How Living on a Socialist Kibbutz Reveals the Value of Private Property

In an interesting recent article, Dartmouth economist Meir Kohn describes how he gradually shifted from being a socialist to eventually becoming a libertarian. A key role was his experience of living on a kibbutz, the famed Israeli socialist agricultural settlement:

A kibbutz is a commune of a few hundred adults, plus kids, engaged primarily in agriculture but also in light industry and tourism. Members work wherever they are assigned, although preferences are taken into account. Instead of receiving pay, members receive benefits in kind: they live in assigned housing, they eat in a communal dining hall, and their children are raised communally in children's houses, and can visit with their parents for a few hours each day. Most property is communal except for personal items such as clothing and furniture, for which members receive a small budget….

Kibbutz is bottom‐​up socialism on the scale of a small community. It thereby avoids the worst problems of state socialism: a planned economy and totalitarianism. The kibbutz, as a unit, is part of a market economy, and membership is voluntary: you can leave at any time. This is "socialism with a human face" — as good as it gets.

Being a member of a kibbutz taught me two important facts about socialism. The first is that material equality does not bring happiness. The differences in our material circumstances were indeed minimal. Apartments, for example, if not identical, were very similar. Nonetheless, a member assigned to an apartment that was a little smaller or a little older than someone else's would be highly resentful. Partly, this was because a person's ability to discern differences grows as the differences become smaller. But largely it was because what we received was assigned rather than earned. It turns out that how you get stuff matters no less than what you get.

The second thing I learned from my experience of socialism was that incentives matter. On a kibbutz, there is no material incentive for effort and not much incentive of any kind. There are two kinds of people who have no problem with this: deadbeats and saints. When a group joined a kibbutz, the deadbeats and saints tended to stay while the others eventually left. I left.


https://reason.com/volokh/2021/04/03/how-living-on-a-socialist-kibbutz-reveals-the-value-of-private-property/

It sounds as if he has gone from a highly impersonal social existence, to the kind of social existence we all experience...that is, unless he has retreated to be a hermit on a mountaintop. He’s gone from a kibbutz to ordinary life.

To be honest, it sounds like creators of his kibbutz confused equity with downplaying pleasure and achievement, and that is the source of his problem.

It doesn’t have to be that way. In our highly socialistic military, we have all that he complains of, yet there is room for individual expression and achievement (e.g., assignment, rank and pay based on merit).

Original Quill wrote:It sounds as if he has gone from a highly impersonal social existence, to the kind of social existence we all experience...that is, unless he has retreated to be a hermit on a mountaintop.  He’s gone from a kibbutz to ordinary life.

To be honest, it sounds like creators of his kibbutz confused equity with downplaying pleasure and achievement, and that is the source of his problem.

It doesn’t have to be that way.  In our highly socialistic military, we have all that he complains of, yet there is room for individual expression and achievement (e.g., assignment, rank and pay based on merit).

The military is a poor example of socialism because it's funded by a capitalist system.

And it can quickly discarded those that are of no use.

Maddog wrote:

Original Quill wrote:It sounds as if he has gone from a highly impersonal social existence, to the kind of social existence we all experience...that is, unless he has retreated to be a hermit on a mountaintop.  He’s gone from a kibbutz to ordinary life.

To be honest, it sounds like creators of his kibbutz confused equity with downplaying pleasure and achievement, and that is the source of his problem.

It doesn’t have to be that way.  In our highly socialistic military, we have all that he complains of, yet there is room for individual expression and achievement (e.g., assignment, rank and pay based on merit).

The military is a poor example of socialism because it's funded by a capitalist system.  

What does that mean? A capitalist system can set up a socialist institution within it, and has done so in our nation as well as many others (including Israel).

Maddog wrote:And it can quickly discarded those that are of no use.  

As is the case with any socialist organizations.

As I say, the organizers of his kibbutz were lacking in imagination.

Original Quill wrote:

Maddog wrote:

The military is a poor example of socialism because it's funded by a capitalist system.  

What does that mean?  A capitalist system can set up a socialist institution within it, and has done so in our nation as well as many others (including Israel).

Maddog wrote:And it can quickly discarded those that are of no use.  

As is the case with any socialist organizations.

As I say, the organizers of his kibbutz were lacking in imagination.

No doubt a socialist society that discards the unproductive could work.

How would you discard these people from society?

Maddog wrote:

Original Quill wrote:

What does that mean?  A capitalist system can set up a socialist institution within it, and has done so in our nation as well as many others (including Israel).



As is the case with any socialist organizations.

As I say, the organizers of his kibbutz were lacking in imagination.

No doubt a socialist society that discards the unproductive could work.

How would you discard these people from society?

Discarding is your word.  I hesitate to put words in your mouth.  You brought it up in the context of the military...which brings to mind a dishonorable discharge.  But, as I say, I don't speak for you.

