Truth To Power wrote:No, government administers possession and use of the land within its jurisdiction, but that doesn't make it the owner, any more than a trustee is the owner of the trust assets.
taxizen wrote:That may be a conceit some governments employ to unnecessarily prettify the relationship between gov and freeholder
True, governments are almost always entirely subservient to private landowners, as proved by the fact that the latter are enriched without effort or contribution of any kind, while the former provide valuable services and infrastructure to the community, but are always broke. The parasite-host relationship created by private landowners greedily feeding on the human flesh of the community is truly an ugly and loathsome -- as well as an unjust and evil -- one, and needs to be prettified with stupid garbage about the property "rights" of "freeholders." But "holding" land has nothing to do with freedom: it inherently abrogates the liberty rights of all who would otherwise be at liberty to use the land. That is why absent massive government interventions, private landowning always reduces working people to slave-like subservience and wretchedness.
but to find the real owner of the land ask whose authority trumps all?
Nope. Ownership is not mere authority, as already proved by the example of the trustee who has authority over trust assets but does not own them. You're just objectively wrong. OBJECTIVELY.
The answer to that is not the freeholder, it is the gov.
Irrelevant, as already proved. Government's authority trumps all because it is charged with the duty of securing people's rights. It can't do that unless it is the final arbiter.
The tenant has authority to make rules (including eviction) for his guest while on his property, but the guest may not reciprocate, so the tenant has the higher title than his guest.
Neither has the title, because they are not entitled to benefit from or dispose of the property.
The freeholder has authority to make rules (including eviction) for his tenant on his property, but the tenant may not reciprocate, so the freeholder has higher title than the tenant.
The owner (no absurd "freeholder" nonsense, thank you) has the title, and the tenant does not, because the owner is legally entitled to use, control, benefit from and dispose of the property.
Finally the gov has authority to make rules (including eviction) for its freeholder on its property, but the freeholder may not reciprocate, so the gov has higher title than the freeholder.
By that "logic," a trustee who manages trust assets owns them, not the trust. But that's just false, as proved above. The trustee has no right of benefit. You're just objectively wrong. OBJECTIVELY.
That is the order of ownership title. Like it or lump it, there is no denying it.
I just
did deny it, and moreover
disproved it.
Like it or lump it.
Truth To Power wrote:By that "logic," no one but government "really" owns anything.
Indeed, as many a traveller has discovered when crossing checkpoints that "their" laptop, money, gold, camera etc was never really theirs at all.
No, that's just more absurd nonsense from you. The fact that private property titles are not absolute, unconditional, and eternal does not mean that private property does not exist.
Most property is pretty trivial and govs, while invariably feckless and greedy,
"Meeza hatesa gubmint," is not an argument, sorry. As proved above, far from being greedy (i.e., grabbing more than it needs or deserves), government almost always GIVES AWAY TO LANDOWNERS the value of the services and infrastructure GOVERNMENT CREATES. It is the
landowner who is feckless and greedy, not the government, and it is only government-issued and -enforced
privilege that
enables the landowner to be so feckless and greedy.
Your claims are the exact, diametric opposite of the truth.
can't be bothered to directly own everything and it is not even the most profitable way to make a living off of their civilians anyway.
Government provides valued services and infrastructure, and gives their value away to landowners in return for nothing.
So, who is living off whom, hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm?
You need to stop typing and start thinking.
A routine shakedown of some surplus is the most profitable way for govs in the long run.
You are describing what landowners do, not governments.
Why kill the goose who lays the golden eggs only to feast for a day then starve forever?
That is why landowners like government, and try not to disturb its operation.
Better to let the goose live and periodically harvest its production.
That is the landowner you are talking about, harvesting the value that government and the community produce, and contributing nothing whatever in return.
GET IT??
It's called "eminent domain" or by more honest governments like the UK, "right by conquest".
Truth To Power wrote:It's true that land can never be made into property by any method other than forcible appropriation, but that only shows there is no rightful owner, not that government is the owner.
Rights are generally acquired by somebody's force,
No, that's self-contradictory. "Rights" acquired by abrogating others' rights are obviously self-contradictory. They are just privileges; they have no basis but force, and are therefore just as validly overturned by force. That's just the law of the jungle, and is not what we mean by rights.
if rights can not be "rightful" if acquired by force then there is no such thing as rights.
Garbage with no basis in fact or logic. The right to life is not acquired by force, it is something we have automatically as human beings. The right to property in the fruits of one's labor is not acquired by force, it is something we obtain by virtue of our productive contribution.
taxizen wrote:"Public" Utilities strikes me as stunningly bad and perverse example of a commercial enterprise doing commerce.
Which only demonstrates your lack of willingness to know the relevant facts.
For one thing the term "public" implies the utilities are owned and operated by a republican government on behalf of its millions of semi-enslaved shareholders
so while a republican government may well be a commercial enterprise in the broadest possible sense of the term it is hardly a typical one. In the UK we have freer market in electric, water, gas etc; you can change supplier at the click of a mouse pretty much any time you like.
And all research on the privatizations has shown the prices are higher and service worse than when they were public, before Thatcher proved her ignorance of economics by privatizing them.
Also you seem to be complaining of the lack of choice for supplier.. but that implies you want more competition and a freer market in those services?
So you don't know enough economics to be aware of natural monopoly or market failure. Check.
Even where circumstances are such that a particular company has an effective dominance or even monopoly over a particular service in a particular area such as your "public" utilities in the US, there are still ways for consumers to push back against aggressive pricing assuming they even care that much about the extent of that expense.
But ways that are even costlier than just submitting to the monopoly's extortion racket:
One can moderate usauge, one can move oneself to another area, use alternatives, one can even abstain completely from using them if one has a hardy disposition (somehow human beings survived and thrived for millions of years without electricity and very many around the world still do, it really isn't a necessity).
See?
All those things exert a downward pressure on prices through reduced demand. Even if you personally can't do any of them, you will indirectly benefit from others who can.
What an absurd notion of economic relations.
I think maybe you need to give a little thought to... well anything.. there has to be a first time for everything 
As they say in Japan, "It's mirror time!"
taxizen wrote:As a fine upstanding citizen of your republican country you can see this very directly if you buy some land
You mean, buy a government-issued and -enforced land title that has certain constraints and conditions of ownership attached....?
and try to build something on it. You will see then that the government agent (your employee) can and will push your shit in if you don't beg for his permission. You need his permission, not the otherway around.
I guess you "forgot" that the land title you bought was issued and created with certain constraints by government in the first place. You just have an incorrect understanding of what a fine upstanding citizen is doing when he "buys land."
Taxizen wrote:Corporations (by which you mean commercial enterprises*) are elected by their customers with the money they choose to pay them. Every dollar or yen is a vote to keep doing what they are doing
The corporation that owns government-issued and -enforced privileges like land titles, patents, copyrights, etc. is only elected in the same sense that Kim Jong-Un is elected.
Zamuel wrote:Perhaps in the Kim Jong-Un sense of an election where there are no alternatives and opposition is not allowed. Big difference in money people choose to spend and money they are forced to spend.
Where apart from North Korea is commerce conducted like that?
Everywhere land is privately owned, for one.
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