People in their late adolescence believe in marxism because when one is just starting out and has nothing, it is a very attractive idea that we should all share what we all have. Adults who pander to this idea, such as the professors who teach these late adolescents, are largely people who recognize their innate inability to do anything of real value for the marketplace of goods and services and retain the adolescent idea of forcing their betters to share with them.
A few days ago I was talking with my sister, three years younger than me, and she said that she might vote Rat in the next election. The discussion heated up to the point where she said that the DC public schools had no books and dilapidated buildings and that I should be willing and glad to forfeit "some" of my paycheck to fix the "problem."
It's easy to believe in Marxist bovine excrement when you have not experienced the joys of tax withholding (forfeiture of income to the government), paying taxes by credit card, and groveling before the bureaucracy to beg for student financial aid to continue in school so the debt collectors don't come calling.
I briefly considered Marxism as a first-year college student, but due to life circumstances, have experienced all of the aforementioned joys...which quickly turned me around.
The worst thing any parent can do is to send their child to a four-year college, in a humanities program. Tell them to get a job and go to community college, instead.
Truth in Advertising:
+ My dad grew up under Ceausescu in Communist Romania.
+ I am an undergraduate student with a graduation date in late 2008 or 2009.