marx believes that the latter is illegitimate as the owner has no personal use for the object. he states that private property is merely a means to profit off of those who do not have the object but require it. i have conflicting ideas regarding how something like a car sharing service would be identified and how it would function. would renting a car out to others for a fee make that car private property?
Marxist doctrine would state that no individual owns the car. Society owns the car and would mandate that a person who is not utilizing the car forfeit it to a person who needs to utilize the car.
Ultimately, this leads to no one wanting to go through the hassle of obtaining a car only to be told that it must be given to someone else. Thus cars are determined to be a novelty or niche piece of equipment.
Which is why communism has never actually worked in practice. Communism only works when every individual -feels- as though the contribution of other members is equal to or greater than his own contribution. The moment people begin to feel as if others are not 'doing their fair share' - the concept of 'From each according to his ability to each according to his need' falls through the floor.
Communism (or Marxism... the ideology behind the government) fails in that it lacks a means of wealth creation. If I create a brand new type of cellular phone battery that puts Lithium Ion batteries to shame, I can't -build- a business out of it under a pure communist economy. I will have to pitch the idea to an already established battery manufacturer, hope they like it, and ... ? Feel good that I did that?
Realistically, there is no incentive to do much more than exist. Or, rather - communism suppresses the natural drive for innovation and wealth creation. Why put in the extra work when the people who laze about get to have just the same?
Obviously, this does not benefit any government, particularly with how combative and hostile communist nations are. They require innovation to enforce their enlightened message.
So people who become recognized as innovators, executives, etc and who are favorable to the existing leadership structure gain preferential treatment. They get to go pick out their flavor of school girl for the evening, to have mansions and statues built in their honor, etc.
Basically - all communist societies will eventually swing toward a governmental oligarchy with a fascist cronyism.
This actually seems to be the defacto state of organization for human beings. We are most comfortable in a caste system with some form of hereditary power structure.
Free markets must fight against this trend just as a communist society would have to fight against this trend. The reason why free markets are more successful is that a free market does not attempt to suppress the natural human drive for innovation and for each individual to seek personal gain within a transaction.
Which is the fact that marxism misses. Just as the seller is free to seek his or her own personal gain - so is the buyer. Marxist ideology is limited in that it tends to consider only consumables - groceries and parts that amount to 'operating costs' of life. It fails to take into proper consideration the development of wealth-creating (time saving) innovations.
For example - the cotton gin. This radically changed the resource investment of textile manufacturing. If that didn't - the industrial revolution most certainly changed the face of textiles into something unrecognizable to the centuries before.
Buying a cotton gin from the guy who made it is just a damned good deal. It may cost me $300 - or a year's worth of operating expenses, but it allows me to turn out the same amount of cotton with one person as I used to need fifteen people for (hypothetically speaking). I can put out more cotton, or re-task most of my workers for some other opportunity (such as making peanut butter, seeing as the new research of the day was suggesting that the goobers could help with my cotton crops).
Marxism has no real way to deal with this phenomena. Who gets the first few cotton gins? Why should anyone sign on to help make cotton gins? They still get the same. The cotton pickers will like the utility of the idea but not the implication (the machine 'took their job').
Marxism within practical human models always leads to a squandering of resources, talents, innovation, etc among the general population. The process of wealth creation becomes tied directly with politics - which creates a sort of fascist oligarchy that controls everything as people broker political standing and power for innovation and ability.
