Top income brackets should be taxed at 99%.

I'm telling it to you because you are the one who doesn't know. The state already knows, which is why unlike a private landowner, it maintains military forces.

 

Hong Kong has one of the most grotesque wealth inequality living circumstances on the planet, and China isn't far behind. People live in palaces, and in cages. How on earth you think 'leased land' prevents this kind of wealth disparity, defies comprehension.

 

Already refuted many times. Administration in trust is not ownership. You know this.

 

He who CONTROLS the land, 'owns' the land.

The lack of title deed is utterly irrelevant.

 

Sure, because its unusually free, low-tax economy is a magnet for people who dream big, and many people who dream big don't execute very well. But naturally some do. Of course, the landed privilege of leaseholders is the main cause of HK's wealth inequality. HK got one big thing right about land, but a lot of things wrong. It's hard to break completely with thousands of years of landowner privilege and parasitism.

Or the USA. China basically adopted HK's economic model in 1979 on the practical grounds that it obviously worked superbly in stimulating economic growth. But the CCP doesn't understand why it works any more than Whitehall did.

Try to keep your eye on the ball. I was responding to someone who thought cages could not be built without landowning, let alone palaces. Hong Kong proves him wrong.

Try to keep your eye on the ball. I didn't say it did. You just aren't paying attention. I was refuting a false and absurd claim that landowning is necessary for construction of fixed improvements. How land tenure arrangements can be reformed to reduce inequality is a different topic.

 

Why cant you ever remember that all your false and absurd garbage has already been conclusively refuted many times?

A trustee controls land but does not own it. You stand refuted. As always.

True; what matters is the legal rights enjoyed. Ownership requires four: control, exclusion, benefit and disposition. Administration in trust of possession and use of an asset does not permit its benefit to go to the trustee, and so is not ownership. Administration in trust may also prohibit disposition, depending on the terms of the trust.

 

Of course. Property in the fruits of one's labor is a cornerstone of civilization and progress.

You are again just makin' $#!+ up about what I have plainly written. I have stated explicitly, many times, that property in the fruits of one's labor is rightful and just. You have no reason whatever to assume it would "rattle my cage."

Oh, OK, now I get it: you are equivocating between property and land. You're just trying another equivocation fallacy on for size to see if you can get away with it. But hey, don't beat yourself up over it. Cut yourself some slack. There's lots worse things a guy could do -- like lie to rationalize privilege, justify injustice and excuse evil.

Let's see some data. It's considerably lower in, e.g., Germany. In any case, current institutions make everyone the victims of landowner privilege, imposing a stark choice: be purely a victim, or both a victim and a perpetrator. It is not surprising that people have enough spirit of resistance to choose the latter if they possibly can.

No peace without justice. Haven't you heard?

Garbage. Until the 19th century, global population growth averaged under 1%. For >90% of humanity's existence, it averaged under 0.1%, and at least once went so far into the negative that we came precariously close to extinction. That low population growth rate was not the result of choosing not to have children. It was the result of insecure access to resources, and if most people had not had children despite lacking secure access to resources, our species would most certainly have passed out of existence.

No, it's mostly a function of whether you are on the treadmill with the honest and productive, or riding up at your leisure on the escalator with the privileged, which that treadmill powers.

Adults do not CHOOSE to be forcibly stripped of their rights and then have to pay the privileged just for permission to exercise them -- to work, to shop, to access desirable public services and infrastructure, etc. To blame them for being the victims of legalized theft and extortion is grotesque.

Paying their debt to their heritage.

You have become confused and lost your way again. Raising your kids IS one of the other priorities: the ones other than escaping from poverty. Remember? Another would be good citizenship and trying to leave your community and the world better than you found them.

That is false and absurd, as already proved.

No they did not. The poverty was inflicted on them involuntarily when their rights to liberty were forcibly stripped from them and given to the privileged as their private property, so that they had to pay the privileged full market value just for permission to work, to shop, to access desirable public services and infrastructure, etc.

That's just objectively false, as already proved multiple times. The fact that you disagree with their choices does not mean they are not in need, sorry.

No one freely chose to have their rights to liberty forcibly stripped from them and given to the privileged as their private property, and I will thank you to remember it (though I know you won't).

No. Denying they are victims, and blaming them for the crimes committed against them, is not only obscene but grotesque, despicable, and evil.

 

Nonsense. Most women (and men) take what they can get. Not much choice involved.

And women are left 'carrying the can'....

You can save yourself a lot of effort in your replies. Fact is 'personal responsibility' is only half the story; government, aka community responsibility, is the other half.

And you better hope the dreaded '2nd wave' doesn't actually appear...….
because then you will see the limits of "personal responsibility", as governments are unable or unwilling to support the mass of people who live from pay-check to pay-check, even in the best of times..

 

"Nicely. Land users would just pay the market rent to the community that creates the land's value and secures exclusive tenure for the user..."

We already do that. It's just called a different name: "property tax".

But why should we pay for anything that no one owns? Why should we pay someone, who doesn't own the land, anything?

"...and secures exclusive tenure for the user..."

We already have that. It's called "ownership".

"...instead of to a private landowner in return for doing and contributing nothing."

Huh?

"Same as now in places where land is leased by users rather than owned, like Hong Kong, China, Monaco, public land, etc."

The land is being leased from an entity which OWNS the land.

"Through voluntary, market-based, beneficiary-pay, value-for-value transactions..."

We have that. It's called "buying and selling".

"...instead of stealing and extortion."

Umm... WUT??!?

