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[GoblinCookie]

What economy? Maybe dwarf mode right now resembles a socialist economy, but the world economy certainly doesn't resemble any human economy very strongly. You're the one imposing those things to the game, because that's your interpretation of how it should work. But who's to say human shop owners don't own their own shops and pass them down as property? Who's to say families don't own their own land? Maybe they have little deeds that they aquired after buying it from the state. Can you prove that this is or isn't the case?

The whole thing is tremendously abstracted right now, but because dwarven society shows signs of being "socialist", you can confortably ascribe that to the entire world surrounding it. Dwarves also show a tremendous ammount of tolerance for some of the player's genocidal actions. They are not in communal societies, they are in robotic societies.

Adding features that make the economy look more capitalistic will actually make the current world "economy" (as well as several features that are planned to be in the game) make more sense. It will justify people having mansions, highway banditry and the coins already existing in the game. Most people really want those things to be in DF, so you're losing the war here.

I am merely stating the nature of the game's economic structure, the only person who is reading into the game things that are not there is you.  Everybody seems to live as long as eachother regardless of their social status, this rather implies that everybody is in economic terms basically equal.  That rather works against the idea that any society has a great role for private property; else why do we not see the nasty consequences of a 'realistic' human economy?

Think of it like this.  You are the site government of the civilizations first Fortress in Yr 0.  Do you invent private property?  The answer is no.  Why is that?

Because there is absolutely no reason to do it; there are obvious problems with the idea, but absolutely no benefit to be had. 

You can stack anachronisms upon anachronisms, they will not start to make sense once you have thrown enough of them in.  The replication of historically developing institutions does not make sense because practically nothing about the way that the civilizations in DF world develop actually mirrors real history.  Real civilizations for instance did not start off with a single government center that produced sufficiant surplus value to produce both the 'peasants' and other government centers. 

Since nobody has in the present game invented something (private property) that no player would invent the world is thus essentially consistent.  If we want something to exist then we have to come up with a reason why it would be invented.  Why would a dwarf fortress invent private property?  That is not a rhetorical question Ribs but one that I want answered. 

[Ribs]

That rather works against the idea that any society has a great role for private property; else why do we not see the nasty consequences of a 'realistic' human economy?

Because we don't have realistic shortages for most goods. Wait until farming is harder, and you'll see that things are not so simple.

Also, nobles still complain when commoners have accomodations that are better than theirs (we've been through this before). They also order people to be beaten to death for arbitrary reasons. The part where they "live along with each other" in equality is your interpretation.

Think of it like this.  You are the site government of the civilizations first Fortress in Yr 0.  Do you invent private property?  The answer is no.  Why is that?

Because there is absolutely no reason to do it; there are obvious problems with the idea, but absolutely no benefit to be had. 

You can stack anachronisms upon anachronisms, they will not start to make sense once you have thrown enough of them in.  The replication of historically developing institutions does not make sense because practically nothing about the way that the civilizations in DF world develop actually mirrors real history.  Real civilizations for instance did not start off with a single government center that produced sufficiant surplus value to produce both the 'peasants' and other government centers. 

Since nobody has in the present game invented something (private property) that no player would invent the world is thus essentially consistent.  If we want something to exist then we have to come up with a reason why it would be invented.  Why would a dwarf fortress invent private property?  That is not a rhetorical question Ribs but one that I want answered.

"invent" private property, you say? Do you even think about anything that isn't related to marxist theory? People always owned things. Land in particular has been recorded as being treated like "private property" for thousands of years. People also owned animals, tools, etc. People like owning things that have value. They often share their valuables with other collectives of people, such as their families, clans, or even bigger groups. But the level and conditions in which they share their things can vary quite a bit.

Say a dwarf decided to stockpile a few biscuits in his quarters, as they sometimes do. Suddenly you have a food shortage. Should he give up his biscuits to everyone, more specifically for you the player to decide what to do with them? Wouldn't he prioritize himself or his immediate family? If food is hard to go by, wouldn't dwarven families then fight hard to keep as many goods as they can to themselves, so when shortages come their families are not the ones who will be sacrificed? Maybe they don't want you to decide who survives when there's only enough food to support half of the population. Maybe they don't want you to decide so directly who gets that artifact. A greedy dwarf may want it to himself, and will do whatever it needs to do to aquire it. Maybe he'd work to accumulate money so he can have it for himself. If private property is a thing, they'd have means to shiled them from the very decisions of the player.

