First the product is produced and sold to a retailer who then keeps it in his shop until he is able to sell it. During the time the product is on sell it is not being used. Instead it is sitting idle so the shopkeeper must be entitled to it else someone could simpily use the item and become its owner. With that being said from the time a product is producted until the time a product is sold to its first user its ownership has depended on three distinct criteria.
OK so then how does one acquire property? Just simple use?
Well, you could also buy it. There would be no limit on the amount of money you could earn or save, because saving is a type of use and property which is for your personal use is your personal property. So you could save as much money as you’d like, buy as big a house or as nice a car or as nice food as you could afford. What you couldn’t do is buy someone else’s livelihood or house and charge them rent to use it.
But I’d also like to say that I’m not advancing this as the Perfect Utopian Society, I think it has advantages as well as disadvantages. But it is a model of property rights which is libertarian in its implications which is also fundamentally at odds with other libertarian definitions of property rights, I’m more concerned with how libertarians propose dealing with the fact that not everyone buys one particular historically and culturally conditioned definition of property rights.
Is Benjamin making a claim that if someone mixes their labor with someone else’s property that the property owner some how forfeights a portion of his property? Or am I mis-interpreting this?
If such were the case Capitalists would have no incentive what so ever to work and employ laborers and what you would have is economic and technological stagnation where the rich remain rich stagnantly, and poor likewise. Such a society would eventually fall on it’s head as natural resources would not longer be put to productive use for fear of loosing the rights to it’s profit.
If I am the sole owner to begin with, and person B is the sole owner of himself to begin with, how is it that we cannot contract ourselves just between the two of us, without your rules
You can contract with person B and reach whatever agreement you want. The only thing you can’t do is steal his property, which is a stake in the store he’s using alongside you.
Technically then the 2nd person that the sole owner brings in would not be an owner at all since they have no power over their so called property.
Technically whichever side is in the miniority wouldn’t have control over their property
If such were the case Capitalists would have no incentive what so ever to work and employ laborers and what you would have is economic and technological stagnation where the rich remain rich stagnantly, and poor likewise. Such a society would eventually fall on it’s head as natural resources would not longer be put to productive use for fear of loosing the rights to it’s profit.
Says you. Cooperative business ventures work just fine. They don’t often get established because capitalists use the state to enforce their property claims, and always have. Capitalism has never existed without state-subsidized protection of the property claims of capitalists, at least to my knowledge. That is in fact the main function of the state; to enforce the property claims of the dominant group.
The question of capital formation has to do with what kind of monetary system is being used, and it certainly adds a few layers of complexity, but obviously this alternative system is questioning the necessity of capitalists in production. Alternative to capitalist investment, cooperatively owned industries can instead raise capital through retained profits.
It’s a bit silly to think that there’s only one possible way to skin a cat.
If such were the case Capitalists would have no incentive what so ever to work and employ laborers and what you would have is economic and technological stagnation where the rich remain rich stagnantly, and poor likewise. Such a society would eventually fall on it’s head as natural resources would not longer be put to productive use for fear of loosing the rights to it’s profit.
Says you. Cooperative business ventures work just fine. They don’t often get established because capitalists use the state to enforce their property claims, and always have. Capitalism has never existed without state-subsidized protection of the property claims of capitalists, at least to my knowledge. That is in fact the main function of the state; to enforce the property claims of the dominant group.
The question of capital formation has to do with what kind of monetary system is being used, and it certainly adds a few layers of complexity, but obviously this alternative system is questioning the necessity of capitalists in production. Alternative to capitalist investment, cooperatively owned industries can instead raise capital through retained profits.
It’s a bit silly to think that there’s only one possible way to skin a cat.
Also, the idea that property rights derive from titles is a bit strange too. How can pieces of paper confer rights?
Like socialdtk is suggesting, this has to be inconsistent with liberty, there’s no way around it.
Suppose the sole owner of the store needs some help but doesn’t want to give up full ownership. He finds a worker and offers him a deal to pay him a salary for his work, but not make him co-owner; the worker agrees. Up to this point, everything is fine. However, according to your logic, some third party must come in between them and decide that the arrangement is unjust and prohibit them in their agreement- that, to any meaningful sense of the term, is anti-liberty.
You may call yourself a leftist, a socialist… whatever, just not a libertarian.
