness of the university locked up by capitalist tuition, that the rising cost of living and hyperinflation are making increasingly harder to pay for the incoming generation.
I understand it's rather hard to comprehend, and admittedly it is very difficult to explain. It would have to be actively simulated to be properly understood.
Well, that was a lot to type out. I think that took roughly an hour. I hope you come back and restate as you desire: I'll be waiting 😊