out of the box thought on taxes

Did I miss that somewhere, tax on production??

 

He calculates all his cost of production and checks what the market will bear and decides to start the business or not, he's getting beat by off shore competitors.

 

Ahem. He obviously knows far more about it than you:

LOL! Google "rent seeking" and start reading before you make an even bigger fool of yourself.

Or better yet, answer The Question:

"How, exactly, is production aided by the landowner's demand that the producer pay HIM for what government, the community, and nature provide?"

"Investing" in land is never a contribution at all, let alone a valuable one.

There is no such thing as intrinsic value except in the coin business; land's "investment value" is merely a measure of how much money it enables its owner to steal from society; and what is really ludicrous is the use of land as a means for greedy, privileged parasites to gain economic good while not contributing any economic good.

 

No, you did not.

No, it is perfectly correct.

I have demolished you, you know it, and you have no answers. Simple.

 

Maybe they will, maybe they won't. But they will have one less way to stay on top without contributing anything.

Maybe. But it's good you've learned something. Read all my posts and you will learn a lot more.

 

That is logically equivalent to pointing at a business Bernie Madoff saved from bankruptcy and thanking him for contributing to the economy.

 

That is correct. When a man is being starved to death, he will sell his daughter to you for a meal. When he has a right to sustain himself by his own labor, he will not sell her for 100 gold pieces. The rich prefer the former situation.

 

Tax it into unprofitabllity and it will stop. Maybe they should have tried that with slavery.

- - - Updated - - -

Taxes generally bear either on rent or on production (there are some exceptions, like estate taxes). Land value tax bears on rent. Income tax, sales tax, VAT, etc. bear on production.

 

Maybe if he weren't forced to pay for government twice so that landowners could pocket one of the payments in return for nothing, he would be in a better position to compete with the offshore competitors.

The value of land measures how much the productive are being forced to subsidize idle landowners. Think about it.

 

There is nothing about land, which is a scarce resource, that means it is not a valid object of property, as all scarce resources are. Land that is not put to use or homesteaded is not owned by anyone, so claiming it as property through homesteading violates the rights of nobody. To claim land is owned commonly by all human beings is an absurdity. How does one pay all human beings for the use of a certain portion of land? Often georgists say you don't have to, but that defeats the entire notion of common ownership of land the theory is based upon. Its not actually "common."

 

Strike "investing" and you might be on to something.

If investing is not helping to redistribute the local surplus value generated by labor, it is of no value to society.

 

Hogwash. They were unionized for decades and did just great because working people could afford to buy quality American cars.

Detroit went sour because the greed heads tried to squeeze too much out of labor everywhere and the auto manufactures decided that Americans need cheap vehicles the size of main battle tanks during an energy crunch, while the Japanese brought in durable economy cars and then wheedled sweetheart deals to locate in non-unionized states.

 

Do you have a problem making decisions?

Well, YES, and NO!

 

You mean, like the Ford Motor Company buying land, and building a factory to build some Ford cars, employing thousands of workers.

 

Not likely. The unions sucked up all the profits, so much so that despite all the taxes on imports people still chose to buy imports for themselves. When fiats CEO came over to take control of his new bailout bought company he complained that the manufacturing floor was outdated. The once largest company in the biz, making big money under Romney's guidance came to be a union stagnant enterprise propped up by the taxpayer and falling behind its developing world competitors that had far less capital access. Shame what Democrat policies and their union greed heads can do in 30 years or so when you get your way. All the worst cities are democrat run. It is no coincidence.

 

The US government actively supports crony capitalism in the United States as opposed to laizze-faire capitalism where there is a level playing field for all individuals and enterprises in the United States. Many of our treaties such as NAFTA are merely a reflection of crony capitalism.

We can note that "taxes" do not increase the cost of production as taxes are taken from profits. They can lead to higher prices though because the corporations seek additional profits. Many major US corporations don't pay any taxes. As I recall GE with billions of dollars in net income (profits) paid zero taxes one year because of tax loopholes that are reflective of crony capitalism in the US. GE paid dividends to its stockholders but didn't pay any federal income taxes.

In this thread we're seeing those that want crony capitalism that will provide an edge in the international markets for major US corporations but the problem is that the average American pays the price for this crony capitalism. The only ones that really benefit are a very small percentage of the workers and the large investors in the corporations while everyone else (about 95% of working Americans) pays the price of the crony capitalism.

 

Yes, Roy, we get it. Anyone who disagrees with you must not know what they're talking about, as well evidenced by your use of the words/phrases, "proven", "disproven", and "nut uh."

