The bones of the game are great.

Edit: So another user pointed out they now have a private construction queue. I checked and this was released just after the last time I did a 20 hour binge of the game so I just missed it. What I said below isn't relevant anymore but I'll leave it there as an example of the type of thing the game was missing for a long time after release and why it has the framework to eventually be a complete and very complex simulation and it's heading in the right direction to achieve that.

The biggest flaw I found was that even under capitalist systems the player was entirely responsible for developing industry and growing the productive forces of the country. Every new industry or expansion of an existing one must be queued up by the player or using a very basic auto-expand and added to a country-wide construction list.

If I'm using a capitalist system I should be having to fight the interests of the bourgeoisie in terms of what and where to expand. They should be forming a private construction sector and focusing on businesses that maximise profit with minimal regard for worker welfare. Instead I can focus on industries that rapidly increase the standard of living and productive forces of the nation with the consolation that they will be privately owned until the working class is empowered enough that I can swap to collective or state ownership.

They have released a bunch of DLCs that I haven't been able to look into yet so they might have begun to address this.

Despite its flaws, this game is probably the closest you can get to a "materialism simulator"