Property rights, explained
I'll try to explain what are property rights, why were they created, why they aren't evil and what benefits and shortcomings of having these may exist.
The (possible) origin of property rights
Every individual wants something. Food, shelter, medicine, entertainment, luxury or whatever it may be, it doesn't matter. What matters is that those things aren't infinitely available and aren't omnipresent. In other words, stuff doesn't exist just everywhere and sometimes you need to actually do something to obtain it.
Let's say, you want a hamburger. In a modern society you can just buy it somewhere unless you live in an incredibly oppressive or -broke ass shithole where hamburgers aren't a thing. But if you're in fucking nature and you want a hamburger, you better start growing wheat, hunting for meat, and learning how to start a fire and cook because there aren't any hamburgers outside. Not because greedy corporations and oppressive capitalist states are taking all the hamburgers from nature so you, a hiker, won't be able to eat one while visiting nature, but because there never were any hamburgers. They just don't appear in nature.
And this is with many, many things you might want. No matter how much you'll say that these are a "basic human right", they still need to be manufactured. Take bread as an example. Someone needs to grow wheat, gather eggs, and optionally produce sugar, salt, and possibly other ingredients; then, someone needs to mix these in right proportions, and then put them into an oven (Which also must be produced, as well as fuel/energy for it so it'll operate) and bake for a certain amount of time. Secondary concerns, such as quality control, are not to be slighted, too.
Sounds like a hassle already, doesn't it? And this is to produce a commodity that's considered "basic" by many. It might be "basic", but if no one produces it, then it won't be here.
I'll leave the exact mechanisms which allow a swift and robust production of labor-intensive commodities for another article. Here, I'll point out this: most known individuals will never, ever do anything that contradicts their own interests. That means - if they aren't interested in baking bread (Or providing anything else), they won't do it.
And of course, if someone performed any constructive activity (read: worked) to produce something they need, they will want to preserve it for as long as possible because producing another entity costs a lot. If you've already acquired something, be it bread, car, electricity, high-end computers, or basically anything, you will mostly likely want to keep it to yourself for as long as possible. Just because making another unit is damn costly and so is obtaining it, by extension.
That desire to preserve own stuff is highly likely the origin of property rights. That, and absence of any willingness to constantly fight off marauders who always want to seize your stuff.
At some point in human history, humans have learned to negotiate. That means, instead of grabbing the biggest sword/stick and bashing people with it and hoping that there isn't anyone stronger or smarter than you who can bash you instead, they've decided to talk to each other. Like, let's make some agreements, such as "I seize some stuff no-one seized before, and that stuff would be considered mine. If some asshole tries to take it away, we go bash those stealin' assholes with the same sticks, but otherwise we don't touch each other and their stuff, okay?"
It appears that many persons actually liked it this way. Really, instead of fightin' each other through your course of life just to ensure your neighbor (or even an outsider) won't take away your stuff that is costly to obtain, you can live in relative safety because everyone around you agreed to not attack each other unless provoked by aggressive acts and you can keep your stuff for very, very long because you've agreed to not plunder each other too.
Congratulations, you've just got basic property rights!
Private property vs. collective ownership: why capitalism always wins
The "let's agree to not touch each other's property" approach was good, but not flawless.
The very first problem is that individuals have merely agreed to leave each other's stuff to their proprietors, but they haven't lost any interest in that stuff. Say, your neighbor got himself a nice car and you really want it to yourself, but you've agreed to not touch your neighbor's stuff. You didn't agree to never want that car and never try to get it and actually, such an agreement would likely never pass. Because not taking it away is one thing, and hurting own interests severely by refusing to pursue the goal of obtaining that car just so there won't be anyone wanting to get it is another thing.
The solution to the problem which involves both you having that car and neighbor not being robbed is rather simple: get your own car. Make it, buy it, summon it from Hell - doesn't matter, long as you aren't hurting any proprietor or their property.
The solution is simple and it respects the property agreements, but it is still more expensive than stealing. That is the root reason for existence of anti-propertarian ideologies, or at least movements which want to undermine private ownership somehow.
The goal of these movements is to have that damn car and not be punished for seizing it. Or "how can I make it so that I can take others' stuff but then no one will do anything to me."
This way they could theoretically both have whatever stuff they could seize, never work for it (unless stealing is working too), and never suffer from retribution by rightful owners. Now that's an idea, isn't it? But the very first problem they encounter is that they have to convince the others that this is fine, and that no one breaks any agreements (or that the previous agreements suck so they would make new ones). Yes, the problem is "how to convince others that me stealing stuff is fine, while others stealing stuff from me is not".
