Friday, January 22, 2010

This law professor can't be right

The Volokh Conspiracy goes into the Supremes and Corporations.

"[T]he dichotomy between personal liberties and property rights is a false one. Property does not have rights. People have rights. The right to enjoy property without unlawful deprivation, no less than the right to speak or the right to travel, is in truth a “personal” right.... In fact, a fundamental interdependence exists between the personal right to liberty and the personal right in property."

The prof does not get that Corporations are artificial property, they are voluntary contracts generated between legislators with shareholders. If either party ceases to like the contractual terms, they can voluntarily severe it. Corporations have property values only to the extent that both parties conclude an extension to the contract.

The Prof might understand that every trade we do creates value, hence property. The apple grower and apple buyer, agree for money today and apples tommorow. The finite existence of that trade is now subject to political risk that one or the other party will use gains from trade to target the other in legislative action.

So, in effect, the prof has applauded the complete dismantlement of corporations and placed new costs of trade on the economy, a property destruction mechanism. There was nothing native in trade contracts.

Update, update:
I cannot stand the lunacy. The very value of a futures contract is the ability of either party to give up basic rights in the interm. The Apple grower and Apple buyer, by prior abrogation of rights, make the Apple market work. The Apple market measures the relative value of Apples in isolation, that is its value, that makes it property. The professor says that can no longer exist.

Here is another. What makes a lecture hall, a classroom, a concert hall, a legislative chamber work? What gives these places value? A prior agreement by ad hoc large groups to give up free speech for specific periods and places.

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