this post was submitted on 08 Aug 2026
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Unpopular Opinion

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Leftism is better without Marxist economics (vargar.org)
submitted 12 hours ago by wraekscadu@vargar.org to c/unpopularopinion@lemmy.world
29 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

I don't think this is particularly unpopular outside of Lemmy, but still.

I consider myself a leftist primarily because:

  • I want every individual to have maximum possible freedom as long as its existence doesn't reduce the summation of the freedom of all individuals.
  • The current system doesn't do a good enough job at this as it permits power concentration.
  • The policies I believe would help achieve my "want" (the freedom thing) are generally considered "leftist".

Marx for his time, did some quite cool stuff. I really enjoyed his work in sociology. His critique of capitalism had merit.

THAT BEING SAID, labor theory of value is absolute dogshit. FOR THE TIME, sure, ok- nice effort. But TODAY, when marginalism has proven time and time again to be the more superior explanation to value, defending LTV is kinda lame.

I've never met a single professional economist who takes it seriously. Most of its defenders (in my experience) tend to be folks who have no economics background, and frankly aren't willing to have a good faith convo. I'm not trying to bandwagon effect + appeal to authority here, but this is just so reminiscent of anti vaxxers and flat earthers (at least for me).

I won't go into MY reasoning for preferring marginalist economics over LTV economics as there are much much better writeups for this than what I'm capable of. Here's one I could lazily find.

But yeah. In conclusion, I'm of the opinion that it would be much nicer if leftists got rid of Marx from their economics, and instead adopted economic models that better described reality.

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[–] Krusty@quokk.au 0 points 7 hours ago* (last edited 7 hours ago) (1 children)

Poor word choices abound.

You refer to people as its instead of their...

Poor construction. What is freedom? You want lawlessness? Are you free to rob other people or kill other people? Where does your freedom end and their freedom begins? Sorry. Where does your freedom begin and its freedom began? See how that sounds awful?

I don't think randomly capitalizing complete words is doing your little diatribe any favors.

I don't know what LTV is and I'm pretty sure nobody else does either(some used LVT). If you use an acronym/initialism you should probably define it.

And you failed to define or elaborate on any economics that better define reality. Which I'm sure you probably can't do.....

I give you a zero. Abject failure. This is fucking garbage. Worse than a shit post. I mean at least some people eat shit. This is just calorie-free bulllocks.

[–] wraekscadu@vargar.org 2 points 1 hour ago

You refer to people as its instead of their...

No. I'm referring to the freedom in question as "it".

Are you free to rob other people or kill other people?

If my freedom of robbing other people didn't reduce cumulative freedom, robbing should be okay. BUT, it generally does do that. Hence, robbing shouldn't be permitted.

If you use an acronym/initialism you should probably define it

I first said labor theory of value and then began to use it as an acronym.

Which I'm sure you probably can't do.....

Ooo burn 🙄

Be humble. Engage in good faith if you want to engage at all. Otherwise you just come across as insufferable.