The modern attempt to solve this issue is collective ownership, or the idea that there is something called the Collective and that it somehow has the rights to own what you, the individual, have made. By convincing others that the Collective isn't just a figment of imagination, and that it actually has rights, the people who decided that this idea is good - the collectivists - are attempting to overthrow the principle of private ownership, or at least tailor it so it'll benefit them more than the others.
That is one argument against collective ownership: it is a fraud. Collective doesn't exist, it doesn't have any rights and it doesn't own anything and neither it produces anything. And since it doesn't exist, there is no reason to give it property rights, either.
There's another argument. Let's assume that some of those collectivist ideas isn't actually created by a bunch of greedy fucks who just look for ways to take others' stuff. Assume that some of them are an actual attempt to help everyone in this society, so we can both have our stuff and never work for it. That's a great-sounding idea! After all, individuals are looking to reduce the amount of work while increasing the amount of useful return through their entire existence.
So we've imagined that some of those ideas aren't created by greedy fucks who don't want to honor the original agreements because that'd be expensive, but actually are created by some really progressive dudes with no evil intent such as fucking someone over for own benefit. And they, for some reason, chose collectivism as the way to achieve their goals. So these ideas aren't a fraud, then.
Doesn't mean they aren't faulty.
Let's assume a collectivist society that did transfer some of its assets into "common ownership". Which means, one way or another, the previous owners of those assets either surrendered them voluntarily or were forced to.
The previous owners can still use those assets, indeed, but so can the others. No more need for property-related conflicts and everyone's happy long as they aren't greedy evil fucks who just want others to suffer? Not so fuckin' fast, buddy.
Remember that those assets are finite and costly? So let's assume, we have X units of Asset and there are Y potential users of it. If Y = 1 which means, exactly one dude uses this asset ever, then the dude gets to use all X of them for own needs. But if we add more users, then it turns out that the dude can no longer use X Assets, but instead it'll be X - sum(y(x')) or everything that isn't used by the others.
Now, the more Assets you have, the more awesome your situation is, because the more Assets, the better. The more Assets you have, the more effectively you can satisfy own interests; which means, the more Assets you have, the more awesome they are. If you have only X/2 assets, that means your Assets are about half as awesome, and it also means that now it sucks to be you twice as much as it was before. For those commies who freeload on your assets, it is an improvement - but not for you.
Suppose you have a car. Long as you own it, you're the only user of it - meaning, this car is for you and no one else. You might use it only once in every so often or maybe not use it at all, but in any case it's ready to be utilized by you in its pristine awesome condition whenever you desire it. Awesome!
But suppose there is some sort of an incident and suddenly you find yourself in your communist utopia of choice. And your car was collectivized, too. You might think that, if you don't use it all day, it isn't a big deal if someone else uses it - but while someone else uses it, you can't. And you might just need it at the very moment when someone else rides it. Sucks to be you.
That's what it is, to "have half of a car": you can use it, but so can anyone else. And there is no guarantee that you'll still be able to use it whenever you need to. Even if you manage to negotiate the time-frame of car usage, it means that you'll have to alter your activities' schedule and restrain -your freedom of choice so to satisfy others' interests as well - something you never have to do if you own that damn car.
And in real life, things are even more complicated because there are even more actual relevant factors which have an impact on your well-being. In this car example, there are also things like deterioration of that car due to excessive usage; potential modifications to its interior, performed by other users; potential presence of empty beer bottles, unsavory-looking stains on the seats, cigarette ash, empty bags of Doritos, puke, shit, piss, awful smell and other unpleasantries left by other users; potential damage to any parts of the car thanks to carelessness of other users; missing components in the car thanks to someone using it as a source of spare parts; some components replaced with less functional/less desired basically for the same reason; not last and not the least, eventual untimely destruction the car by some careless driver.
None of this can happen if you own the car, and no one else does. And if it does, then it's thanks to no one but you - or maybe that thief who may later be approached for compensation of harm caused to the property.
And here we come to the most important question. Why in the world should any individual waste their time and resources on that car if they don't get to own it?! In other words, there's no guarantee that the car will there, in first place - and if it will be, then it'll be more expensive (meaning: you'll have even less allowed time to use it) because:
there will be less of them made, not many will want to do some maintenance to keep it in reasonable shape, and the amount of people wanting to use the car will be even greater.
In the end, the idea to collectivize some assets wasn't a fraud. But it is a total failure thanks to immutability of one's personal interests - and to simple math and plentiful factors which influence your car's quality and compatibility with your needs. The collectivist society becomes a poor, miserable place where no one wants to live 'cause it oppresses everyone by stifling their ability to achieve own goals.