To my mind, we discard people when we imprison them, or leave them homeless and unemployed.  When the system doesn't work for them, they fall through the net...and are discarded.

The way to un-discard them, is to enhance their skills and preparedness for society to incorporate them; and to provide: homes for the homeless; food for the hungry; clothing for the cold; education for the uneducated, and so forth.

There are plenty of opportunities to interest the disinterested, once they are integrated.  To say that some people have no interests is to say that they don’t operate in the way ordinary people do.  I don’t believe there are such people in ordinary walks of life.  To say a person has no interests is to say they have no thought processes, no emotions and values, and/or both.  Even the most depraved person is quite rich in values.  So, you hunt for them.

Original Quill wrote:

Maddog wrote:

No doubt a socialist society that discards the unproductive could work.

How would you discard these people from society?

Discarding is your word.  I hesitate to put words in your mouth.  You brought it up in the context of the military...which brings to mind a dishonorable discharge.  But, as I say, I don't speak for you.

To my mind, we discard people when we imprison them, or leave them homeless and unemployed.  When the system doesn't work for them, they fall through the net...and are discarded.

The way to un-discard them, is to enhance their skills and preparedness for society to incorporate them; and to provide: homes for the homeless; food for the hungry; clothing for the cold; education for the uneducated, and so forth.

There are plenty of opportunities to interest the disinterested, once they are integrated.  To say that some people have no interests is to say that they don’t operate in the way ordinary people do.  I don’t believe there are such people in ordinary walks of life.  To say a person has no interests is to say they have no thought processes, no emotions and values, and/or both.  Even the most depraved person is quite rich in values.  So, you hunt for them.

You brought up the military.

It was a poor example as it's "selective" in terms of membership.

It also relies on sources outside of itself for sustenance.

It can't support itself. It's basically a giant welfare program.

I did bring up the military, but you brought up how "quickly discarded those that are of no use".

I'm simply saying that no one must be discarded if you take a holistic view of opportunity for everyone...no one left behind!

Original Quill wrote:I did bring up the military, but you brought up how "quickly discarded those that are of no use".

I'm simply saying that no one must be discarded if you take a holistic view of opportunity for everyone...no one left behind!

So the military was a dumb analogy.

Agreed.  

Now go back and read the article.  It addresses your second point quite well.

Maddog wrote:

Original Quill wrote:I did bring up the military, but you brought up how "quickly discarded those that are of no use".

I'm simply saying that no one must be discarded if you take a holistic view of opportunity for everyone...no one left behind!

So the military was a dumb analogy.

Agreed.  

Now go back and read the article.  It addresses your second point quite well.

The military is a perfect analogy.  It's a socialist organization, owned, run, and of the people.  You objected to it because it could "discard" people: it's not holistic.  I think that's inconsequential, because it could be made holistic. Just remove the discarding of members.

Original Quill wrote:

Maddog wrote:

So the military was a dumb analogy.

Agreed.  

Now go back and read the article.  It addresses your second point quite well.

The military is a perfect analogy.  It's a socialist organization, owned, run, and of the people.  You objected to it because it could "discard" people: it's not holistic.  I think that's inconsequential, because it could be made holistic.  Just remove the discarding of members.

How well would a military work with members who provided no value to the organization?

"On a kibbutz, there is no material incentive for effort and not much incentive of any kind. There are two kinds of people who have no problem with this: deadbeats and saints. When a group joined a kibbutz, the deadbeats and saints tended to stay while the others eventually left. I left."

Maddog wrote:

Original Quill wrote:

The military is a perfect analogy.  It's a socialist organization, owned, run, and of the people.  You objected to it because it could "discard" people: it's not holistic.  I think that's inconsequential, because it could be made holistic.  Just remove the discarding of members.

How well would a military work with members who provided no value to the organization?

In a holistic military, it would work by using known practices to involve and incentivize those "no-value" human beings, instead of merely "discarding" them.

Original Quill wrote:

Maddog wrote:

How well would a military work with members who provided no value to the organization?

In a holistic military, it would work by using known practices to involve and incentivize those "no-value" human beings, instead of merely "discarding" them.

"On a kibbutz, there is no material incentive for effort and not much incentive of any kind. There are two kinds of people who have no problem with this: deadbeats and saints. When a group joined a kibbutz, the deadbeats and saints tended to stay while the others eventually left "

Maddog wrote:

Original Quill wrote:

In a holistic military, it would work by using known practices to involve and incentivize those "no-value" human beings, instead of merely "discarding" them.

"On a kibbutz, there is no material incentive for effort and not much incentive of any kind.

Not every kibbutz.

Maddog wrote:There are two kinds of people who have no problem with this: deadbeats and saints. When a group joined a kibbutz, the deadbeats and saints tended to stay while the others eventually left "

Spoken like a true absolutist and tyrant. There's always an alternative. You can be whatever you want to be.