A significant error that I constantly run across among liberty-oriented fellows: the labor theory of value is not a "Marx thing", it's a "classical thing" -- Adam Smith himself subscribed to a form of it, as did Ricardo (which is a more explicit precedent for socialist theories).
The fork in the road that led to a more truthful theory of value was the Marginal Revolution that lies at the core of neoclassical theories.
Login to reply
Replies (1)
I always scratch my head when labor theory is attacked when it's not fully Marx's understanding.
He obviously has a particular understanding compared to classical political economists like Smith or Ricardo but he was basically following their lines a lot.
Marx focused on contradictions in how capitalism develops and undermines some of its own characteristics, like how capitalism and free markets are about competition but also leads to monopolies that undermine competition. Or that free markets is a non-statist form of organizing production but then leads to state and regulatory capture by private interests.
Look around. Does this not happen? So it's nice to see some push back at these misunderstandings.