Problems which can/do appear in a society which respects property rights, and a few ways to solve them
With all that said, property rights aren't some magical panacea which gets rid of every problem that exists in the society - they're invented to solve exactly one problem: asset loss due to sapient marauders and scavengers who don't distinguish between your homee and free-for-all territory. They are not intended to solve problems like world hunger, poverty, unemployment, lack of free stuff, lack of services some tender socialists perceive as "essential" and basically anything that isn't tied to someone trying to seize your stuff.
The first problem which, honestly, is quite hard to foresee is humans taking their wealth and well-being provided to them through civilization as granted. For many known humans, the ability to buy stuff (essential and not) from the store, have a doctor within several kilometers from their home, have complex machinery affordable for an ordinary worker or even an unemployed dude, have a neat home where it's warm even during a harsh winter, be able to travel from one continent to another within a day or so, and be able to post their rants about America oppressing the world with their capitalism on an American social media website while sitting somewhere in Beijing or Tomsk - as well as many other things created through clever cooperation of individuals in a civilization - are taken as something that is always there. Kind of like air or sunlight.
So they, oblivious to the fact that civilization is not a natural phenomenon that is just there no matter what, invent some ideologies which could, according to their private vision, get rid of some problems which currently exist in that society but they shouldn't (according to their private vision), without any thoughts on how do they manage to be able to post their ultra-novel ideas on a social media network for free while eating carefully prepared Pringles and sitting in a warm, sturdy home hey didn't build. So they propose things such as robbing the rich to provide to the poor, or limiting one's economic freedom, or regulating every transaction they would like to - without even a slightest concern about being able to purchase their Pringles if they do push their ideology in local power, or having enough electricity and fuel to not to freeze in their "temperate" climate where winters are cold AF, or even having their homes.
As I've already said, they think these things are kinda like air. So if they do push their self-proclaimed super-duper-dirty-pooper ideology which is intended to make everyone happy, they will keep eating their Pringles while playing some Counter-Strike rip-off with dude from other countries on their ultra-powerful gaming PCs. Because, where are they going to go, they're like the air. And when they do lose their damn Pringles, they still believe it's the damn corrupt traitors who just can't fall in line and do as the self-proclaimed supreme leader says.
So they try more authority and restraints. That puts the country in even deeper sh!t. Eventually their ideology is either being cancelled by some power-monger who is a bit smarter than the author of the Infallible Super-Ideology, or it destroys the country entirely.
The second problem is that humans tend t think that having an insight or a smart-looking idea is enough t rush into immediate transformation of the whole society, without revising their attitude at least several times.
It's all good and fine if those not understanding how and why does your society have huge problems but eager to try their shallow-minded ideologies which are supposed (according to own personal opinion) to fix all the problems while hurting no one, will gather a bunch of the likes of them and build a separate utopia where they and -their buddies will live according to -their beliefs. Go ahead! Create your collectivist utopia outside of our society!
So if some bunch of chucklefucks manages to promote their BS ideology to the point where they gather a sizeable portion of a population to support their ideology, they won't screw up the entire civilization with their bullshit which is based on a very narrow perception of society and a fanatical refusal to learn new information.
Nowadays everyone can at least try to be a great philosopher or something or at least offer a good idea which could potentially save the society from a lot of trouble or even uplift it, but once again, if you don't want to re-view your thoughts once a new objective fact appears between your idea and the ultimate utopia based on it, then it is certain that it's better to leave your ideas to yourself and those truly willing to test them. The first airplane didn't last too long in the air and the first cars were slower than a human's legs, but instead of forcing these things on the entire society, they were thoroughly reviewed. Failures and ideas that were either innately bad or grossly inefficient were thoroughly searched for and removed, and the entire concept was improved gradually - as a result, human-made airplanes and cars are really useful now.
Simple solutions like "ban this" or "get rid or them" are attractive because they're simple. But attractiveness isn't necessarily a factor of efficiency, especially compared to other ideas.
Third factor is that way too many humans are willing to surrender their liberties and possibilities in exchange for guaranteed food, shelter and care.
Property rights are a little bit complicated for many, very many known humans - and their interests are somewhere around being fed, sheltered, and cared for. So if there is a promise of guaranteed food, housing, medicine and employment, those humans just don't see any need in those property rights - that's why the WEF openly tells them they'll own nothing and be happy.
