A BRIEF RESPONSE TO ANONYMOUS

With regard to my exaggerated respect for Marx, who has, as you observe “been dead for almost 150 years,” you must remember that I am a philosopher.  We philosophers tend to think that although Plato has been dead long enough for us to form an opinion about him, Hobbes is scarcely cold in the ground after three centuries.  Marx?  A newcomer, almost a contemporary. 

Also, it does seem a trifle harsh to say “I think your time would be better spent pointing to contemporaries who have advanced the analysis and the argument” to someone who spent 9000 words reviewing Thomas Piketty’s important book.  Lordy, you probably think me tediously stuck in the mud for harboring a fondness for the original Star Trek.

By the way, neither I nor Marx have any objections to accumulations of capital.  It is private ownership of the capital collectively produced by generations of workers to which we object.  I am with you whole-heartedly on the 100% inheritance tax for estates above, say, the equivalent of a millennium of the median annual family income [which is to say, estates above fifty million or so.]

As for “anonymous,” if I were having dinner with someone, I would want to know my dinner companion’s name.  If I were playing a game of chess, I would want to know my opponent’s name.  If I were having sex, I would want to know my partner’s name.  Is it really outré to want to know with whom I am having a conversation?