Economic heritage: Adam Smith vs. Karl Marx

College Student Journal, June, 2008 by Edgar J. Manton, Donald E. English

The problem of this study was to determine the number of first semester college freshmen who could correctly identify the individuals who are generally considered the "fathers" of communism and capitalism. A questionnaire was administered to 241 freshmen students enrolled in English 101, College Reading and Writing, at Texas A&M University-Commerce. Thirty-eight percent of the students correctly identified Adam Smith. Forty-six percent of the students correctly identified Karl Marx. Only 22% of the students correctly identified both men. A vast majority of the respondents--218 of the 241--indicated that they had a high school economics course or an economics component in their high school curriculum. Of these 218 students, 48 percent correctly chose Marx as the "father" of communism, while only forty percent chose Smith as the "father" of capitalism.

Economic Heritage

Economic heritage is an important aspect of any society or nation. We have been fortunate to have adopted the capitalistic or free enterprise system of economics since our beginnings as a nation in 1776. Who was the individual most responsible for this occurrence? Clearly it was Adam Smith and his groundbreaking and insightful work "The Wealth of Nations," which was published in 1776, and which formed the basis for our founding fathers to adopt and implement capitalism as a means to distribute goods and services within our nation.

Conversely, the person considered the founder of communism was Karl Marx who, through his defining work "Das Kapital" influenced many nations to follow the path of communism as the economic system to distribute wealth. The two economic systems have been in a struggle for dominance for over 100 years. In recent years, it appears that the winner in the contest between capitalism and communism is capitalism or the free enterprise system.

The researchers have conducted three previous studies to determine whether recent high school graduates or beginning college students are able to identify the founding fathers of these competing systems. This was done as a gauge or proxy to measure the young student's knowledge of this nation's economic heritage. The citizens of the United States have enjoyed unparalleled economic success for more than 200 years. Certainly the influence of Adam Smith should be recognized and appreciated. But is this the case? In the earlier studies of freshman college students on this issue, it was found that more students were able to identify Karl Marx as the founder of communism than could identify Adam Smith as the synthesizer and main proponent of the free enterprise system.

The first survey was conducted in 1984 since Texas had introduced legislation which mandated an economic component in all high school curricula by the 1978-79 year. Thus, the mandate for an economic component had been in place for about 5 years.

   In 1973, the Texas Legislature mandated
   that all public high schools
   provide instruction in the "essentials
   of the free enterprise system."
   Subsequently, the State Board of
   Education amended school accreditation
   standards to require that all
   schools: (a) offer an elective free
   enterprise course to all high school
   students, (b) incorporate the study
   of the free enterprise system into the
   required high school social studies
   courses, and (c) correlate free enterprise
   education instruction with the
   elementary curriculum (Texas Education
   Agency, 1979). The Economic
   Education Act of 1977 gave the State
   Board of Education power to expand
   the scope of free enterprise education
   and listed deadlines for the
   implementation of economic education
   in Texas public schools.
   Adopted measures for grades 10-12
   were implemented for the 1978-1979
   school year (Manton &
   English, 2000, p. 468).

The results of surveying mostly freshmen students in two sections of introduction to business classes consisting of 201 students, showed that 73% were able to correctly identify Karl Marx compared to only 22% correctly identifying Adam Smith. It was concluded that this was probably because Karl Marx is mentioned in the news media and in historical presentations much more than Smith (Manton & English, 1984). However, the fact that such a low percentage of the students who had been exposed to economic theories in high school could not correctly identify Adam Smith as the father of the free enterprise system was disappointing. A better result was anticipated as a result of the Texas legislation.

A follow-up study was conducted in 1988. This study included first semester freshmen enrolled in the first English composition course. Two hundred and ninety-three students enrolled in all sections of the English class were surveyed. Again a higher percentage of students correctly identified Marx--67% compared to Adam Smith--34% (Manton & English, 1988).

Then in 2000, the study was basically repeated by surveying students enrolled in the beginning business computer course which was composed primarily of freshmen students. Of the 93 students surveyed, only 37% correctly identified Marx and 27% correctly selected Smith (Manton & English, 2000). The percentage identifying Marx clearly had dropped significantly from the previous surveys. Was this due to the waning influence of communism in the world at that time? In Poland, East Germany, Eastern Europe, and the Soviet Union, communism was generally supplanted by a form of free enterprise. Even communistic strongholds such as China and North Vietnam had experienced inroads of free enterprise. Still a higher percentage of students correctly identified Marx than Smith. In any event, the percentages of correct responses for both men were not what was anticipated. In the Fall of 2006 it was decided to repeat the study and compare current results to the earlier efforts.