This paper is an introduction to property theory including the invisible hand mechanism which handles the initiation and termination of property rights in an on-going private property market economy. The Fundamental Theorem is that when Hume’s conditions of no involuntary transfers and no breached contracts are fulfilled, then the Lockean principle of people getting the fruits of their labor, i.e., imputing legal responsibility in accordance with de facto responsibility is satisfied. The major application is to the current system of a private property market economy based on the renting of persons, i.e., the employment contract.
This is a reprint of the paper in the Journal of Economic Issues in Sept. 2014.
On Property Theory
November 25, 2013 by
Introduction to Normative Property Theory
November 16, 2012 by
This was my first (1972) publication in property theory. The normative part of the theory is essentially the same as what I would espouse today, but for the descriptive theory, I was still in the grip of the “fundamental myth” that the rights to the product are part and parcel of some existing property rights to some capital asset.
Listen Libertarians! Concluding Part V
June 21, 2012 by
In this fifth and concluding part of the review of John Tomasi’s book Free Market Fairness, we look at the invisible hand mechanism of the property system (in contrast to the usual price system) which seems to be invisible to liberal scholars and social scientists since it does not give a satisfactory “account” of the current economic system based on the renting of human beings.