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Well, the elves were more reclusive, and most of them knew each other, having had ample time to meet before. So they didn't really need surnames. It is interesting that the elves, who along with men placed the most emphasis on descendants and ancestry, did NOT use a patronymic (?) or, "son of", while men DID. I think the hobbits having surnames may have been a device of Tolkien's introduced when he was writing 'The Hobbit', to be familiar to children/give the story an English feel. But the elves could most definitely NOT feel English, and the men had to feel... pre-English (hence the patronymics). So you could say that the hobbits correspond to the latest time frame of our world, but the circumstances in Middle-earth are different, and this does not necessarily indicate advancement. Remember, the later the age, the greater the technology, and Tolkien seemed to dislike industrialization (yes,t hat's stretching it a bit). Also, it may be because there were so many hobbits, and they had similar first names, so calling a hobbit (first name) son/daughter of (first name) would have been confusing.
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