John Locke and Henry George

               The readings by John Locke and Henry George both do an outstanding job at framing an argument in which they address the concept of land and property. With John Locke there is a greater stance upon the concept of property, while on the other hand Henry George places greater emphasis on land.

               John Locke’s stance is an interesting one that diverges into a multitude of ideas. However, the one idea that stands at the center of his argument is that of past possession in contrast to his “modern day” possession. He brings up contrast to how in the past possessions were perishable goods and one would own what they needed. If one does over consume or horde the laws of nature would regulate this. “…were forced to seek for their sheer survival – are things that will decay and perish if they are not consumed soon.” (Locke, 17). With the introduction of assigning things value, such as the ide of money, does the nature of over consumption come into play. This is due to the nature of which, by applying a monetary system to things does the natural regulator of a good’s expiration gets negated. Locke places this under a loss in which there is negative connotation towards this change, however I disagree with that. I believe that by adding a monetary system is adding order into the system of owning property. Locke discounts a lot of the benefits in trade and specialization we see in todays modern day brought about by the creation of a monetary system. His argument of how the idea of money being a bad influencer for it allows man to “…take more than he needs.” (Locke, 18) doesn’t address the pros money has brought. Money creates a system in which uniforms a system of trade. It places order into the hand of the participants and places a foundation for measuring the value of what could be in one’s possession. So ultimately, I consider Locke to be correct in stating that money has allowed for over consumption, however, it’s a positive creation for it helped revolutionize trade by creating the foundations of mass markets.

               Henry George’s stance focuses more upon the idea of owning land. George dives deeper into the idea, that Locke opened his writing with, of how labor should define ownership. Where as Locke goes into how money has altered the system of labor producing possession, George dives into how ownership of land produces a negative aspect upon this idea. George argues that landowners who don’t labor upon the land, rather profit from workers of the land are unjust. “one is unjustly enriched – the others are robbed” (George). This is George’s perception of rent, a plain robbery from workers. However, I feel that George dismisses a very important concept that comes with land ownership. That being the control over the land’s utilization. I feel that under George’s idea of should happen to land there is a very blatant problem. That being the disagreement of a community on what should be done with the land. Take for example someone wanting to build an amusement park right next to a quiet neighborhood. The only people who would be able to say anything and stop such a matter would be the legal system, thus if this action is done then the government technically owns, to a degree, the land near the neighborhood. They got to say what can and can’t happen on it. In short, I believe that land ownership is a good thing, in the matter of which it helps funnel the direction of land development.