Karl Marx may have been prescient, but not that prescient

If only he had actually said it, Americans might have a healthy new respect for -- or maybe fear of -- Karl Marx.

This hoax quote has been going around the Internet for at least a month now, attributed to the man most associated with the rise of communism:

"Owners of capital will stimulate the working class to buy more and more of expensive goods, houses and technology, pushing them to take more and more expensive credits, until their debt becomes unbearable. The unpaid debt will lead to bankruptcy of banks, which will have to be nationalized, and the State will have to take the road which will eventually lead to communism." -- Karl Marx, Das Kapital, 1867

In the blogosphere, no one who has looked into it has found any such actual quote from Marx. Can’t find it, or anything remotely similar-sounding, on marxists.org, either.

As Megan McArdle at the Atlantic magazine wrote, the wording immediately sounded "a little too apropos, as if Marx were writing from the CNN green room."

Still, Marx did predict that communism would be the last stage in the evolution of human society, once the working class finally revolted against exploitation by the capitalist class. His vision, however, was one of utopian communism, not the authoritarian communism of the old Soviet Union.

As for genuine Marx quotes apropos of the current economic and financial-system mess, here’s one:

"In every stockjobbing swindle every one knows that some time or other the crash must come, but every one hopes that it may fall on the head of his neighbour, after he himself has caught the shower of gold and placed it in safety. Après moi le déluge! is the watchword of every capitalist and of every capitalist nation. Hence Capital is reckless of the health or length of life of the laborer, unless under compulsion from society."

-- Tom Petruno

Comments

[tom]

One only has to play a game of monopoly to see where unchecked capitalism leads. Sooner or later one player will own all the hotels and houses. The statistics in this country bear this out by the fact that 10% of society own 80% of its assets. Short of communism, the only way to spread wealth more evenly
is through the tax system such as the graduated income tax.

[Tom]

Joseph Stalin wrote:
It would be wrong to think that WW I I was a casual occurrence, or mistakes made by a particular statesman, though mistakes were undoubtedly made. Actually the war was the inevitable result of the development of world economic and political forces on the basis of modern monopoly capitalism. Marxisits have declared more than once that the capitalist system of the world economy harbors elements of general crises and armed conflict and that, hence, the development of world capitalism in our time proceeds not in the form of smooth even progress but through crises and military catasrophes.

Karl Marx's mother once said in effect: I wish Karl would have made more capital and wrote and spoke less about it.

[martscan]

Once again, Tom Petruno displays his acuity in stimulating his readers to think beyond the mundane of run-of-the-mill money blogs. That labor is nothing but a factor of production hasn't changed since long before Marx was so able to describe it.

[Phil Dog]

Well, back in the day, we secretly met in a spare room at the Whittier YMCA. We read Marx, Lenin, and Engels too. We awaited the type of days we see in the world now. The time is ripe, when this would happens, we decided. With a bit of glee and anticipation, I feel as though this country is finally ready for an alternative; for a better way. We 5th column workers have waited for so, so long. I can't wait for May Day!

[furthermore]

Sounds like Tom (first comment, not the author) sucks at Monopoly.

[Alberto Jorge]

Usually when nation states lose a war, they are history. We have have a case of two wars, not lost, but not won. And these and the lifesyles in that era, were funded by communists (China) and religious fanatics (the Gulf). Both have the bomb. So war and crises are different now in relation to Marx's time. Be happy and choose somewhere quiet for the next five years !