DF it's not only about what the player wants, gobbo. One of the most interesting aspects in this game is how dwarves react to things on their own. You don't directly control them, ordering them around like puppets. It doesn't matter if you would never want them to have private property. They would want it anyway. Just like it doesn't matter that you don't want your dwarves to ber be lazy. A lot of them a lazy regardless. They don't marry according to your decisions, either. They decide things on their own. This is Dwarf Fortress we are talking about, and DF is a game that purposely limits the player.

[Untrustedlife]

What economy? Maybe dwarf mode right now resembles a socialist economy, but the world economy certainly doesn't resemble any human economy very strongly. You're the one imposing those things to the game, because that's your interpretation of how it should work. But who's to say human shop owners don't own their own shops and pass them down as property? Who's to say families don't own their own land? Maybe they have little deeds that they aquired after buying it from the state. Can you prove that this is or isn't the case?

The whole thing is tremendously abstracted right now, but because dwarven society shows signs of being "socialist", you can confortably ascribe that to the entire world surrounding it. Dwarves also show a tremendous ammount of tolerance for some of the player's genocidal actions. They are not in communal societies, they are in robotic societies.

Adding features that make the economy look more capitalistic will actually make the current world "economy" (as well as several features that are planned to be in the game) make more sense. It will justify people having mansions, highway banditry and the coins already existing in the game. Most people really want those things to be in DF, so you're losing the war here.

I am merely stating the nature of the game's economic structure, the only person who is reading into the game things that are not there is you.  Everybody seems to live as long as eachother regardless of their social status, this rather implies that everybody is in economic terms basically equal.  That rather works against the idea that any society has a great role for private property; else why do we not see the nasty consequences of a 'realistic' human economy?

Think of it like this.  You are the site government of the civilizations first Fortress in Yr 0.  Do you invent private property?  The answer is no.  Why is that?

Because there is absolutely no reason to do it; there are obvious problems with the idea, but absolutely no benefit to be had. 

You can stack anachronisms upon anachronisms, they will not start to make sense once you have thrown enough of them in.  The replication of historically developing institutions does not make sense because practically nothing about the way that the civilizations in DF world develop actually mirrors real history.  Real civilizations for instance did not start off with a single government center that produced sufficiant surplus value to produce both the 'peasants' and other government centers. 

Since nobody has in the present game invented something (private property) that no player would invent the world is thus essentially consistent.  If we want something to exist then we have to come up with a reason why it would be invented.  Why would a dwarf fortress invent private property?  That is not a rhetorical question Ribs but one that I want answered.

GUYS THIS THREAD IS ABOUT ADVENTURE MODE HOUSING!  Not DWARF MODE housing. And that is already confirmed to be a future feature, look at the dev pages, arguing wont get rid of what toadys going to add.


Private property is planned. However there no reason a human civ and a dwarven civ wont have different constructs involving property.


I could see dwarven society as more socialist, and human society is obviously FEUDAL (based on how the game currently works), not sure about elves.

But i do believe its planned that social construct would vary between civilization (even in the next version some human societies don't produce scholars because of there values, while others do) I expect property to be treated in the same manner.

Remember, the game is not finished yet.
Also the world economy isn't finished either.

[Ribs]

GUYS THIS THREAD IS ABOUT ADVENTURE MODE HOUSING!  Not DWARF MODE housing. And that is already confirmed to be a future feature, look at the dev pages, arguing wont get rid of what toadys going to add.


Private property is planned. However there no reason a human civ and a dwarven civ wont have different constructs involving property.


I could see dwarven society as more socialist, and human society is obviously FEUDAL (based on how teh game currently works), not sure about elves.

That's the argument. Comrad Gobbo there insists that DF is, in fact, a socialism simulator and is agaisnt the concept of private property to be introduced to the game. He's done this before, too... the man hijacks these threads and turn them into social-economic debates

[Untrustedlife]

GUYS THIS THREAD IS ABOUT ADVENTURE MODE HOUSING!  Not DWARF MODE housing. And that is already confirmed to be a future feature, look at the dev pages, arguing wont get rid of what toadys going to add.


