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From: orb@whuxl.UUCP (SEVENER)
Newsgroups: net.politics.theory
Subject: Re: Re: Contributions to the rich
Message-ID: <533@whuxl.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 21-Mar-85 11:57:31 EST
Article-I.D.: whuxl.533
Posted: Thu Mar 21 11:57:31 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 22-Mar-85 02:19:35 EST
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> > 
> > 	I don't have any problem with people or institutions receiving
> > 	a fair return on capital investments, it's the claim to
> > 	perpetual ownership of the profits from the funded enterprise that 
> > 	bothers me. 
> >						Mark Roddy
> 
> Perpetual ownership of the profit (through dividends or capital gains) is
> by definition the fair return on a capital investment. That I should still
> be getting a dividend from common stock I bought X years ago is exactly what
> I paid for at the time.
> 
> If you don't understand what I mean by the above, you don't understand the idea
> of capitalism. 
> 						Michael Esco

I think that Mr. Roddy's statement shows a keen understanding of
Capitalism.  And it is precisely this idea that ownership implies
the right to expropriate from others labor that is objectionable about
Capitalism. Why should the Rockefellers be guaranteed an enormous income
for the rest of their life irregardless of their own effort?
Not only the present generation of Rockefellers but their children and
their children's children and their children's children's children,
ad infinitum?  Is this really any different than the inheritance of
feudal fiefs by a landed aristocracy?  The only difference is the
inheritance of manufacturing fiefs by a capitalized aristocracy i.e.
the mode of production and the way in which one class dominates another
has changed.  The class domination remains.
           tim sevener   whuxl!orb