The Inevitable Result

Marx’ lack of understanding about how economics works would lead to people in a communist society being even more oppressed than people now.

What Marx seems to deliberately ignore is that the division of labor is not, as Marx puts it, “based on the natural division of labour in the family and the separation of society into individual families opposed to one another.” Division of labor is, in reality based on the fact that it is inefficient for one person to perform multiple careers in the same day, instead of devoting all their time toward one career, and because it is nigh impossible for a person to achieve the knowledge necessary to perform many separate highly professional tasks. Marx claims that in a communist society, man could be a hunter, a fisherman, or a critic, as he pleased. He doesn’t mention that man could be a neurosurgeon, anesthesiologist, or structural engineer as he pleased. He also doesn’t mention that man could be a garbage collector, burger flipper, or janitor as they pleased, even though these jobs are just as necessary in a functioning society. What he doesn’t seem to realize is that, while people may have a burning passion for a certain career, often times people work in certain jobs because that’s what is needed, and the market is willing to pay for that service.

It is because of this market demand, and the subsequent supply by the workers, that Marx believes that the workers are being oppressed. Marx believes that for some reason, when the communist revolution occurs, supply and demand will cease to exist, and men will only produce what they want to. He claims that in communism, “society regulates the general production,” which will somehow magically allow man to do whatever he wants, and not be concerned with what the society needs. In this case, many men will be fishermen, but few will be garbage collectors. Marx may say, that if man becomes a speices-being, then he will want to do what is best for the society. If this is the case, however, the workers are not doing what they please, but what they need to do for their society to succeed. Moreover, because the efficiency of things would be so decreased, far more men would have to work far longer at jobs that benefitted society instead of at jobs they wanted. Inevitably, Communism would lead to all men being forced to work unpleasant jobs to merely sustain society, instead of some men working in jobs that would push society forward. It is difficult to believe that Communism would allow a society in which we as humans would one day be able to send spaceships to Mars, or delve into the mysteries of science at all. Any sort of specialization would be rooted out in for the sake of jobs that sustained basic life.