Thread: New, simplified geoist-style tax code..

Originally Posted by General Fear

Replacing all taxes with one national land tax has many advantages. Especially if there is a high tax on capital gains that is linked to land sale.

< crude example alert >
Today, if someone buys a piece of land and just sits on it, then they can sell it at a higher price later. That person has made money and has contributed nothing.

Land value taxes would nearly eliminate capital gains on land sales. As the earning potential of a particular land parcel increases, the tax also increases, which means that the land will not gain exchange value in the market.

You might find this informative: http://chestofbooks.com/finance/econ...ess-Taxes.html

Let's tax those that grow lawns. Dandelions are 100 % edible (flower, root and leaf), essentially non-toxic and extraordinarily robust due to the seed dispersal system and root structure. Why should anyone grow Kentucky bluegrass for display when that land is available for harvesting? I could collect a lot of taxes from Beverly Hills, CA residents and redistribute that wealth as part of my beer fund.

Originally Posted by dudeman

Many landowners inherit land and a tax imposed upon that land above and beyond the outrageous "property taxes" (i.e. education unions primarily) would be a burden to those that have land and grow food. Why not tax wealth and income?

Private ownership of land caused the Irish Potato Famine. The Irish farmers couldn’t keep what they produced. Read and learn:

...The truth is obvious. Ireland has never had a population it could not have maintained in ample comfort, given the natural state of the country and the current state of technological development. It is true, a large proportion has barely existed, clothed in rags, with only potatoes for food. When the potato blight came, they died by the thousands.

Did so many live in misery because of the inability of the soil to support them? Is this why they starved on the failure of a single crop?

On the contrary, it was the same remorseless greed that robbed the Indian ryot of the fruits of his labor and left him to starve where nature offered plenty. No merciless banditti plundered the land extorting taxes, as in Asia. But the laborer was stripped just as effectively by a merciless horde of landlords. The soil had been divided among them as their absolute possession, regardless of the rights of those who lived upon it. Most farmers dared not make improvements, even if the exorbitant rents left anything over. For to do so would only have led to a further increase in rent. So labor was inefficient and wasteful. It was applied aimlessly, whereas had there been any security for its fruits, it would have been applied continually.

Even under these conditions, it is a matter of fact that Ireland did support eight million plus. For when her population was at its highest, Ireland was still a food exporting country. Even during the famine, grain, meat, butter, and cheese destined for export were carted past trenches piled with the dead. So far as the people of Ireland were concerned, this food might as well have been burned or never even produced. It went not as an exchange, but as a tribute. The rent of absentee landlords was wrung from the producers by those who in no way contributed to production.

What if this food had been left to those who raised it? What if they were able to keep and use the capital produced by their labor? What if security had stimulated industry and more economical production? There would have been enough to support the largest population Ireland ever had, and in bounteous comfort. The potato blight might have come and gone without depriving even a single human being of a full meal...
http://www.henrygeorge.org/pchp7.htm

Land value taxation would have helped the Irish farm producers keep more of what they produced ... that is a fact.

dudeman. You're not making any sense.
We aren't talking about a tax on plants here, but on the land itself.
Though it could be said that certain plants might add value to a piece of land, some might even be said to take value away.
Either way, what exactly is the issue that you have with land taxation, especially if it replaces another type of taxation?
Is it that it will somehow cause people not to farm as much?
Or is it that individuals who own only small insignificant plots of land will be taxed?

-Meta

Keep in mind, I don't own any large acreage of land. However, how will this tax be applied? Is it based upon topsoil content, area (i.e. length squared)? What about land in the desert that can not support crops? What about hilly land that isn't as effective at supporting crops? What is the basis of the tax? To punish those that do not use their land? From a capitalist perspective, it is their land - they can do what they want with it. If a group of thieves want to steal assets to redistribute, there are plenty of other targets (i.e. Beverly Hills millionaires) to try to steal from. Why not try stealing from someone who will punch you in the face back instead of stealing from the poor and victimized?

