Download Philosophy of Property Rights: Establishment and Political Society and more Study notes Ethics in PDF only on Docsity! Phil 100A Section Handout 10 I. Theories of Property Broadly, property includes everything that you have a right to (e.g. life, liberty, possessions). Question: How are (material) property rights established? 1. One Answer: By Means of Distributed Justice. Property rights are the product of institutionalizing the demands of distributive justice (i.e. distributive justice determines how material goods ought to be distributed, and we institutionalize these requirements so that everyone has a right to their just share). Example: Utilitarianism Given the declining marginal utility of wealth/income, the happiness maximizing distribution will be roughly egalitarian (allowing for inequalities only to deal with disincentives associated with redistribution of wealth). This distribution can be accomplished via progressive taxation. So, you have a right to whatever you have after being taxed. 2. Locke’s Theory of Property Three Claims: 1. God gave the world to humankind in common (i.e. we originally have common ownership of the world). 2. Everyone has property in his/her person and labor. 3. Property is established by mixing labor with materials provided that: i.) There is as much and as good left for others. ii.) There is no waste. What is involved in common ownership? It can’t be the holding of joint property rights by all humankind, since the original transfer of property rights from all humankind to an individual is not practically possible. Distinction: claim rights vs. liberty rights • A claim right yields a corresponding duty to give/not take what the other has a claim on. • A liberty right yields no corresponding duties to give/not take the object in question. Example: my favorite park bench What is involved in mixing one’s labor with materials? Some possible answers (three from Locke and one from McMahon): 1. Annexation: the coming into contact of the labor which is owned with the unowned material creates material ownership. Objection (Nozick): It seems equally plausible that annexation would work the other way, so that the labor that was once owned becomes unowned. 2. Crystallized Labor: Labor creates most of the value of the good, so the good is owned by the owner of the labor put into it. Problem: Most of the value of a picked apple is not due to the labor. 3. Requirement of Fairness: The unpleasant task of mixing one’s labor with materials is performed with expectation of enjoying the benefits of the good. To deprive the laborer of the expected good is unfair. Problem: Not all labor is unpleasant. 4. [McMahon] We have moral protection for a normal human life (this is an interpretation of Locke’s claim that one has property in one’s person and labor). This requires that we have reliable control over certain material items (especially domicile, food sources, clothing, etc.) Note: this also fits with our intuitions concerning (non-human) animals…e.g. it seems wrong to destroy a beaver’s dam (the beaver has a right to the dam). What is the significance for the modern world? This depends on how we understand Locke’s proviso that there must be as much and as good left for others.
