What would life be like in the system as proposed, is a reasonable question which can be computed by anyone on their own. There are certain constraints (example: thieving is illegal, and owning a large proportion of all land factories and money in the Nation will also not be possible), and there are certain freedoms. Life could generally not be about what is not allowed, and whether or not someone takes advantage of the given freedoms is up to them, as well as how to do that exactly. It is difficult to describe what “life would be like” because it can be about so many things, and many of those things exist in all other societies, perhaps even in the same way.
It is perhaps best to think of it as a shift in a number of things, which change the character of that society, like herbs might change the taste of some dish. The most likely changes are: creativity of individuals in terms of their work and livelihood will be greater, if not much greater. Everyone will have their share of land, and that is an invitation to be creative and productive on your own or with whom you like. At the same time, you can still join a business as an employee, there would still be a public sector, some businesses could still become quite large and they could still have a boss oriented command structure. There is a certain character shift toward free people however, smaller businesses, people who are working and free without debt. The point of power in the economy drops from up high with the few with all the money and power (in most late stage economies who have destabilizing systems), to all the way down to the individual, with also a certain weight of power taken by successful businesses – none of which will be allowed to grow to monstrous sizes, and all of which will sooner or later be worker owned which puts the power back down in the population again. The point of power shifts down and outward to all people. That is of course how it should be in any economy that can be taken serious as an economic system, as a market system. This condition should never change, land, business power and money never should accumulate in the hands of the few.
There is also a character shift in the State, in the same way. The point of power shifts down to the individual and the population, away from the few with all the money. This is caused by the direct Council model, which also can alter personal lives a little because people who want to participate in the election and Council system, will be able to do that easier and with more influence than they can in most other known systems of elections. That means that people who want to be engaged could for example have a meeting every month or half year or whatever they want. This could be a meeting with 10 people, sometimes 50, likely about things concerning the local area and general governing issues that affect all such as roads, etc.
There should be no poverty, and what poverty exists is less deep and more easily resolved because people always have their share of land. Relative poverty that exists is more likely the result of a poor work ethic or competence, rather than lack of opportunity. Homelessness should also be reduced a lot, because it seems rather unfriendly to deny people even a makeshift non-intrusive shelter on their very own inalienable land, if they somehow are lost otherwise. On the other hand, there should also be no extreme wealth. There should not be a privileged class of the super rich. However that does not mean there can be quite a difference between the wealth of one or another person, depending on how much and how well they work, and their success in the market, and other factors. One could still be a rich person, by the norms of what we call to day a rich person. At some point there is a limit on it, that is all.
Although it is a mistake to think that we should all be farmers again, it is likely to see more small farms, even if for no other reason than that people who have fallen into lasting unemployment will be challenged to do something productive, and if all else fails in the market one can always still try to grow food from hand to mouth as a last resort on the one hand, and as a way to get back in the market that way. Growing food hand to mouth is a great way to get back in the market, by the way, because it is a versatile activity, brings contacts with other people, and there is a tremendous amount of things that people use and need which is grown from plants and the subsequent processing of such grow produce, materials, etc.
If there are thieves, the police and Justice will still be hunting them as usual. If people like to learn how to make music, there will be music teachers doing it for them. If people like to travel around by train or bus, those systems will be there. If people want sewer and water distribution systems, those systems will be build and maintained as usual. The difference would be that the police man and Judge will have their share of soil and if they want a seat in the voter group they want to be a part off, and they will be living in an economy and State where the point of power has shifted down all the way to the population itself. This shift in power brings out the effect that the market should be a meritocracy (which it is not as much the case in the Capitalist system, because there are too many problems with it; those with merit get outflanked with those who play illegal games or are psychos playing with old and huge amounts of money, and due to the chronic lack of opportunity in the Capitalist system due to lack of free natural resources.)
The music teacher might have turned half of his free land into a lovely garden to play music to a tea drinking audience. That is possible at virtually zero cost in this system. The police agent might have decided to live in a city and not see a use for land, so he could have rented it out and earns a little extra from that. Perhaps the police agent is rather active the Council system, since he already has relations with the State and laws and such things, and is elected to sit in a local Council. The bus driver might have fixing cars as a hobby, and has for example build a repair shed on his land, and earns some money by fixing cars in the area. All these people could live in houses like we know them today. It seems likely that the houses will be a bit more free standing, with less low grade housing, but if people like huge high rises, that could be build of course. Since power is more spread out toward the population, wealth will follow that generally, and so there will likely be an improvement to what is the low end of housing, there could even be more houses of people who are rich, and there will be no houses for people who are over the top rich (which is where the power will be cut).
