Why should all property be privately owned?

[Mnrchst]

I'm an anti-taxation minarchist and a big fan of Ayn Rand. I convinced of Rand's metaphysical, epistemological, and ethical views, but I'm not sure of some of her political views. One of them is her belief that all property should be privately owned. I don't think the idea is outrageous, but I'm just not convinced of it.

Why should all property be privately owned? I honestly haven't (to the best of my recollection) come across an argument by Rand for why this should be the case.

I listened to a podcast

http://www.peikoff.com/2008/08/04/in-ayn-rands-definition-of-capitalism-she-says-that-all-property-is-privately-owned-is-that-really-true/

by Peikoff about this subject. He says "Collective ownership doesn't mean anything." I suppose he means "collective ownership" is a contradiction in terms. Why is this the case?

Here's the rub for me:

Suppose someone owns the roads and sidewalks of a neighborhood. This means that if people who live in the houses want to get around, they either (1) must have permission by the road-owner to walk/drive on their property or (2) use alternate means of getting around (using a jetpack, a helicopter, flubber-boots, or tunneling, although I suppose most Objectivists would say tunneling under someone's property violates their property rights, while flying above it doesn't). If the road owner decides that you can't use their roads/sidewalks, how are you going to get around? Do you really have to try as best you can to live off of your own (small) bit of land? Or are you just supposed to go with the jetpack option?

I surmise some Objectivists at this point might say, "Other people could bring you food." Let's suppose the road/sidewalk owner doesn't allow anyone to travel on the roads and that the road-owner is wealthy enough to keep this up indefinitely (I'm guessing maintenance costs won't be very high if no one's using the roads).

When I say wealthy, I don't just mean "has a lot of money." If a person with a lot of money owned these roads, they would quickly become hated and no one (or almost no one) would trade with them. Perhaps they would quickly starve. However, let's say this person controls enough productive property that they're getting all their short-term needs met without trade (they own a good deal of arable land, for example). Therefore, even if no one decides to work for them, they can still survive.

Is the inconvenience you're being subjected to because you can't use the roads really moral? Do you have to jetpack around now? Why not have the roads which are public now remain public and be maintained by voluntary donations by people (the same way the military, police, and courts would be financed)?

Since rights are contextual, I'm thinking having public roads might be compatible with Rand's ethics. For example, someone has the right to their life, but not if they carry a virus which will quickly wipe out the human race unless they're killed. Or, you have the right to operate a bar on your property (without having to deal with zoning), but you don't have the right to disturb the peace. Couldn't it be reasonable to say the opportunity to keep people from moving around on foot/with a car is bad?

Some Objectivists might at this point say "So why not make all roads public?" I think this is like saying there shouldn't be any zoning whatsoever, because if you allow some zoning, then there's no good answer to why you shouldn't have more zoning than X amount of it. Yet, I believe Rand herself said (I think this is in the Ayn Rand Q&A book) something to the effect of "An industrialist shouldn't be allowed to manufacture explosives near a crowded residential area with schools."

I surmise some Objectivists might also say "This sounds incredibly unlikely. Why would a road-owner not want to profit from their property by letting people use it?" To me, that's just a utilitarian argument, and not substantively different from an anarchist saying "But why would a private defense firm/court behave badly if they need a good reputation to stay in business?" Or, they might say "This sounds like a fantasy." But it's certainly within the realm of possibility, which I think is all that counts.

All the people in this neighborhood can't get around (easily). They could then sell their property, but who would buy it if they couldn't use the roads?

I suppose if the roads get privatized, we could have a homestead-ish system where the people living nearby get shares in a roads corporation. But what about when they move? And wouldn't a requirement that only people living nearby get shares in the road corporation be anti-capitalistic (at least, according to Rand). And where do you draw the line between one zone and another? Would we have to allocate shares to everyone in the country for all the roads?

Edited June 22, 2011 by Mnrchst

[2046]

I don't have time for a detailed response, so I'll mainly link you to other parts of the forum or to some articles where you can further investigate the subject.

The theory of individual rights are a derivation of the normative requirements for man's life, and private property is the implementation of these requirements given man's nature and the nature of the world (i.e. that we require the free exercise of our reason to function, and that we aren't ghosts or floating spirits, and we don't live in the Garden of Eden.) See here for an encapsulated response from another thread. Rand set forth her arguments for private property rights in the essays "The Objectivist Ethics" and "Man's Rights" in The Virtue of Selfishness, and commented on these views in "What is Capitalism?" and "The Property Status of Airwaves" in Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal (as well as touching upon it in Atlas Shrugged during the chapter "This is John Galt Speaking.")

What I would interpret Peikoff's statement on the meaninglessness of collective ownership as meaning is not that any cooperative ownership, such as in a corporation, is impossible, but that the concept of "public property" is a but more elusive than it seems.

In no sense can any property be "owned" by "the public," regardless of whatever the legal fiction might say. You can't go on some public property and try to claim your "share" of it, for there are no shares, unlike in a corporation. If you own something, you have the right to disown it, i.e. to sell it, but you can't sell your shares of public property. If I can't sell a thing, it's clear that I don't really own it.

The point here Peikoff is trying to make is that "public ownership" is a myth and entirely meaningless slogan. Ownership refers to ultimate control and decision making power. "Public property" in the collectivist sense, simply means government ownership and control, meaning whoever is running the government, or in the ruling class, or the temporary democratic caretakers owns the property. So by contradiction in terms, he means that there cannot be two individuals with exclusive ownership over the same piece of property, as per the law of contradiction.

As far as your rub goes: see this thread on "encirclement" as well as the legal concept of easements vis-a-vis privatization of roads and highways, and with the "But what if road owners wouldn't let anyone on their road and/or charged a million dollars to get on their road?" kind of question.

See also this scholarly paper from UNLV economist Hans-Hermann Hoppe for the Libertarian Papers "Of Private, Common, and Public Property and the Rationale for Total Privatization" which deals with some of your question.

Also see this book by economist Loyola University in New Orleans Walter Block The Privatization of Roads and Highways, or at least the first chapter: "Free-Market Transportation: Denationalizing the Roads."

[Mnrchst]

Thank you. I'll post again when I've read all this.