I am sure they view them as, parasites but how exactly do they see them?
Doesnt a landlord provide useful functions like investment capital and home repairs to justify their existence?
Or is it more the idea of people working all day while someone gets rich by monopolizing finite real estate and collecting rent?
It might vary from country to country, what country are you talking about?
Let’s find a communist and ask them.
I believe both Russia and China declared war on landlords.
Where is Zangief or Ivan drago.
Not useful enough. Remember that most Marxists are not big fans of the idea of private property.
That is exactly it. The actual slur used is the rentier class. Basically they consider certain necessities in life like housing should not be a source of profit. As you say a property owner is considered by most Marxists to be a parasite leeching from those who actually work for a living.
They derive their profits primarily from ownership of capital.
It is important to remember that landlord had different implications when Marx wrote. More of the population was still engaged in rural based agriculture than we are used to today. The landlords were frequently the old European nobility or the newer moneyed classes that had expanded into those old noble roles. The tenants were not just living on the land they were also using it for their livelihood. There might be very little improvement on the land itself beyond what previous tenants had done as part of farming. Marx’s war on the landlords shouldn’t be thought of just in terms of someone that invested in a duplex they rent out to supplement their main income.
Marxist theory said that value was created by labor. So they objected to anyone who was making money without performing labor for it. Their theory said that this meant they were stealing the money from the workers who had earned it.
Landlordship is little more than feudalism, in short.
“Hate” is an emotive word and, while it might be true that individual communists do hate landlorld in the way that Indiana Jones hates Nazis, the word is probably best omitted from any consideration of a Marxist analysis of landlordism.
Little Nemo has it, I think. As far as Marx is concerned wealth is created by labour. Owning a property is not labour, and therefore landlordism is a mechanism by which wealth is transferred from those who create it to to those who don’t. While Marxists don’t generally object to transfers of wealth - indeed, they keenly encourage them in many circumstances - they don’t see the fact that someone owns property as a characteristic that, in itself, justifies the transfer to them of wealth which they have not created.
On edit:And probably worth reinforcing what DinoR says; when Marx talks about landlords, he’s not talking only, or even primarily, of people who own a second residence and rent it out to others; he’s thinking of people who own farming estates and collect rent from the tenant farmers who actually farm the land.
Mention anything about a landlord on twitter is like wearing a steaksuit in bear country, every single tankie within a 100 mile radius is coming right for you.
What if I am a landlord who rents out properties that I bought with money generated by my labors? Isn’t that just a more intelligent application of the fruit of my labor?
No, that’s you transitioning from being a worker (hurrah!) to being a capitalist (boo!). You’re a class traitor, Tim.
As others have said, there’s a tendency to confuse landlord (person who owns real property, i.e a thief.) with the modern sense of landlord, who may or may not be the former, or may just be a glorified custodian.
It’s the thieves many far leftists object to.
Mao Zedong certainly hated landlords.
During his revolution he would march into a village and demand to see the landlords and property owners. After they gathered them in the center of town, they were executed on the spot in front of the townspeople. Mao would then proclaim, “The buildings are now yours!”
That’s a very rough synopsis, but you get the drift…
Got no reason. What the heck?
Kill my landlord. Kill my landlord.
C-I-L-L my land lord!
“Great! I’m renting mine out!”
I didn’t think you had to go all the way to communism to find people who hate landlords. I was thinking just about anyone on the far left hates them.
Not that there aren’t asshole landlords. There are plenty. But being a landlord doesn’t make you an asshole.
So once I’m unable to work as hard as I could in my youth, I’m doomed to starve. Got it.
From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs, so I figure the plan isn’t to have you starve.
I don’t think communists are against the idea of providing for one’s needs via performing high quality property management services, as much as they are opposed to getting rich by fucking over the working class. There is a LONG history of the latter happening through the landlord/tenant relationship.