Since power drops down in society to the population, it seems to me that the character of society will change to be more diverse, creative and lively on the personal and small group level. At the same time there should be less of these dramatic and overwhelming National or International problems, so much of which is caused by an unstable Capitalist economic system. The economy in general is probably not going to be in the news, because it is just doing its thing. A big panic of a catastrophic stock market crash will not be there, because the business are smaller, because State debt is outlawed, because the stock market is outlawed, debt trade is outlawed, and being super rich is outlawed, and other measures to relief debt slavery. It is the same in the State. It is not so much anymore about these powerful things called ‘parties,’ it should be more about individual issues or individual persons. It may also be more about civil conduct by these voter groups and Councils, which will be the big test of that population. Just because everyone has so much more power, does not mean people will use it wisely.
It ends up being what people make it to be, there is no way around that with any system. This system proposed on market.socialism.nl should track more closely than most if not all other systems to what the population is doing and wants, and it should balance itself quicker if things go out of whack. That is the whole challenge and opportunity with this system: it is more about what people make of it, both collectively and individually. It is therefore a system that is a best fit for: a people who enjoy being creative and productive, who are civil, easy going with each other, not shy to pay when it is time to pay something, who look at problems as a challenge to be solved rather than a stick to hit others over the head, who think that enough wealth is enough, who like to see other people do well and who want to help people get up rather than push them further into the mud. The system is not well suited for ill behaved people, or people who want to dominate others, because such people create dictatorships and slavery for themselves, which is exactly not what this system is about.
More than anything, I think the breaking or making point of this system is in the Councils, the voter groups. If people are too badly behaved, it becomes necessary to revert to Parliament or worse. This implies a return of potential corruption and criminal rule, and once that has happened it will probably not be long until the Parliament starts messing with the laws to cater to the rich and themselves. Although that is also possible by the Councils (naturally), there is more control over politicians in the Council system to make sure it does not happen, or is repaired if it has. It is therefore essential that the population who wants to make a lasting success out of freedom and democracy (the real versions thereof that is), need above all else to be a truth loving, soft spoken people, who care about each other, care about what is good sense and to overall live in a state of balance with nature, with other Nations, with each other. They must have a big ear to hear, they must want to understand each other. Perhaps that is the single most important thing: to listen and understand. A people who can listen, understand and care, may want to consider trying the system proposed on this website.
Then there is the future of a people who manage this system. These people will grow in terms of their creativity, their self confidence will grow along with that, and hopefully they will enjoy good and increasingly better relations to each other (if they behave morally, which is of course a must). I think history has already shown what will happen to a people who manage to put the power in society lower in the population than others who have it more concentrated. The populations with more power spreading will quickly be the better of the others in everything, even in war. The other Nations on Earth will fall behind further and further in terms of the competence, wisdom and skill of this population, because the free and good people just learn faster and do more by their own wits, and once they are doing more and learning faster, they will then only learn even faster at an ever increasing speed. it accelerates faster, the gap keeps widening, and that means the other Nations will more and more look with amazement at this creative and free people.
Herein lies a risk, because Nations that did manage to be better than others in this respect (such as Rome when it became a Republic, while the others remained Monarchies), or the Netherlands which did precisely the same, can start to use their greater power to build an Empire. If that happens, it failed and will likely fail in the long term. They have broken the balance, broken the principle underlying it, and eventually they will possibly ruin their own Nation and fall into tyranny and criminal Government, just like Rome. That will perhaps be the greatest long term test: to exercise self constraint for the sake of others at the point of knowing you have the power to do almost whatever you want. To succeed at that will perhaps be the final test of that population. If they manage it … may they live forever.
The other Nations may see all that, and decide for themselves: we want this too, we want to live in peace, we don’t want poverty and criminal Government anymore. They can do it, we can do it too. This has happened before, even thousands of years later there was again an attempt to have a Republic and a less criminal and exploiting system. This struggle is constantly going on. If another Nation also wants to engage in a system like this, and starts to succeed, hopefully eventually the whole world will live a good life. All kinds of interesting things can happen, on the way there and when we get there.