Should public ownership be abolished?

theinfectedmaster

Argument Topic: I think it should.

I think public ownership needs to go because the government alone shouldn't be the one to own everything. Everything should be socially owned, that means owned by everyone in the society.

just_sayin

theinfectedmaster said:

I think public ownership needs to go because the government alone shouldn't be the one to own everything. Everything should be socially owned, that means owned by everyone in the society.

You need to explain how 'socially owned' would work.  Who buys things?  Who decides what gets bought and at what price?

I can agree that government being the sole owner of things is a horrible idea.  When everyone 'owns' something, no one takes ownership of it.  The reason countries like Russia and North Korea have such horrible environmental records, is because if the government owns everything, and the government is also responsible for keeping companies environmentally responsible, the government tends to ignore environmental concerns so its other interests can prosper.  

There is an old adage in Cuba 'we pretend to work, and they pretend to pay us'.  In a society where your earning potential is limited by the government, nobody works hard.  Why should they?  They will not be rewarded for it.  

Again, explain how your system would work.  Who decides what gets bought, and who decides who gets what?

theinfectedmaster

@just_sayin There wouldn't be buying or selling or any money period. I just feel like money ruins the reputation of people.

MayCaesar

theinfectedmaster said:

I think public ownership needs to go because the government alone shouldn't be the one to own everything. Everything should be socially owned, that means owned by everyone in the society.

Something that is owned by everyone, is owned by no one. A piece of property cannot be owned by more than one person in any sensible meaning of the word, for owning something exactly means being able to decide what happens to it, and if you are not the only one deciding, then you do not own it.

Imagine that you and I "own" the same car. I take the car and go on a road trip all of a sudden, and you wake up to go to work and find yourself carless. Do you still feel like you own the car? Or what if we both want to take the car at the same time and cannot find compromise? Then clubbing will begin.

Clubbing is where all these ideas inevitably lead. And then the biggest guy with the biggest club is the one owning everything. There is a reason socialist ideas, whenever attempted anywhere with any degree of seriousness, resulted in genocides and gulags. What else can one expect from a society from which civilized means of negotiation (such as voluntary trade and open discussion) have been extracted and in which only barbaric means (such as intimidation and violence) remain?
Authoritarian governments respecting people's private property rights to a significant degree (such as modern China or Russia) are a significant improvement over governments embracing full-on socialism (such as modern Cuba and North Korea). I have never met anyone who would prefer living in the latter to the former, although there are a lot of people who like the "hippie socialism", aka roleplay in a capitalist system.

just_sayin

theinfectedmaster said:

@just_sayin There wouldn't be buying or selling or any money period. I just feel like money ruins the reputation of people.

So who builds you a home and gives you a car?  What do they get for doing that?  Who decides who gets what?  And what do you do if you think you didn't get as much as someone else?

Explain how this would work.

theinfectedmaster

@just_sayin I think that money should be abolished period.

just_sayin

theinfectedmaster said:

@just_sayin I think that money should be abolished period.

You avoided answering my questions.  I suspect the answer of who decides what you can and can not get is the government.  If that is the case then goverment controls the means, which is just like communism.