It is exactly the pre-capitalist norm.

Is Wal-Mart drawing its workers from pre-capitalist societies?

My impression is that in medieval and ancient Europe, the bulk of the population were serfs or slaves with very limited legal rights -- the opposite of independence. They also had well defined land holdings -- they did not "live independently off the commons".

I have the impression that there are hunter-gathering or herding societies where the population "lived independently off the commons" -- but are there examples of societies with farming and cities where this was a routine or comfortable way of life?

To find a society "before and outside" capitalism in the relevant sense, requires going very far back in the history of our civilization. Are there examples from other parts of the world that you have in mind?

Well, "outside" of capitalism was pretty thoroughly explored in the 20th century and while they produced some really splendid music the 200 million dead by the hands of their own governments was admittedly a bit of a bummer. But maybe "before" has a better answer?

Well, capitalism's immediate predecessor, mercantilism, was a pretty sweet setup all told (although I doubt it would seem particularly appetizing to you). Divine right of Kings and the virtues of a natural aristocracy is admittedly a tough sell, but the results were pretty phenomenal; each of the great golden ages of the European empires, one after another, for centuries. But still, going a bit further back couldn't hurt.

Well now we're in pre-Renaissance times, pretty good for our third bullet point, but the results aren't so encouraging. Manorialism was a pretty inefficient system even in it's own time; it's probably for the best that the serfs were emancipated and all those usury laws got repealed, that would really put a damper on a post-industrial society. Still you can't argue that all those Castles and Gothic Cathedrals weren't a blast, and you could still find some un-enclosed Commons to farm if you wanted them. Put that one in the "maybe" column then.

Before that we're into the Classical era and they didn't even have a proper economic system, not to mention the way slavery choked off incentives for developing labor-saving technology. And the way masters choked off the slaves, er, literally... maybe best to just slide past that one too.

Maybe go all the way back to the Bronze Age; they must have had to have had something really interesting if they were cool enough to convince aliens to help build all those monuments. Well there was a lot of collective farming, that sounds right up your alley, although the whole Pharaoh thing seems like a bit of a drag. At least you get lots of nice pyramids and ziggurats, that's pretty bad-ass.

Well what about if we go Full Environmentalist; leave the neolithic behind and embrace the hunter gatherer! There's certainly something to be said about it nutritionally, that's to be sure, and there does seem to be a bit of truth to the idea that it builds a man's heroic character. Still, that doesn't seem likely to scale well for 10 billion people and there's that whole "no internet or penicillin" thing to consider too. I'm still a bit attached to looking at cat pictures and not dying of diarrhea, makes it hard to get into the back-to-the-earth spirit.

So I guess you were right; a little look at history really does put "the iniquities of capitalism" into perspective. Thanks!