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Notes -
This might be SLIGHTLY too big for small-scale Sunday, but I will give it a go:
What is the strongest argument against "you will own nothing and be happy" as a concept?" Ideally an argument that can be expressed in a few sentences of average complexity.
For instance, one argument might be that "people will not be able to build up wealth." However, I note that most of the property people own are depreciating assets. It actually might make sense for someone to not own a car and instead simply rent one on a weekly basis from a fleet of vehicles maintained by a larger company that are mostly standardized and will suit whatever their needs are at the time. Or a system like Citibike for cars. Or maybe later on, just call a robotaxi as needed.
This means they will not have to worry about the costs of repairs and maintenance, or insurance, or storage, and they can expect to get new models on a regular basis, thus it reduces a potential source of stress and unexpected costs to a simple monthly subscription. This seems like it would work well for a lot of people, and save them money in the long run!
And similar can apply to housing! If you live in a rented, pre-furnished apartment you are far more flexible if you want a change of scenery, to expand your living space, or need to move to a new city to pursue opportunities. Home ownership introduces lots of complexity and presents an illiquid asset even if it appreciates.
Same can apply to, say, smartphones, which upgrade so fast that 'owning' one almost doesn't make sense as it becomes outdated in < 1 year.
So extending some logic, I begin to see reasons why the average person might prefer to own nothing but a retirement account, and simply have a subscription service for most items they will use throughout their life.
What philosophical, economic, psychological, social, biological, political etc. etc. argument do you think most strongly refutes or rejects this as an ideal?
Taking a guess at the argument that will be the most common response, Rot-13'd:
Vg qvfpbhentrf snzvyl sbezngvba naq yrnqf gb n pvgvmrael gung vf vapncnoyr bs erfvfgvat nhgubevgl.
(Let us be clear, I'm not supporting owning nothing, but I do plan on trying to do a steelman or similar in the future)
Mostly for the same reason people don't want to eat bugs and stop flying: someone will still be eating steak, flying around in personal jets and that someone will also lease you the flat, the car and the phone. And because they own property and you don't, no one will ever be able to challenge their dominance, while property owners will be able to modify the terms of the social contract at will for ESG reasons or whatever new acronym is in vogue.
Yes, I've read Austrian-adjacent complaints that fiat money is functionally the same attack on liberty and that we should wake up and wrestle control over our money away from the governments.
Most likely this will be a publicly-traded corporation, which means you can 'own' shares in the company (via your 401(k) or whatever) and thus the wealth won't inherently all accrue solely to the executives and such. Indeed, maybe everyone at this point only rents their property, but some people can afford to rent nicer property than others. Like there are 'tiers' of subscription models, and some people are in the diamond tier, but just as a rich person can't buy a better smartphone than whatever model is then-considered top of the line, they're not getting extraordinarily better service than you, just the best the economy has on offer, on demand.
Why would an extremely wealthy person want the hassle of owning a supercar or private jet, when they could, again, just rent one on the spot in any city they happen to be in?
What benefit does the private ownership actually convey to them in this scenario?
This sounds like an argument from either egalitarianism, or from human liberty, not sure which one you're couching it as.
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