Private property is planned. However there no reason a human civ and a dwarven civ wont have different constructs involving property.


I could see dwarven society as more socialist, and human society is obviously FEUDAL (based on how teh game currently works), not sure about elves.

That's the argument. Comrad Gobbo there insists that DF is, in fact, a socialism simulator and is agaisnt the concept of private property to be introduced to the game. He's done this before, too... the man hijacks these threads and turn them into social-economic debates

Im also going to add that,goblin you should analyze the dev pages more, the Thief and Trader roles both mention property and buying and selling property, and hiring servants, etc etc etc. And the world economy. In fact, I am sorry but in the upcoming version (I emailed to toady to ask), toady told me that we will be able to RENT rooms at inns (this feature is in the unreleased version), though this isnt neccesarily capitalism, it is pretty close, and why wouldnt they? Selling rooms at an inn is a great way to gather wealth, and wealth DOES matter in df, this small scale trading was common in both feudal europe and feudal japan, and therefore, is common in feudal human civs in dwarf fortress. Why hire servants? because what you pay them has value, and they can use this value to get food, and having a servant shows status. Just as "owning" a mansion shows status. Now I doubt that all human societies in version 1.0 will operate like this, but some will, at least those that have either: Feudal society, or Imperial society.

[Ribs]

Im also going to add that, you guys should analyze the dev pages more, the Thief and Trader roles both mention property and buying and selling property, and hiring servants, etc etc etc. And the world economy. In fact, I am sorry but in the upcoming version (I emailed to ady to ask), toady told me that we will be able to RENT rooms at inns, though this isnt neccesarily capitalism, it is pretty colose, and why wouldnt they? Selling rooms at an inn is a great way to gather wealth, and wealth DOES matter in df, this small scall capitalism was common in both feudal europe and feudal japan.

For Christ sake man. I'm on your side here, go read the thread. I've been hammering these points for days now.

[Untrustedlife]

Im also going to add that, you guys should analyze the dev pages more, the Thief and Trader roles both mention property and buying and selling property, and hiring servants, etc etc etc. And the world economy. In fact, I am sorry but in the upcoming version (I emailed to ady to ask), toady told me that we will be able to RENT rooms at inns, though this isnt neccesarily capitalism, it is pretty colose, and why wouldnt they? Selling rooms at an inn is a great way to gather wealth, and wealth DOES matter in df, this small scall capitalism was common in both feudal europe and feudal japan.

For Christ sake man. I'm on your side here, go read the thread. I've been hammering these points for days now.

edited to correct that, sorry heh

[Ribs]

He's notorious for doing this. Seems like he's proud of it, too.

[GoblinCookie]

Because we don't have realistic shortages for most goods. Wait until farming is harder, and you'll see that things are not so simple.

Also, nobles still complain when commoners have accomodations that are better than theirs (we've been through this before). They also order people to be beaten to death for arbitrary reasons. The part where they "live along with each other" in equality is your interpretation.

There is no logic in anything you are saying.  You are saying, well in future things will be different therefore how things are is not how thing are?  You are also implying that people abusing power implies a different economic system than the one that exists. 

"invent" private property, you say? Do you even think about anything that isn't related to marxist theory? People always owned things. Land in particular has been recorded as being treated like "private property" for thousands of years. People also owned animals, tools, etc. People like owning things that have value. They often share their valuables with other collectives of people, such as their families, clans, or even bigger groups. But the level and conditions in which they share their things can vary quite a bit.

Say a dwarf decided to stockpile a few biscuits in his quarters, as they sometimes do. Suddenly you have a food shortage. Should he give up his biscuits to everyone, more specifically for you the player to decide what to do with them? Wouldn't he prioritize himself or his immediate family? If food is hard to go by, wouldn't dwarven families then fight hard to keep as many goods as they can to themselves, so when shortages come their families are not the ones who will be sacrificed? Maybe they don't want you to decide who survives when there's only enough food to support half of the population. Maybe they don't want you to decide so directly who gets that artifact. A greedy dwarf may want it to himself, and will do whatever it needs to do to aquire it. Maybe he'd work to accumulate money so he can have it for himself. If private property is a thing, they'd have means to shiled them from the very decisions of the player.