All of your statements are logically contradictory. There can be no theft if both parties voluntarily agreed to the exchange.
Look, this is how it works. The owner of the store has saved enough goods that he can now offer them for exchange for labor. Nobody is forced to accept the owner’s offer for whatever wage he offers. Only if person B thinks it can improve his well being in comparison to his other alternatives, will he accept the offer. How is this person B automatically entitled to something that even according to you, does not belong to him? In the same way, I am not automatically entitled to the property of person B. I cannot force him to work for me.
Either 2 people have the right to voluntarily agree on the terms of exchange or they don’t. Either they can conduct the exchange peacefully without violence or they cannot. Which is it?
It is not me saying it. It is simply a matter of fact. Property owners do not forfeit up their wealth with intent on losing a share of it’s profit. They do not share their capital goods with others with intent of loosing a portion of its claim. In the case of the philanthropist he is still deriving a profit, just not an objective/tangible one. All of these points are built from irrefutable facts known of the real world. It’s like arguing that gravity does not exist, or that the sky is not blue. Human Action is an axion which we cannot ignore simply because it’s conclusions inconvenience our ideological agendas.
Some do, but even the cooperative follows the capitalist traditional concept of property. Especially the successful ones, they employ successful managers to grow their business. They don’t rely on the collective to decide their direction. Further more the collective thought does not decide where a business goes, but individuals consumers decide the direction of affairs. Cooperatives would never get the capital needed, nor the managerial expertise necessary to run business if they abandoned the concept of property all together. The simple fact they are a business’, singular entity, agrees with the point that they respect property. Otherwise they would not be trading with anyone outside of their own organization. Business’s who attempt to operate in a socialist fashion must still partake in the division of labor at one degree or another and ultimately admit a necessary requirement for property. They must trade with other individuals if their goal is to survive. Trading and exchange implies an existence of property. If there was no property, there wouldn’t be a need for exchange.
A medium of a exchange is simply a derivative of the market. It is a natural social phenomena. Changing the structure of the medium of exchange only necessarily comes detrimentally and it ignores the desires and needs of the individuals who participate in the system in the first place. Money exists simply because people want it, and use it as a tool to employ the division of labor of the market, and satisfy their unknown needs of the future. You cannot argue a removal of this system without first understanding it’s functional purpose. If you concede that a barter system would always exist, then a unit of exchange is only an extension that vastly benefits that system. Allowing people to operate in a more efficient manner and ultimately increase their personal individual wealth.
Many people attempt to philosophize how property should function. The error in making such(Not referring to you Benjamin) aaorgant claims is a failure in understanding the praxeological implications of property itself.
Property only exists as a complex consequential axiom which occurs naturally as a result of the following 3 pre-existing earthly ailments. These 3 pre-existing conditions are universally accepted as non-avoidable.
Property results naturally as a consequence naturally due to:
- Objects are Scarce
- Time is scarce
- Man must employ(occupy) objects over scarce time to satisfy his needs
Property itself is a right, which is nothing more then a claim to human action and a claim to any associated tangible object. The technicalities of how property is handled on the market between two parties, assuming no coercion, is not really open to scrutiniy. If people come together voluntarily then the methods they choose to abide by is left up to them. You or I cannot judge someone else simply because they prefer to rent, or prefer to own, or prefer to be a laborer as opposed to a capitalist(and vise versa).
You or I are in no position to really judge such arrangements. As such many philosophical discussions of property are incredibly uninformed, non-realistic, and completely ignore human action. We can only pretend to theorize how we would like property handled, but the market alone is the ultimate arbiter. Consumers, or individuals, decide how they want their property handled. If we disagree with that we can voluntarily choose not to associate with them.
Ultimately people act economically, and in their own self interest.
So with all of that said, I feel like many folk attempt to dig far too deep in the concept of property itself and pass judgments where they no authority to do so. They ultimately come down to nonesensical claims like calling “Money Evil”. As if the two had anything to do with each other. Such a claim is folly and has no real tangible meaning, especially when one understands the fundamental economic purposes money and property serves. Property exists naturally as an economic method just as money does, we need not exhaust ourselves beyond that.
All we have to know is that a concept of property helps us define aggression(For we could not define aggression without first establishing property), and that ignoring the respect for this property will have drastic consequences economically. for everyone.
