Don’t dehumanize victims of landlords by calling them “mob”. There are way more empty homes than homeless. The picture obviously is about needs based distribution instead of hoarding for profit.

Sure, the government just found the land laying around unused, no colonialism or genocide of natives involved at all /s

They were simply lying in the beginning to device people.

That’s not what happened in Europe. The opposite in fact. Many rich were completely fine during Hitler’s or Mussolini’s rule, profiting immensely from forced labor. They continue to be among the richest families in the world. Fascism is an unstable death cult, though. It always needs new victims and eventually destroys itself. So yes, long-term, you’re right.

All great and smart questions. Marxism has the answers:

So if I make a program by myself, sell it for profit, I am stealing the wages of the working class?

You could get lucky, but on average and long-term, self-employed people don’t get any profit. Some lose, some win, but in total, they only make enough to reproduce themselves or everyone would be self-employed. In fact, they make less, because as a solo operation, they are at a disadvantage amongst market forces and fluctuations. So they are bought up by oligopolies. In the specific case of a very successful program, you might be able to exploit copy-right rules and the oppressive state apparatus to seek monopoly rents well above development costs and punish anyone threatening your monopoly with open source software. Then, yes, you’d be like a landlord.

What if I run a company that does the same, I pay my employees well above market value, yet still manage to make profit for the company, is that also stealing from the working class?

Setting aside rents and violently enforced monopolies, let’s assume you operate on a free market. Then you could pay fair wages for a short time, but you’d lose out eventually against inevitably arising competition who dosn’t care about their employees and undercuts your prices making you irrelevant. You’ll have to fire your employees or get bought out or both. Capitalists don’t start out evil, the good ones just cease to be capitalists after a while.

What if I reduce the price to stop making profit, yet won’t reduce the pay for my employees, how has that benefitted them?

Individual capitalists can freely set prices, but on average, market forces make prices tend towards the value. The value is determined by the socially necessary labor time to produce the commodity and all the inputs. (At least within a society with a fixed level of automation, in reality different sectors complicate things somewhat, but let’s leave that aside for now). Exploitation happens, because employees aren’t paid the true value of what they produce, but only enough to reproduce themselves (to come to work next day). Basically, after they have produced enough to cover their reproduction, they have to keep working for a few more hours. Clearing out your stocks by selling products below their market value doesn’t change the fact that the workers aren’t being paid the full value of their product. It just makes the company unable to stay afloat long term. If you lower the price just enough to not make a profit, you’ll see competitors use their profits to buy more efficient machines and innovate. You won’t be able to keep up and go under. Either that or you won’t have any backups in case of a crisis. If you lower the price even more, you won’t be able to afford inputs and pay your workers. The result is the same.

Being a capitalist is a social role that comes with certain rules enforced by market forces. Capitalists who don’t behave like capitalists cease to be capitalists and become irrelevant. The only way for society to get out of this “game” is to stop playing.

I feel you! Great recommendations, thanks

Panpsychist breakfast