DF it's not only about what the player wants, gobbo. One of the most interesting aspects in this game is how dwarves react to things on their own. You don't directly control them, ordering them around like puppets. It doesn't matter if you would never want them to have private property. They would want it anyway. Just like it doesn't matter that you don't want your dwarves to ber be lazy. A lot of them a lazy regardless. They don't marry according to your decisions, either. They decide things on their own. This is Dwarf Fortress we are talking about, and DF is a game that purposely limits the player.

Real people do not live underground on a permanant basis; talking about what real people do in relation to dwarves is basically a false analogy.  Definitions change, the meaning of words change over time as the society develops.  Saying that something is 1000s of years old, does not mean that it was the same 1000 yrs ago nor that it was not orginally invented even more 1000s of years ago. 

You biscuit example is the very reason why private property would never be invented by any sane dwarf site government.  The dwarf that hoards biscuits without private property has absolutely no right to do so, the site government can simply catch him, take the buscuits away and come up with some suitably nasty punishment for him.  Once you have invented private property that buiscuit horder can now legally hoard his buiscuits while the rest of the fortress starve to death and the fortress gov is now legally bound to protect his buiscuit horde against the rest of the fortress. 

The interests of the fortress are to crush greedy buiscuit horders not protect them.

GUYS THIS THREAD IS ABOUT ADVENTURE MODE HOUSING!  Not DWARF MODE housing. And that is already confirmed to be a future feature, look at the dev pages, arguing wont get rid of what toadys going to add.

No need to get so angry.  When did I say I was against adventurers having houses to live in?  I was merely interested in the details, which are the same as fortress mode because they are supposed to be the same world.

Im also going to add that,goblin you should analyze the dev pages more, the Thief and Trader roles both mention property and buying and selling property, and hiring servants, etc etc etc. And the world economy. In fact, I am sorry but in the upcoming version (I emailed to toady to ask), toady told me that we will be able to RENT rooms at inns (this feature is in the unreleased version), though this isnt neccesarily capitalism, it is pretty close, and why wouldnt they? Selling rooms at an inn is a great way to gather wealth, and wealth DOES matter in df, this small scale trading was common in both feudal europe and feudal japan, and therefore, is common in feudal human civs in dwarf fortress. Why hire servants? because what you pay them has value, and they can use this value to get food, and having a servant shows status.

Remember that everything has a meaning only in context.

He's notorious for doing this. Seems like he's proud of it, too.

You have PM button for snide remarks about third parties, use it!

[Untrustedlife]

I thought I had plenty of context.

Quote from: Untrustedlife on Today at 04:46:06 pm
--------------------------------------------
Im also going to add that,goblin you should analyze the dev pages more, the Thief and Trader roles both mention property and buying and selling property, and hiring servants, etc etc etc. And the world economy. In fact, I am sorry but in the upcoming version (I emailed to toady to ask), toady told me that we will be able to RENT rooms at inns (this feature is in the unreleased version), though this isnt neccesarily capitalism, it is pretty close, and why wouldnt they? Selling rooms at an inn is a great way to gather wealth, and wealth DOES matter in df, this small scale trading was common in both feudal europe and feudal japan, and therefore, is common in feudal human civs in dwarf fortress. Why hire servants? because what you pay them has value, and they can use this value to get food, and having a servant shows status.
---------------------------------

One world can have a variety of social structures, for all intents and purposes dwarven society is differnet from human society and vice versa.

Feudal property was different then current private property, usually given to people by their lords (or in japans case daimyos), which is why it also mentions in the dev page that you may have to get info about struggling nobels to obtain property, and therefore status (status and property are synonymous in feudal societies for the most part (though it is skewed by a rigid social status (eg its possible to have lords who are in fact rather poor, but still own property, as what sometimes happened with samuris in feudal/tokugawa period japan) but its also possible to have rich merchants with alot of property but low social status (merchants were in fact at the bottom of the social structure in japan however, they owned alot, because they had alot of WEALTH))), its a very complex topic, but essentially what im saying is that in the future DF will likely have both feudal, and imperial and libertarion societies. However it is starting with feudal and feudal systems do involve transfer of wealth via trading and status via wealth/property.
EDIT:
Its closer to capitalism then you think.

[Untrustedlife]

I forgot to add "socialism" to that list as-well.