Originally Posted by dudeman

Keep in mind, I don't own any large acreage of land. However, how will this tax be applied? Is it based upon topsoil content, area (i.e. length squared)? What about land in the desert that can not support crops? What about hilly land that isn't as effective at supporting crops? What is the basis of the tax? To punish those that do not use their land? From a capitalist perspective, it is their land - they can do what they want with it. If a group of thieves want to steal assets to redistribute, there are plenty of other targets (i.e. Beverly Hills millionaires) to try to steal from. Why not try stealing from someone who will punch you in the face back instead of stealing from the poor and victimized?

The rates of land value taxation is based on whatever individuals offer the state to exclude others from a parcel of land. Land near public infrastructure (such as a paved roadway) often times has more earning potential, so individuals will offer more tax to the state for excluding others from that land. As you move to less desirable land, usually further from public infrastructure and services, the amount individuals will offer drops off considerably, all the way to nothing. If you are the only person who wants to use a parcel of land (meaning you don’t need to forcefully exclude others) then you can use that land free of taxation, i.e., that taxes levied on that land would be zero. Even if you use land that isn’t taxed, the government would still protect your rights to whatever you produced on that land.

Conversely, if you see some land outside of town that you feel you have a better use for than the current user, you can go to the courthouse and make an offer to pay slightly more taxes for that land. The county government would then raise the taxes on that land to meet your offer, the current user could either pay the higher tax rate or he would sell that land to you.

Originally Posted by dudeman

However, how will this tax be applied? Is it based upon topsoil content, area (i.e. length squared)? What about land in the desert that can not support crops? What about hilly land that isn't as effective at supporting crops?

That's an excellent question.

What is the basis of the tax? To punish those that do not use their land?

One could view it that way, but then one would also have to assume that income tax is a punishment to people for making money,
while there may or may not be some truth and or even usefulness in that,
it isn't the main reason for the tax.

A more reasonable purpose is the same purpose that the majority of today's taxes have.
To fund the government, and to try to balance the burden as fairly as possible,
taxing more of those who are more able to pay and or who benefit the most from various government services.

...Why not try stealing from someone who will punch you in the face back instead of stealing from the poor and victimized?

What do you mean steal from the poor and victimized?
If the land tax is progressive, it is people who own the most land who will end up paying more.
The poor do not own a significant amount of land, even collectively.
They are in large part, renters.

-Meta

Originally Posted by dudeman

you don't understand the concept of "inheritance".

No, you just do not know any economics.

Many landowners inherit land and a tax imposed upon that land above and beyond the outrageous "property taxes" (i.e. education unions primarily) would be a burden to those that have land and grow food.

Nonsense. How would it burden those who grow food? They would merely be paying the government for land instead of an idle landowner -- AND THEY WOULD NO LONGER BE PAYING OTHER TAXES FOR THE IDLE LANDOWNER TO POCKET.

Why not tax wealth and income? Or would that redistribute some of YOUR wealth?

Because unlike land, wealth and income are not fixed in supply. Tax wealth, and there will be less wealth in society. Tax income, and people will work less and produce less in order to pay less tax on what they earn. But tax land, and the land will still all be there -- but will be used more productively.

It ain't rocket science.

Originally Posted by Meta777

I'm not against a wealth tax and I actually think an overall wealth tax would be preferable to a pure land tax only system,

I used to think so, too, but then I saw the cat: government spending on services and infrastructure all goes to landowners. It doesn't go to people who own factories, cars, ships, bank accounts, bonds, stocks, etc. They all have to pay landowners full market value for everything government provides. Any time you tax anything but land value, you are automatically creating a welfare subsidy giveaway to landowners.

and honestly I'm not against an income tax either though I think that it would be unnecessary if either a wealth tax or a progressive/tax neutral land tax were to replace it....

Income is The Wrong Thing To Tax.

Originally Posted by dudeman

Let's tax those that grow lawns.

I have a better idea: let's try not to prove we are stupid.

Dandelions are 100 % edible (flower, root and leaf), essentially non-toxic and extraordinarily robust due to the seed dispersal system and root structure. Why should anyone grow Kentucky bluegrass for display when that land is available for harvesting? I could collect a lot of taxes from Beverly Hills, CA residents and redistribute that wealth as part of my beer fund.

Were you under an erroneous impression that you were contributing something of meaning?