ABSTRACT
This chapter presents an argument to show that capitalism is a just economic system. A developed economy has been specified to conform to the Marxist view that capitalism arises only when the forces of production have reached a high stage of growth. A developed capitalist economy consists of two principal classes: capitalists and proletarians. Our hypothetical Marxist might argue that the definition begs the question against Marxism in a subtler way. Marxists contend that their view of the historical origins of capitalism is not mere extraneous detail. Whether it is logically possible to imagine a capitalist system without exploitation is a scholastic conundrum, given that actually existing capitalism rests on exploitation. The phrase "other things being equal" cannot be fully explained before we present the argument for capitalism and consider the Marxist criticisms of it. A critic of capitalism could show that, in the circumstances of capitalism's actual development, workers or other economic actors lacked economic freedom.