[Untrustedlife]

Because we don't have realistic shortages for most goods. Wait until farming is harder, and you'll see that things are not so simple.

Also, nobles still complain when commoners have accomodations that are better than theirs (we've been through this before). They also order people to be beaten to death for arbitrary reasons. The part where they "live along with each other" in equality is your interpretation.

There is no logic in anything you are saying.  You are saying, well in future things will be different therefore how things are is not how thing are?  You are also implying that people abusing power implies a different economic system than the one that exists. 

"invent" private property, you say? Do you even think about anything that isn't related to marxist theory? People always owned things. Land in particular has been recorded as being treated like "private property" for thousands of years. People also owned animals, tools, etc. People like owning things that have value. They often share their valuables with other collectives of people, such as their families, clans, or even bigger groups. But the level and conditions in which they share their things can vary quite a bit.

Say a dwarf decided to stockpile a few biscuits in his quarters, as they sometimes do. Suddenly you have a food shortage. Should he give up his biscuits to everyone, more specifically for you the player to decide what to do with them? Wouldn't he prioritize himself or his immediate family? If food is hard to go by, wouldn't dwarven families then fight hard to keep as many goods as they can to themselves, so when shortages come their families are not the ones who will be sacrificed? Maybe they don't want you to decide who survives when there's only enough food to support half of the population. Maybe they don't want you to decide so directly who gets that artifact. A greedy dwarf may want it to himself, and will do whatever it needs to do to aquire it. Maybe he'd work to accumulate money so he can have it for himself. If private property is a thing, they'd have means to shiled them from the very decisions of the player.

DF it's not only about what the player wants, gobbo. One of the most interesting aspects in this game is how dwarves react to things on their own. You don't directly control them, ordering them around like puppets. It doesn't matter if you would never want them to have private property. They would want it anyway. Just like it doesn't matter that you don't want your dwarves to ber be lazy. A lot of them a lazy regardless. They don't marry according to your decisions, either. They decide things on their own. This is Dwarf Fortress we are talking about, and DF is a game that purposely limits the player.

Real people do not live underground on a permanant basis; talking about what real people do in relation to dwarves is basically a false analogy.  Definitions change, the meaning of words change over time as the society develops.  Saying that something is 1000s of years old, does not mean that it was the same 1000 yrs ago nor that it was not orginally invented even more 1000s of years ago. 

You biscuit example is the very reason why private property would never be invented by any sane dwarf site government.  The dwarf that hoards biscuits without private property has absolutely no right to do so, the site government can simply catch him, take the buscuits away and come up with some suitably nasty punishment for him.  Once you have invented private property that buiscuit horder can now legally hoard his buiscuits while the rest of the fortress starve to death and the fortress gov is now legally bound to protect his buiscuit horde against the rest of the fortress. 

The interests of the fortress are to crush greedy buiscuit horders not protect them.

GUYS THIS THREAD IS ABOUT ADVENTURE MODE HOUSING!  Not DWARF MODE housing. And that is already confirmed to be a future feature, look at the dev pages, arguing wont get rid of what toadys going to add.

No need to get so angry.  When did I say I was against adventurers having houses to live in?  I was merely interested in the details, which are the same as fortress mode because they are supposed to be the same world.

Im also going to add that,goblin you should analyze the dev pages more, the Thief and Trader roles both mention property and buying and selling property, and hiring servants, etc etc etc. And the world economy. In fact, I am sorry but in the upcoming version (I emailed to toady to ask), toady told me that we will be able to RENT rooms at inns (this feature is in the unreleased version), though this isnt neccesarily capitalism, it is pretty close, and why wouldnt they? Selling rooms at an inn is a great way to gather wealth, and wealth DOES matter in df, this small scale trading was common in both feudal europe and feudal japan, and therefore, is common in feudal human civs in dwarf fortress. Why hire servants? because what you pay them has value, and they can use this value to get food, and having a servant shows status.

Remember that everything has a meaning only in context.

He's notorious for doing this. Seems like he's proud of it, too.

You have PM button for snide remarks about third parties, use it!

Why do you keep talking from a dwarven context? I , at least am talking about the HUMAN feudal societies which are the societies the player will interact with the most in adventure mode.
Sure it will be treated differently in dwarven fortresses, but we are talking from the context of the HUMAN societies in dwarf fortress. You realize the scope of this game/simulation right? It isnt just dwarves, and its entirely possible for the dwarves and humans to have different social structures, hell they already do.