Titles do not create property rights. Property rights create titles. Property is a form of a right, and rights are just claims to action. Such things occur naturally. A title on the other hand is simply a market mechanism to accommodate how property is recognized and handled in a social context. Legal positivists like to take it too far and say that the paper itself is what creates the property but this is a backwards and circular claim, it ignores how property comes into existence in the first place.
Here is my summary of rights for the laymen. It’s also linked above.
The following businesses would cease to exist under such a system: Holiday Inn, Blockbuster, Netflix, uHaul, Avis, and every other rental business.
A couple of scenarios:
If my wife and I have 3kids, at what point are they able to tell us what we can and cannot do in the house we have paid for?
If my buddies and I take a road trip cross country in my car… at the end of the trip do they now own my car?
“prefer to be a laborer as opposed to a capitalist”
That’s the funniest thing I’ve heard in weeks. You talk a lot about “voluntary,” but the fact remains that your definition of voluntary is backed up by state coercion. The only reason a ‘capitalist’ can enforce his claim to “own,” let’s say, a factory, is because any opposing claims to ownership are violently supressed by state coercion. That is, in fact**, the main funciton of the** state in a capitalist society.
"Titles do not create property rights. Property rights create titles. "
No, actually property titles are created by human beings and human institutions. One group of humans think they have a right to something and write it down on paper. That doesn’t prove it follows from a right.
Christopher Colombus might land somewhere, claim it for Spain and Spain might well print up a title to ‘their new land.’ That doesn’t mean they have a right to that land. Titles are created by laws. Laws are created by dominant players within a society.
In a libertarian society, you will have different groups which have different conceptions of property. The only two options are to have different societies with different property rules, or for the dominant group to surpress the groups with alternative conceptions with violence. Which are you proposing?
So for how long do I get to not use my bicycle until it is considered to be “not used” by me? If I take a bicycle that was used 5 min ago I am stealing, but what about if I take a bicycle that was used 1 day ago? And 1 month ago? And 1 year ago? And 5 years ago? And who decides from what moment it becomes moral to take the bicycle?
And if we are talking about a book? If I have not read a book in 1 day is still mine? And in 1 month? And if I have not read a book in 1 year is till mine?
So for how long do I get to not use my bicycle until it is considered to be “not used” by me?
If it’s for your personal use, it’s yours.
You did not answer my question. How long can I have my bicycle parked without using it until it is considered its not for my personal use anymore? 5 minutes? 1 day? a month? 1 year? 5 years?
And what about a book? 5 minutes? 1 day? 1 month? 1 year? 5 years?
And who gets to decide this and why?
If my wife and I have 3kids, at what point are they able to tell us what we can and cannot do in the house we have paid for?
If my buddies and I take a road trip cross country in my car… at the end of the trip do they now own my car?
There are all kinds of details that have to be worked out in any society, but what’s more interesting than the specific solution is who is making that decision. Is there going to be one standard globally, or different standards locally, or different standards between every two individuals? And then who or what is setting those standards?
There are many different ways to resolve problems like this, and different groups of people do come up with different workable solutions.
One possible solution is that personal property can be used however you like, including sharing, without violating your claims to property. If others are contributing more than you are for the maintainence of your personal property, however, they could contest your claim to it. You could rent rooms in your house, but the people who pay rent are contributing to the creation of the housing, so they would be co-owners to the extent that they were contributing, but only to that extent.
Blockbuster video and netflix for example could still exist; customers would just put up a deposit to ensure that they either return the video or, if they don’t, the business still makes a profit.
re: hugolp
No one else would have a claim to it if you were the only one using it, and no one would have a right to use it without your permission. If you keep it in your private dwelling it remains yours forever.
If you leave it out in public without using it for a protracted period of time, people will rightly consider it to be abandoned, just like they do today.
Ok. So basically you are saying that I can not lend or borrow stuff, right? So, if I have a tractor and my neightbour needs one I can not lend him mine, because that would mean that since he is using the tractor, it is now ours and he gets to decide (democratically I am guessing) what can be done with it. Am I getting it right?
And if I got it right, why do you want to ban borrowing and lending and how would this be enforced?
There go bed-and-breakfasts. I pay for a night in someone’s house, and then I have an equal claim to that house because I used it. Great.