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Adam Smith vs. Karl Marx Both Adam Smith and Karl Marx are considered two of the top twenty most influential people in the world for the millennium. They both are respected in their views for creating a perfect society where everyone is happy. Adam Smith, a brilliant Scottish political economist philosopher born in 1723, had the goal of perfect liberty for all individuals through the capitalistic approach. While Karl Marx, born in 1818, believed in individual freedom for society and logically criticized capitalism giving reasons as to why it was irrational and why it would fall. Figuring out what kind of state will ensure the greatest freedom or liberty of individuals was their main philosophical problem. They differed in their views of human nature, the social decisions made in the society, the role of competition, and the effects of the division of labor on human beings. Perfect liberty according to Smith, will allow a system of natural liberty to establish itself in which every man, as long as he does not violate the laws of justice, is left perfectly free to pursue his own interest his own way. This self-interest produces a market and in effect produces perfect liberty. In Smith’s theory of human nature, Smi