My earlier post so you dont have to scoll up.

I thought I had plenty of context.

Quote from: Untrustedlife on Today at 04:46:06 pm
--------------------------------------------
Im also going to add that,goblin you should analyze the dev pages more, the Thief and Trader roles both mention property and buying and selling property, and hiring servants, etc etc etc. And the world economy. In fact, I am sorry but in the upcoming version (I emailed to toady to ask), toady told me that we will be able to RENT rooms at inns (this feature is in the unreleased version), though this isnt neccesarily capitalism, it is pretty close, and why wouldnt they? Selling rooms at an inn is a great way to gather wealth, and wealth DOES matter in df, this small scale trading was common in both feudal europe and feudal japan, and therefore, is common in feudal human civs in dwarf fortress. Why hire servants? because what you pay them has value, and they can use this value to get food, and having a servant shows status.
---------------------------------

One world can have a variety of social structures, for all intents and purposes dwarven society is differnet from human society and vice versa.

Feudal property was different then current private property, usually given to people by their lords (or in japans case daimyos), which is why it also mentions in the dev page that you may have to get info about struggling nobels to obtain property, and therefore status (status and property are synonymous in feudal societies for the most part (though it is skewed by a rigid social status (eg its possible to have lords who are in fact rather poor, but still own property, as what sometimes happened with samuris in feudal/tokugawa period japan) but its also possible to have rich merchants with alot of property but low social status (merchants were in fact at the bottom of the social structure in japan however, they owned alot, because they had alot of WEALTH))), its a very complex topic, but essentially what im saying is that in the future DF will likely have both feudal, and imperial and libertarion societies. However it is starting with feudal and feudal systems do involve transfer of wealth via trading and status via wealth/property.
EDIT:
Its closer to capitalism then you think.

The world doesn't have to SHARE a social structure, heck, the site 1/2 mile away might have  a completely different structure depending on what civ they came from/ how their own society developed, all civs in df start out seperate, therefore logically they would develop seperately. Especially in a world with no mass transit.

EDIT:
Ima pull up the ethics, and analyze them. (though in the next version they will vary)

[Ribs]

You are saying, well in future things will be different therefore how things are is not how thing are?

Yes. Thank you. The way things are right are no desireable, as the creator of the game wants certain resources to be more difficult to aquire.

Real people do not live underground on a permanant basis

Really? I thought dwarf fortress was a perfect reality simulator. Great answer, by the way

You biscuit example is the very reason why private property would never be invented by any sane dwarf site government.  The dwarf that hoards biscuits without private property has absolutely no right to do so, the site government can simply catch him, take the buscuits away and come up with some suitably nasty punishment for him.  Once you have invented private property that buiscuit horder can now legally hoard his buiscuits while the rest of the fortress starve to death and the fortress gov is now legally bound to protect his buiscuit horde against the rest of the fortress. 

Oh, you stalinists and your gulags. Let's crush those disgusting capitalists, right?

Would people who worked hard to save food simply accept the player's decision that they need to be sacrificed because he's decided that "these other specific dwarves deserve to live more than you do". Why? Are they the borg? Depending on their personalities, they would likely rebel

Let's say a craftsdwarf worked very hard on his profession. He's made many items on his own, and decided to sell them on the side in the market/fairs to several people or travelling merchants. He's aquired a lot of extra money/goods in the process. With his individual resources, he's decided to buy a few dozen barrels of wine over the years and stockpiled them in his cellar. Some of these wine barrels came from foregn merchants, even. From your perspective, the government should crack up his house and get those barrels away from him. Also, they should punish him for making illegal commercial transactions in the first place, the filthy hoarder. I see this as authoritarian and psychotic. You, on the other hand, seem to percieve this is justice.

[GoblinCookie]

I thought I had plenty of context.