When the civilization was way too weak to give those things to the needy, there wasn't an option to surrender your property rights in exchange for food an home because there simply wasn't enough. At some point, however, it became actually possible to provide these things; arguably, this is how slavery started as a thing. In exchange for bread and some shelter, people were more than happy to work for someone perpetually, long as that someone was providing them basic necessities.
Over time, as civilizations became stronger and stronger, slavery went through several modifications, to allow more stuff for the slaves who weren't very happy with their limited options - and the societies became more stable as a result. When slaves' lives were hard and way too frugal, uprisings were commonplace - but as civilizations grew more capable of satisfying slaves' needs, there was less and less resistance. Civilizations grew stronger, slaves got more permissions from their Masters - which reduced their will to break free over time, because once again, freedom isn't very important for most of them.
And there goes the problem: property rights are really needed only for those individuals who prefer freedom to substinence. Persons who think that "someone's going to trample my personal autonomy and sovereignty" is much scarier than "you're going to be homeless, hungry, and/or sick and the only one who can pull you out of this is you" are the only ones known to have a stable desire for property rights. The rest will be happy long as they have sufficent food, shelter, care and entertainment - and a strong enough civilization is able to provide just that.
These three problems are why support towards individualism, personal responsibility, private ownership and personal autonomy and sovereignty is on the decline now among the mainstream society.
The future of property rights?
With all that said, the need for securing own assets against unwanted users isn't going away. So it is safe to assume that property rights, in one form or another, for one group or the whole population, will continue to exist.
It is, however, possible that in many countries, property rights might become more of a privilege rather than a right; there are entities interested in taking away majority's property rights to free up resources (especially land) and there are humans willing to surrender their property rights in exchange for guaranteed care.
Come to think about it, biologically the humans that were voluntarily enslaved in exchange for food, protection and shelter, are not very different from the humans living now.
Countries which have strong freedom cultures (for example: the United States of America and Switzerland) are less likely to surrender those rights on a large scale; it is expected that a t least 50% of the population will defend their property rights - and this number is being increased due to faulty anti-propertarian propaganda riling people against a propertyless society. Nevertheless, some sort of signing off one's property rights in exchange for guaranteed care may exist, not as a political agenda but instead as some sort of corporate service.
Persons defending their property rights will retain them; these persons are few, but their determination is high enough to protect their property against whoever. The elites, unless they're suddenly stupid and unable to understand the reality, will likely leave these persons alone - long as these persons push for their sovereignty hard enough.
All in all, property rights were always for the freedom-loving persons; those who always seek more, gain more, and aren't willing to part with it at all.
Eventually, this will likely lead to separation between the two layers of society - those who'd like a guaranteed care, and those who'd like freedom and personal prosperity. Alternatively, property rights won't be abolished or "privilegized", but the emergence of special services which provide guaranteed free stuff in exchange for transferring all of clients' assets to the corporation that provides the service will de-facto lead to a multi-layered society.
Those who own nothing and are happy, and those who own many things and are still unhappy - but at least they're sovereign and free.
Conclusion
Property rights exist to satisfy one's critical needs: preservation of own assets.
There are, of course, those who want to get rid of them for the "ordinary" humans, because they'd like to use their resources for themselves - or have a privilege to seize anything from nearly and almost anyone when necessary.
However, those rights only make sense for those who do have the interest to preserve own stuff from being accessed by others. Earlier, when social cohesion within a society was rather weak and civilizations were not very advanced, property rights were necessary simply so the Others would not steal your necessities such as food or home. Nowadays, however, property rights are mostly demanded by individuals with high interest in personal autonomy, sovereignty, and maximum independence from anyone but own self. Food and medicine are cheap enough now to be replenished when necessary in many cases even when they're lost to an accident or something - so if one has no interest beyond being fed, comforted and having pills when necessary, that one is more likely to have no need for property rights rather than respect or demand them.
Both collectivists (such as socialists and communists) and propertarians (libertarians and such) are missing one fact: there are different persons and they all have entirely different needs. But each side believes that the other side is terribly wrong and that if they could only win, everyone would be happy. Those who not... well, they're just assholes, so why care about them.
But to achieve real progress, one needs to understand that only by satisfying both sides, we can finally move on. This can be done this way: property rights are to be preserved, but propertyless alternatives to be created (and heavily advertised if necessary) so those who never needed to own stuff for reasons other than staying alive 'till tomorrow would finally choose their own utopia and be happy.
You can't have a world of propertarians and you can't have a world of slaves because there will always be some resistance from either side. Knowing why do property rights exist in the first place, further decisions regarding what to do might be adequately reviewed and locally applied where they are needed.