 

Wages are a component of the cost of production and do not come from profits. While higher wages do increase the cost of production they are unrelated to the profits of the corporation and when the "profit margin" is upon a percentage of the cost of production it actually increases the profits for a corporation. By way of a simple example if the cost of production of a product, including labor, is $50 and there is a 6% profit margin then the profit would be $3 but if the cost increases to $100 then the profit margin at 6% is $6.

The problem is protectionism that violates the Law of Supply and Demand related to labor which is something we see related to our limitations on immigration that the unions, and for some bazaar reason Republicans, support.

 

What union got Ford to set the tone for that industry? Unions keep people out of jobs that want them. That is their purpose. The auto union has no where near the power levels then as it did just before GM needed a bailout. Can you name any sectors other then government that are growing, unionized, and not protected by burdening the rest of the country? A single one? Just one example from the left is all I ever ask.

 

Not at all. When wages go up without company growth or faster then it profits go down. I can show you how this would work today when I do payroll of you like. I will just increase the wages or benefits paid and I will have less money to improve in capital expenditures, making my employees less competitive in the long run. Instead we pay the same today, buy heavier weights for my net, and we catch more fish tomorrow then the other guy and we make more money for less marginal effort making us more competitive and more profitable.

in an union situation my labor pool is reduced artificially, so the price goes up artificially. My competitors without the same burdens placed in me, will be able to get the net. My employees will get the bigger check today and will lose their jobs later unless we can lobby the government for protections and taxes bailouts etc..,

Sound like unions to you? Does to me.

 

Funny that you should mention the Ford Motor Company, as Henry Ford himself was a supporter of the land value tax system:

"We ought to tax all idle land the way Henry George said — tax it heavily so that its owners have to make it productive." — Henry Ford (1863 - 1947)

 

I would take your plan for revenue over the current one if land were Scarcer and not already taxed so much. Maybe in your state it is, and that should be a local decision. Here in fl I see acres and acres of fairly cheap land either in production or paying a fair amount in taxes. What i don't see is the government playing fair with its land. It seems to have a preference for giving it away to for profit companies at the expense of the taxpayer - padded with campaign cash. Google digital domain Florida Lois frankel for an example. Until that day ends I do not think government should get land, not until it can learn to behave.

 

Interesting because Ford was only advocating a "land value tax" on idle land and not land in use.

As a Libertarian I actually believe that a person doesn't have a "right of ownership" to unused land. The Right of Property is established by "labor" and there is no expendature of labor related to unused land. Lacking an "expendature of labor" related to the land there isn't a Right of Property related to unused land. I've also questioned land granted or sold by the government to individuals because a government doesn't have any Right of Property and it can't sell or give away something it doesn't have a valid claim of ownership established by the Labor of the Person based upon the individual Right of Property.

 

Are you saying that once the land is productive, the tax disappears?

 

In my opinion Alabama will have the same successes and failures as every other state/country which house businesses. Eventually the grass can get greener elsewhere.

But to the main discussion.....land value taxation. Providing all current land owners could get just compensation for what they own through purchase or family acquisition and we start fresh giving the current occupiers of the land the option to stay or leave LVT could work, but not on as large a scale as some of the opinions that have been expressed here by the less economics educated. All it would be is a different system of taxation with the assumption that the land owner is the "rich" as opposed to income taxing of those who make more paying a higher % of their income. The problems encountered will be far more complex than the group on this thread think it will be and taxation will still not be fair.

The presumption that landowners are the same as the land barons of the past is ludicrous. The idea that land owners tend to gouge for the use of their land is also ludicrous. In the business world we have today a land owner who tries to over charge for the use of his land does not get a tenant. It is as simple as that. Capital has a mobility today never seen in a world envisioned by or LVT adversaries. The very idea that anyone will stay in business without adding all costs (including taxes) to their product or service such that they make adequate profits is kindergarten thinking. Business seldom pays taxes in the sense that it comes out of their hide. Business is an easy collection agency for the government collecting taxes and passing it on to the government. When taxes make total costs too much to make adequate profits they either close their doors or move, and capital mobility as seen today suggests moving is the more common solution. Draconian concepts of making the "rich pay the bill" (also defined as "make the land owner pay the bill") will not, cannot succeed in a mobile economic situation, no matter how much closed minded people think it should. Recalling our conversation about repatriation of profits is but one example of business telling the "take it from the rich" (rich land owners) people to simply go to hell, we will make our money where we can keep more of it.

Now, unless this discussion gets more civil from those closed minds I see no reason to stay and accept their abuse.