Adam Smith and Karl Marx are amongst the most influential economists of the last few centuries and are noted for their revolutionary contributions to the world of economics. While Adam Smith is known as an advocate of the capitalist school of thought, Karl Marx is recognized as the father of a politically opposing economic system: Communism. Although both these notable philosophers vastly contributed to the field of classical economics, their ideologies have always known to clash with one another. While Smith proposed the idea of the free market system where all individuals were given the liberty to follow their competitive nature and produce goods without any government intrusion, Marx strongly opposed the idea of a laissez-faire society and believed that Socialism would ultimately replace Capitalism. Marx believed that the capitalist system was inherently flawed since it was meant to only profit the rich and exploit the poor. To abate the hot debate of Smith versus Marx, this essay explores the ideas expounded by the two philosophers, discusses their opposing opinions …show more content…
For example, farmers now just focus on tending to their crops and livestock rather than pausing from their agricultural tasks to make their own tools or household items. Similarly, furniture-makers and workers in other fields get to concentrate on their field of expertise without having to worry about growing their own food, making each field much more productive and efficient than it was before. Likewise, an entire country can even specialize in a field of its expertise, export the goods it can produce best, and import other commodities it needs, which other countries can produce more efficiently than it can on its own land. Instead of doing everything ourselves, we acquire all the commodities we need through specialization and division of