Old World has revamped Freedom multiple times but for all the time I've played it, Slavery just feels like the obvious pick to me. I have never really had actual problems with lack of workers or settlers in early game bottlenecking me and the passive flat stone and iron bonus from slavery is always useful.
No idea if Freedom is more useful in higher difficulties though since the rebels might be more of a problem sooner with increased discontent, I have never played above The Strong.

>>2075043
>>2077050
Maybe Soren Johnson is trying to tell us something with his design principles.