The state is like land and is a shared asset

We know that we cannot own land if we have not left enough and as good in common for other people to use. But, in the context of democracy, we can think of the state as an asset which is shared equally among the people, and is not owned by anyone. We as the people share the state with each other when we have elections. So then the state can be viewed as a kind of land in the Georgist sense, something no person can claim to own.

The first-past-the-post voting system doesn't share the power held by the state equally among the voters as it favours the larger parties compared against the smaller parties. This is (at least partial) ownership of the state by individuals who are not the voters so it is invalid since the state is like land and is owned by everyone. No one owns the state and this is reflected in the democratic process but the fptp method denies this by making the assumption that the state can be fairly owned in an undemocratic way. Anything other than full democracy assumes that the state is the property of someone (or people) who is not the voters themselves, which is false since the state is a shared asset.

Demand is a lump (whereas labour is not a lump)

If you have ever spent time trying to work out a suitable birthday present for someone who is relatively wealthy it becomes apparent that most people have most of what they want. In a developed and relatively equal society most of the demands of most of the population are accounted for. They have what they want. For someone who seeks to earn money this is a problem because there is little to supply them with that they do not already have. There are certain things that people regularly buy such as food and to earn money a new entrant would need to be cheaper or more efficient than existing suppliers. But overall it is hard to break into the market because demand is a lump and people avoid spending money if they can.

Even rich people are pretty frugal with their money. Of course there are the exceptions of the 'playboy prince' and the female equivalent but overall rich people don't spend a proportionately greater amount of their wealth than the poor.

There are four ways to make a living

As far as I am aware (and please correct me if I am wrong) there are only four different ways to make a living and survive.

I'll get the easy one out of the way and begin by discussing communism. Communism is the ideology whereby there is no private property and everything is owned by the state. This means that only the state can feed you and only the state is able to be productive in the economic sense. Communism is widely recognised as being unworkable (an unworkable utopia) not least because so many lives have been lost in its implementation. It has a staggering history of failure.

If people think they might be able to make communism work where it has in the past failed then I suggest they should try to do so on their own in a small group and when people see how well it works they will copy the techniques themselves. There is no reason to involve the state in any future experiments in communism.

Having discussed communism it seems only natural to turn to what is considered by many to be its axiomatic opposite: capitalism. Again, most people are familiar with capitalism and how it works (most of us have devoted some of our thinking lives to working out how to get 'rich'). Capitalism has its problems... we know that some people who have very few in-demand skills will find it hard to prosper on their own in a capitalist system. We also know that as technology increases it will become increasingly difficult for typical people to sell their labour because labour costs will have been driven down.

I want to mention here that we might consider there to be two different types of capitalism, namely 'safe' capitalism and 'risky' capitalism. By safe capitalism I mean the safe job where you turn up for work and each working day is much like the last. Whilst you may have skills the skills are not too advanced. So this would be the proverbial burger-flipping or shelf-stacking. (Interesting to note as an aside that both of these types of labour, burger-flipping and shelf-stacking, are becoming increasingly complex and skilled work.)

More complicated and skilled work would be the kind for which the participant would generally become famous to a greater or lesser degree as a result of their activity. So this would be cultural stars such as singers or actors. Sports stars. Entrepreneurs and people who have been able to make a lot of money on the stock market. This type of capitalism is risky and might not earn anything for long periods prior to their success but when they eventually do make it big they will do very well.

In our capitalist careers we will generally need to consider both types of work, both the risky and the not-so-risky.

The third means by which we might be able to make a living is to have our own land which we use to grow crops and raise livestock. If we have our own land and a farm then it is possible (at least theoretically) to live in a self-sufficient way without having to buy produce from outside. We might barter some of our goods with a neighbour but we don't need money in the same way that most people need money. This would be a very drastic change in lifestyle for most people and at this point in history is almost an academic concept only. But as time goes forward and farming technology gets better this might become increasingly viable for large numbers of people.

