Howdy! I’m new here and was hoping someone might have some insight to a question I’ve been thinking about for a while:
If I saved up my money and bought a tractor, would it be permissible/ethical to charge others to use it when I didn’t need it?
This seems awfully similar to owning the means of production. What if I instead offered to plow their fields for them instead, driving the tractor myself and negotiating fair compensation in exchange?
Sorry if this is basic stuff I’m still learning. 🙏
The point is not over your tractor, individually. If you were living under marxism, society would have decided “all [farming equipment, factories, whatever] are the property of the community and you cannot own them individually”. You couldn’t lease your tractor, because you couldn’t own the tractor to begin with.
Markets largely still exist in socialism we see today because capitalism is extremely pervasive. A socialist state currently is forced to behave like a capitalist entity to at least the outside world, or they will be taken advantage of by capitalists. Because of this, all socialists states today are internally capitalist with some social programs, as opposed to fully Marxists.
Yeah… another way to say it would be:
Giving things (especially means of production) the attribute of property, “being property of X”, is a contingent human decision. It’s ONE specific way of organizing the handling of things (tightly connected to the idea that the “owner” uses the given thing for his*her own benefit).
Another way of organizing things, aka mode of decision making regarding ressources (nature, labour, and its products), production, distribution would be having a king that tells everyone what to do. Another option would be democracy: “Oh dang, we got a tractor over here. Let’s see how we can use it best to fulfill the next important need”
That way you are right, your community (feat. You) would decide what to do with your tractor. Depending on how long capitalism would be gone at that time, people just might look at you a bit puzzled when you call it “yours”. You know, since the idea of you being given the power to decide over a tractor you didn’t build and can’t consume, is quite weird ;)
Thanks for your response! As I understand, even under marxism I still have the ability to use the product of my labour to buy things for my personal use? Like if I want to own a painting or piece of art, I can exchange the products of my labour with an artist for the products of their labour.
Regarding ownership, personal property still exists on some level, right? I don’t want other people wearing my clothes or sleeping in my bed for instance. I might not even want people driving my personal car if it’s something that I collected, built, or restored myself.
Indeed. Marx is actually very careful in distinguishing personal property (your toothbrush, your bed) from the means of production (a tractor, a lathe, a factory). If it were a society where it’s needed to have a car then it would probably be your own, but it’d be better for everyone if the public infrastructure (that belongs to the community) made it so cars aren’t a requirement.