Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!lll-crg!mordor!sri-spam!nike!ucbcad!ucbvax!MC.LCS.MIT.EDU!kfl%mx.lcs.mit.edu From: kfl%mx.lcs.mit.edu@MC.LCS.MIT.EDU Newsgroups: mod.politics Subject: Property rights Message-ID: <12228201008.23.MCGREW@RED.RUTGERS.EDU> Date: Mon, 4-Aug-86 17:14:20 EDT Article-I.D.: RED.12228201008.23.MCGREW Posted: Mon Aug 4 17:14:20 1986 Date-Received: Tue, 5-Aug-86 23:22:12 EDT Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Reply-To: kfl%mx.lcs.mit.edu@mc.lcs.mit.edu Organization: The ARPA Internet Lines: 99 Approved: poli-sci@red.rutgers.edu From: dab@BORAX.LCS.MIT.EDU (David A. Bridgham) You do have the escape clause that you would only do this if you expected to get something back of greater value than the future value of the land being destroyed but this is pretty weak. I can't think of a better way to decide how to use the land, can you? The techniques for assigning values to things like the future value of a forest is pretty laughable. Which 'technique' to use is entirely up to the owner of the forest. Actually those techniques bring me back around to my basic dislike for capitalism. You have found a better economic system? Please tell us. It's assumed that the value of something is how much money you can get for it. No it isn't. It is assumed that the value of something is for its owner to decide, by whatever method he chooses. For instance in a socialist country, the government chooses what they consider the most productive use of every bit of land. The tenants of the land (there are no owners except the government) have no choice but to go along with this. But in a capitalist system, if someone owns some forest land, no matter how much someone else wants to use it, they are not compelled to sell it. There is an organization called the Wildlife Conservatory which does just that. Using voluntary donations they have purchased millions of acres of wilderness, and they refuse to sell it to anyone for any reason. No such organization could exist under any system but a capitalist one. Thinking ahead several hundered years just isn't done. If your goal is to succeed in the market place it doesn't make sense to be concerned about that far ahead. Wrong. It is true than no individual expects to own any land for centuries. But he does expect to sell it or to leave it to his children. In any case, he wants it to be worth as much as possible when he gets rid of it. Manhattan real estate has gone from being worth 24 dollars to being worth many billions of dollars, over 360 years. Virtually everyone who invested in Manhattan real estate over those centuries sold it for more than they bought it for. But no individual owned it for the full 360 years. Suppose it was possible to destroy Manhattan real estate. Would anyone have done so? Or would they have preserved it, knowing it was worth more to the next investor that way? It's that goal that I dislike and I dislike it because of how it makes people so short sighted. It is up to each individual to decide how short sighted to be. You keep viewing capitalism through red colored glasses, and you see it as a distorted version of socialism, with a handful of evil capitalists in charge, all wearing top hats and smoking cigars as they decide how to exploit the masses. Nothing could be further from reality. It seems much more likely that the point where humans can no longer survive on this planet will happn before the point where all of nature collapses. Could you explain just how something like this could happen? It seems to me that our standard of living is getting better, not worse. Do you disagree? Or do you agree but think that it will turn around? Please tell me the details. I honestly don't see how we could wipe ourselves out unless there is a nuclear war. This may sound very strange to someone who thinks in old movie cliches, but I firmly believe that people now are living in closer harmony with nature than ever before. And I see very little feedback that would cause us to stop pushing before we get to that point. Feedback is what capitalism is all about. For instance if wilderness is valuable and is becoming more and more valuable, then people will be motivated to invest in it and preserve it. And to make more of it, if possible. The more I think about it the more I understand the Indians perplexity about ownership of land. It's a very strange concept. Land ownership is not only not strange, it is inevitable. If no person or private organization is allowed to own land, it is not NOT owned, rather it is owned by the government. If NOBODY owned a piece of land, presumably it would be ok for anyone to do anything with it. This is clearly NOT what you want. In order for land to be preserved, it must be in someone's interest to do so. You don't come out and say it, but you obviously think that someone should be the government. I don't. ...Keith -------