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Marx's analysis biggest weakness is actually housing, and it shows. He uses a two-factor model of production, land and capital, and completely ignores land as a

Marx's analysis biggest weakness is actually housing, and it shows. He uses a two-factor model of production, land and capital, and completely ignores land as a factor of production with characteristics quite dissimilar from capital. (At least on the broad economic sense, land is quite different, even if in accounting it is pretty much capital.) His later parts of Capital Part 3 on the class of landowners was good, but he never finished it. The first directive of the Communicst Manifesto, confiscating and redistributing land rents, was something that would have actually helped capitalism quite a bit to be more productive and improve everyone's life.

xkekjrktllss 3y ago
A housing situation like the modern US would have been ridiculous for any 19th century European to write about. Having most of a population living in homes occupied by their owners was unheard of and irrelevant at that time and/or place. Popular home ownership comprises a uniquely American political strategy. Calling this a "weakness" is just laughable. What other 19th century thinkers are you holding to the standards of a God?
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago
  > Popular home ownership comprises a uniquely American political strategy We're smack in the middle of countries that measure and report homeownership [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_home_ownership_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_home_owne...
  - xkekjrktllss 3y ago
    Those are both American countries, but that isn't necessarily the point, which is a historical one. Tapping bits of seemingly infinite natural resources to expand land-owning constituencies has played an overwhelming role in the history of the United States and all over the New World.
    - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
      > Those are both American countries There are more than two countries on that list. Most aren’t in the Americas. Laos, Romania, Kazakhstan, Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia, Macedonia, Vietnam, China, Serbia, Lithuania, Russia, Singapore, Poland, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Bulgaria, Indonesia, Taiwan, Latvia, Oman, Estonia, Malta, Norway, Thailand, Czechia, Portugal, Malaysia, Slovenia, Spain, Egypt, Kenya, Italy, Iceland, Greece, Belgium, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Ireland, the EU as a whole, Cyprus, South Africa, Finland and Australia each have higher homeownership rates than the United States.
      - deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
    - ffgjgf1 3y ago
      Except many European countries have significantly higher home ownership rates than the US. Belgium for instance which has been one of the most intensively economically developed areas over the last 700 years higher he ownership and interestingly both one of the highest median wealth per capita AND lowest(!) wealth inequality in the developed world. That’s pretty much the opposite of what you’d expect (of course you won’t reply to this comment now).
epistasis 3y ago
Major typo there, the two factor model is "labor and capital," and land is what is omitted.

xkekjrktllss 3y ago

A housing situation like the modern US would have been ridiculous for any 19th century European to write about. Having most of a population living in homes occupied by their owners was unheard of and irrelevant at that time and/or place. Popular home ownership comprises a uniquely American political strategy. Calling this a "weakness" is just laughable. What other 19th century thinkers are you holding to the standards of a God?

JumpCrisscross 3y ago
> Popular home ownership comprises a uniquely American political strategy We're smack in the middle of countries that measure and report homeownership [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_home_ownership_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_home_owne...
- xkekjrktllss 3y ago
  Those are both American countries, but that isn't necessarily the point, which is a historical one. Tapping bits of seemingly infinite natural resources to expand land-owning constituencies has played an overwhelming role in the history of the United States and all over the New World.
  - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
    > Those are both American countries There are more than two countries on that list. Most aren’t in the Americas. Laos, Romania, Kazakhstan, Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia, Macedonia, Vietnam, China, Serbia, Lithuania, Russia, Singapore, Poland, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Bulgaria, Indonesia, Taiwan, Latvia, Oman, Estonia, Malta, Norway, Thailand, Czechia, Portugal, Malaysia, Slovenia, Spain, Egypt, Kenya, Italy, Iceland, Greece, Belgium, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Ireland, the EU as a whole, Cyprus, South Africa, Finland and Australia each have higher homeownership rates than the United States.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
  - ffgjgf1 3y ago
    Except many European countries have significantly higher home ownership rates than the US. Belgium for instance which has been one of the most intensively economically developed areas over the last 700 years higher he ownership and interestingly both one of the highest median wealth per capita AND lowest(!) wealth inequality in the developed world. That’s pretty much the opposite of what you’d expect (of course you won’t reply to this comment now).

epistasis 3y ago

Major typo there, the two factor model is "labor and capital," and land is what is omitted.