Quote from: Untrustedlife on Today at 04:46:06 pm
--------------------------------------------
Im also going to add that,goblin you should analyze the dev pages more, the Thief and Trader roles both mention property and buying and selling property, and hiring servants, etc etc etc. And the world economy. In fact, I am sorry but in the upcoming version (I emailed to toady to ask), toady told me that we will be able to RENT rooms at inns (this feature is in the unreleased version), though this isnt neccesarily capitalism, it is pretty close, and why wouldnt they? Selling rooms at an inn is a great way to gather wealth, and wealth DOES matter in df, this small scale trading was common in both feudal europe and feudal japan, and therefore, is common in feudal human civs in dwarf fortress. Why hire servants? because what you pay them has value, and they can use this value to get food, and having a servant shows status.
---------------------------------

One world can have a variety of social structures, for all intents and purposes dwarven society is differnet from human society and vice versa.

Feudal property was different then current private property, usually given to people by their lords (or in japans case daimyos), which is why it also mentions in the dev page that you may have to get info about struggling nobels to obtain property, and therefore status (status and property are synonymous in feudal societies for the most part (though it is skewed by a rigid social status (eg its possible to have lords who are in fact rather poor, but still own property, as what sometimes happened with samuris in feudal/tokugawa period japan) but its also possible to have rich merchants with alot of property but low social status (merchants were in fact at the bottom of the social structure in japan however, they owned alot, because they had alot of WEALTH))), its a very complex topic, but essentially what im saying is that in the future DF will likely have both feudal, and imperial and libertarion societies. However it is starting with feudal and feudal systems do involve transfer of wealth via trading and status via wealth/property.
EDIT:
Its closer to capitalism then you think.

You are right about the way the property under Feudalism worked.

The non-problem is that Feudalism (and hence Feudal property) depends upon a state of affairs that while pretty much universal historically due to the way that civilization developed from the previous hunter-gatherer state where they were scattered about the place.  We have a loose group of peasant family groups all over the place and then we develop for whatever reason a specialised institution that taxes the peasantry that happen to live in an abstract area that they rule over.  They have to tax the peasants because the institution does not itself produce surplus value, which means the total value of what it consumes exceeds the total value of what it produces.  The peasants by contrast produce surplus values, which means the value of what they produce is greater than what they consume. 

Dwarf society is supposed to be ruled by underground fortresses.  However the non-problem is that the fortress unlike the historical palace produces surplus value, it has to because otherwise it would not be able to CREATE the other fortress and the hillocks/mountain halls that carry out the peasant function of growing stuff.  Hence Feudalism does not come to exist and dwarf society is something else altogether that has never actually existed in reality.  You cannot understate the sheer importance of the fact that the government institution is self-sufficiant and does not need to collect taxes from any outside entity at all.

If you need to collect taxes you need to make sure that our taxpayers are too scattered and disorganised to resist being taxed.  Or to put things more positively, we need to make government a 'marketable commodity' by making sure there is a 'government famine'  .  You want to break whatever semblence of organised community exists down as much as possible among the peasants and reduce their ability to rebel/raise the market value of the goverment commodity.  To a dwarf fortress however the more united, communal and organised it's hillocks are the stronger the fortress is, as since there is no conflict between the two sites their power combines to form a larger whole.

Why do you keep talking from a dwarven context? We are talking about the HUMAN feudal societies which are the societies the player will interact with the most in adventure mode.
Sure it will be treated differently in dwarven fortresses, but we are talking from the context of the HUMAN societies in dwarf fortress. You realize the scope of this game/simulation right? It isnt just dwarves, and its entirely possible for the dwarves and humans to have different social structures, hell they already do.

Humans do not behave like historical humans either.  Not only do the dwarves not presently behave like historical medieval people, neither do the humans (or anybody else for that matter).  The only real difference is that with humans (as with elves) the hamlets/forest retreats come first and then their trade generates a town/major forest retreat while the dwarves/goblins produce a fortress which then makes hillocks/dark pits/mountain halls around itself.  The crucial element however is that the capital always produces surplus value, not which particular type of site came first. 

Oh, you stalinists and your gulags. Let's crush those disgusting capitalists, right?

Would people who worked hard to save food simply accept the player's decision that they need to be sacrificed because he's decided that "these other specific dwarves deserve to live more than you do". Why? Are they the borg? Depending on their personalities, they would likely rebel

Let's say a craftsdwarf worked very hard on his profession. He's made many items on his own, and decided to sell them on the side in the market/fairs to several people or travelling merchants. He's aquired a lot of extra money/goods in the process. With his individual resources, he's decided to buy a few dozen barrels of wine over the years and stockpiled them in his cellar. Some of these wine barrels came from foregn merchants, even. From your perspective, the government should crack up his house and get those barrels away from him. Also, they should punish him for making illegal commercial transactions in the first place, the filthy hoarder. I see this as authoritarian and psychotic. You, on the other hand, seem to percieve this is justice.

