If the system is mutating into technofeudalism or becoming a debt-trap (leveragism), the traditional agent of change, (the industrial proletariat) may no longer exist in the form Marx described. The "gig economy" workers and digital serfs of technofeudalism face different exploitation mechanisms (rent extraction) than the factory workers of the 19th century (surplus value extraction).

The persistence of "late-stage" capitalism for over a century, and its potential transformation into technofeudalism, highlights capitalism's adaptability. It suggests that rather than collapsing under its own weight to give way to communism, the system may simply evolve new mechanisms of extraction that postpone or prevent the Marxist endgame entirely.