Similarities Between Marx And Adam Smith

Theorists like Smith and Marx approach the topic of the economy in a theoretical way as well as one which seeks to influence the future. Both theorists are influenced by their surroundings, Adam Smith coming from a time just on the cusp of the Industrial Revolution, living in Scotland, and Karl Marx being educated in philosophy, in the midst of the Industrial Revolution, and seeing rebellions taking place. Each theorist seeks to outline an economic guide through which a state could be successful, their definitions of success as well as the paths they detail in an effort to get there, are quite different.
Adam Smith: Adam Smith approaches the economy with a new perspective on wealth. Previously, it had been believed that there was a set amount
He posits that work is what gives people purpose. This purpose is achieved through a process of closing the gap between the alienated world and man. Man, according to Marx, is alienated from the world he inhabits. Because our consciousness informs us that we are not the world and similarly the world is not us, we are alienated from it, man must work in order to break this dynamic. This alienation leads people to be repressed by the unhappy consciousness; alienation from our world breeds a feeling of unfulfillment and worthlessness. Marx argues that manipulating and recreating the world around us is what shifts the unhappy consciousness into a happier one. As humans, Marx describes, we are inclined to work as part of our nature. Labor is meaningful in the way in which it instills part of an individual into the product of their labor. That product then returns the profit it receives to the owner of the labor from which it was produced. The ability to do this is synonymous with the ability to exercise one’s liberty. With this in mind, Marx sees the capitalistic system and sees workers being denied their liberty through the disassociation of the work they provide and the final product. The bourgeoisie reap the benefits of the labor of the proletariat, thus denying the opportunity for the proletariat to work towards breaking the alienation from the world and
Property proves to be an important point for both Smith and Marx but in entirely different ways. For Marx private property, which is always owned by the bourgeoisie, is the root of the problem of capitalism. The few own the means of production and the many labor for an unfair return; the man who owns the property receives the benefits that are rightfully meant to belong to the proletariat. Marx describes private property by saying “modern bourgeois private property is the final and most complete expression of the system of producing and appropriating products, that is based on class antagonisms, on the exploitation of the many by the few” (Marx, 22). Smith’s view is one that private property is given. Private property, which originally is discussed by Locke, is a product of man instilling his labor into a piece of property, which therefore, gives him ownership. This is taken as a fact for Smith. Marx however raises the question of whether or not private property is indelible aspect of nature. He concludes that no, there is no way private property is not a construct that has been accepted by the bourgeoisie and then used to disenfranchise laborers. The only way to ensure that men are not dragged into appropriation is to abolish private property altogether. Marx definitively describes that the communist mission “may be summed up in the single sentence: Abolition of private