Under the present economic order the craftdwarf has just sold surplus fortress items to the outsiders and then bought the fortress several barrels of wine.  If he suffers from the illusion that somehow the items he sold did not belong to the fortress and the barrels of wine belong to him personally then nobody cares.  The other dwarves will help themselves to the wine he bought without any real concern as to where it came from.  He cannot wish the items to belong to him any more than King Canute could change the tides; if he personally tries to rebel he will simply be crushed underfoot by the fortress guard. 

The government might punish him but not because he thinks the barrels he bought with fortress crafts are his (that is just crazy); they would instead punish him because he did things that he was no authorised to do.  The Fortress Broker will at least have words with him for trading things without authorisation because the fortress has placed him in charge of the matter of trading fortress things with outsiders.  Basically he does not get punished for private property, he gets punished for not doing what he is told.  As I raised with Jester Hell earlier, there are four fundermental economic concerns that are clearly there in the present economic order has (but are clearly being solved off camera) and it is around these concerns that the economy arc should be developed I think.  They are.

1. Getting beings to work at all. 
2. Getting beings to work together.
3. Stopping powerful beings from hoarding stuff.
4. Stopping outsiders from walking out with more value than they contribute.

Your biscuit hoarder would potentially bean example of No 3. problem.  If he is nobody important then he can simply be hunted down and his biscuit horde reclaimed, but what if he *is* the Captain of the Guard?  What if he is giving out hoarded biscuits to all the members of the fortress guard? 

You craftstmen however is really an example of No 2. problem.  He certainly works hard for the fortress but his labours are not coordinated with the other members of the fortress, he is going around selling some fortress goods and buying others without anybody telling him too.  The next dwarf then comes along and sells the wine in order to buy the fortress glass armour stands which the next dwarf trades in for cheese and so it goes on.  They are all working hard, it is just that without any coordination their work is actually destructive. 

[Ribs]

Under the present economic order the craftdwarf has just sold surplus fortress items to the outsiders and then bought the fortress several barrels of wine.  If he suffers from the illusion that somehow the items he sold did not belong to the fortress and the barrels of wine belong to him personally then nobody cares.  The other dwarves will help themselves to the wine he bought without any real concern as to where it came from.  He cannot wish the items to belong to him any more than King Canute could change the tides; if he personally tries to rebel he will simply be crushed underfoot by the fortress guard. 

The government might punish him but not because he thinks the barrels he bought with fortress crafts are his (that is just crazy); they would instead punish him because he did things that he was no authorised to do.  The Fortress Broker will at least have words with him for trading things without authorisation because the fortress has placed him in charge of the matter of trading fortress things with outsiders.  Basically he does not get punished for private property, he gets punished for not doing what he is told.

Why are you mentioning the "present economic order"? Aren't we arguing about a hypothetical future where private property may exist in dwarf mode?

Your big question was  "Why would a dwarf fortress invent private property?  That is not a rhetorical question Ribs but one that I want answered."

My answer to the question above is that is not entirely up to you, and that dwarves may wish to privetely own things whether you like them to do it or not, and it may be even something that is ingrained in dwarven culture if Toady says so.

Let me expand on the scenario even more, and make it more complicated for you. Let's say the dwarf in question was a carpenter. In this scenario, dwarven law is slightly less communist and permits merchants to trade with individuals in a desigated marketplace. Individuals can also use their wages to buy things from outsiders, if said outsiders are willing to accept local dwarven currency.

So our carpenter uses his savings to aquire wood from the outsiders. In his spare time, he's decided to make a few wooden furniture on his own with the wood he brought. He decided to sell the furniture he's produced in the market, and with the money he brought a casket of wine. Is the wine his?

Also, is this a bad way of handling idle dwarves? You asked why would you want to allow dwarves to have private property. Well, here's a scenario where a dwarf used his idle time to do something productive and bring wealth to himself without your help.