Finally it might be possible for the government to introduce a scheme similar to the Universal Basic Income which has been suggested by some theorists. This would be a stipulated quantity of money given to everyone (every adult) regardless of their circumstances. Clearly if we have a fiat currency which the government can print this UBI would be much easier to implement because even if the government is unable to raise sufficient taxes the sum could still be paid.

The immediate thought would be that if everyone can live without working then there would be no one to provide the goods and services. This would be an interesting test of the claim made by some market-evangelists that they are not motivated at work by money alone. I suspect that many people do enjoy their free-market work irrespective of the profit element so perhaps people even with enough money to survive indefinitely would still go out and earn a living. Of course the UBI would not pay for luxuries so there would always be the incentive to earn that little bit extra which suggests this system might be possible.

In the face of increasing technology which is replacing workers it seems almost cruel on the part of the government not to consider some kind of universal income.

Robots and technology will replace workers

The reality of capitalism and technology is that machines are increasingly competent at work. This means for people who sell their labour that the machines encroach increasingly on their market. If people are able to employ machines cheaply instead of manual workers then the demand for labour will fall and manual labourers will be replaced in the market.

It can also be argued that machines will make it more difficult for employees in the 'knowledge economy' who sell information and knowledge. Computers have democratised access to information and as a result it is much easier to become an expert in a topic and to access the knowledge of an expert. So even (an employee in) the knowledge economy is not immune from the advance of technology.

Machines destroy jobs and since capitalism is able to provide machines then capitalism itself destroys jobs.

Democracy is bad for the land-establishment

Part of the problem in instigating land reform is that many countries use the first-past-the-post system of voting. With this system it is very difficult for the people (the voters) to remove the establishment from power. The establishment are that group of people who have traditionally ruled and (as a consequence) traditionally owned the land. Because the fptp system makes it difficult to remove the establishment (which might be called the land-establishment) land ownership remains the same. Under fptp the land-establishment remain because the people have no mechanism to remove them. With a fully-proportional system the people will be able to remove the historical land owners and thereby claim land freedom for themselves. The voters can acquire true land ownership for themselves if a proportional system is used. True democracy is favourable to those who have (wrongfully) been excluded from land. Democracy is good for the landless and bad for those who have historically owned the land (the land-establishment).

It is not a contradiction to beg

To live we must beg which means we must ask others for money… in a capitalist system we do this by offering goods and services in exchange for payment. But we are still begging we cannot force people to be our customer.

We can only live without begging if we are able to produce our own food as a subsistence farmer everyone else must use capitalism to live and as a consequence they are a beggar. But this is not a problem unless we all must become subsistence farmers... if we are to be capitalists and not (subsistence) farmers then we must be beggars and so to beg should lose its negative connotations. It is not a contradiction to beg in a capitalist society in fact this is the means by which most people are earning their living. Capitalism is begging but this is not bad unless non-farming is bad. Unless farming is more virtuous then selling things begging is not a bad act and there should be no shame in begging… even if we do not offer something in exchange.

Labour can be sold only once

A big problem with capitalism for the working class is that to sell your labour is to sell something which can be sold only once. The great fortunes in capitalism are made by those firms which sell many of something. The volume is important. If volume is not important then we are dealing with something which might resemble capitalism but which is not quite capitalism... for example mining raw materials is profitable and doesn't have a high volume of sales (there are no individual units) but it is not quite like capitalism because it relies on being able to sell something which is present in nature. Farming is another example of an industry where great profits can be made but this again is slightly different from true capitalism. True capitalism requires a high volume of sales which is where this is a problem for the working class who can sell only their labour. Labour can be sold only once which means there is no means to sell a high volume of labour… it is only the management who retain the upside who are able to make a great fortune in a capitalist system. To sell your labour is a very bad way to make profits… it is much better to have equity in a profitable firm because then you will be able to benefit from the high volume of trade.