"No it isn't. That's exclusive tenure. Tenants get exclusive tenure without owning land. Ownership consists of four rights: use, control, benefit and disposition. Productive use with exclusive tenure does not require a right of disposition."

OK.

But you're not describing anything different from what already exists. People already build structures on land that they lease from the owner. You're claiming to be championing something different, but it's not. If no one owns the land, no one can control it. If some entity controls the land, they own it. It doesn't matter what it's called, it's still owned. The right of disposition is still there; with the entity that owns the land.

"That is nothing but absurd nonsense unrelated to anything I have said."

Originally, you claimed that no one would own land. That is the claim that I responded to. Now, you are claiming that some entity, other than the end user, would own the land. I guess that you don't want to call it 'ownership', but your description defines it as such.

Please forgive me for operating under the scenario described in the post that I responded to.

"It's nonsense. You could with equal "logic" claim that non-ownership of land would cause smallpox."

Again, I responded to the text contained in that post. I stand by my response to that post. That response doesn't apply to the post quoted in this post. Only this post applies to the post quoted in this post.

 

House ownership is falling in Australia...and the homeless (who can't afford rent) currently number 116,000. A disgrace, in a 'wealthy' country.

Meanwhile, there is LESS housing stress in China than the US.

https://ellenbrown.com/2019/06/14/the-american-dream-is-alive-and-well-in-china/

 

No, that is false. Property taxes are levied on both improvement value and land value, and are a (usually small) fraction of the land's unimproved market rent, as proved by the land's unimproved value.

Property taxes are economically perverse because they consist in effect of two opposite taxes: the tax on improvement value, which measures what the owner has contributed to the wealth of the community, and the tax on land value, which measures what the community is expected to contribute to the wealth of the owner. As a result, when property tax rates are low, as in HI and CA, they fall mainly on the land, and should be increased, whereas when they are high, as in Detroit, they fall mainly on improvements, and should be reduced. Because of its economic perversity, it would be much better not to tax improvement value at all.

Because we deprive others of it. No one owns the earth's atmosphere; but if you deprived people of air to breathe, don't you think you would owe them some compensation?

Because by excluding them from it, we are depriving them of their liberty right to use it non-exclusively, the same right our ancestors exercised for millions of years to survive.

Yes, and it is a subsidy to the owner, as proved by the land's value.

INSTEAD OF TO A PRIVATE LANDOWNER IN RETURN FOR DOING AND CONTRIBUTING NOTHING.

That's just a matter of legal form, not economic necessity. Exclusive use of locations can be paid for without their being owned, as is done with geosynchronous satellite locations, broadcast spectrum allocations, etc. which are administered in trust for the public but not owned.

False. Buying and selling land is not voluntary for the people excluded from the land, any more than buying and selling slaves is voluntary for the slaves. It is also not a beneficiary-pay or value-for-value mechanism, as the land's value represents an unrequited subsidy given to the owner, but that benefit is paid for by other people's taxes.

Read and learn:

THE BANDIT

Suppose there is a bandit who lurks in the mountain pass between two countries. He robs the merchant caravans as they pass through, but is careful to take only as much as the merchants can afford to lose, so that they will keep using the pass and he will keep getting the loot.

A thief, right?

Now, suppose he has a license to charge tolls of those who use the pass, a license issued by the government of one of the countries — or even both of them. The tolls are by coincidence equal to what he formerly took by force. How has the nature of his enterprise changed, simply through being made legal? He is still just a thief. He is still just demanding payment and not contributing anything in return. How can the mere existence of that piece of paper entitling him to rob the caravans alter the fact that what he is doing is in fact robbing them?

But now suppose instead of a license to steal, he has a land title to the pass. He now charges the caravans the exact same amount in “rent” for using the pass, and has become quite a respectable gentleman. But how has the nature of his business really changed? It’s all legal now, but he is still just taking money from those who use what nature provided for free, and contributing nothing whatever in return, just as he did when he was a lowly bandit. How is he any different now that he is a landowner?

And come to that, how is any other landowner, charging rent for what nature provided for free, any different?

I made a mistake there, but I was in a hurry and didn't get back in time to correct it before the edit deadline passed. It should say, "exclusion" instead of "use."

It is very, very different, as proved by the fact that land value would be near zero instead of astronomical, and the productive would be able to keep the fruits of their labor instead of having them stolen by taxation and given to landowners in return for nothing.

Already proved false. For example, there is an international commission that controls use of the oceans even though it does not own the oceans.

Already proved false. Control is just one of the four rights property owners enjoy.

Already proved false. Please try to use English words correctly, as it makes accurate communication possible.

But no entity would own the land or have any right to dispose of it.

That is false. Administration in trust is not ownership. A trustee has no right of benefit, and in this case would have no right of disposition -- i.e., it would not be able to sell the land, as it would not own it.

No, it does not. See above.

See above. You are either not understanding what I have written, or not using English words correctly.

 

"No, that is false. Property taxes are levied on both improvement value and land value, and are a (usually small) fraction of the land's unimproved market rent, as proved by the land's unimproved value."

I gather that you disagree with my characterization of property tax, as a form of rent, because it's not high enough .

It's more perverse than that. In one case, people would be paying high rents to some entity that doesn't own anything. In the other case, the rightful owner is paying low rents to an entity which doesn't own anything.

"Because we deprive others of it. No one owns the earth's atmosphere; but if you deprived people of air to breathe, don't you think you would owe them some compensation?"

You're forgetting my point. Under your system, no one would be deprived because no one would build anything.

No one is owed compensation for that which they do not own.

"Because by excluding them from it, we are depriving them of their liberty right to use it non-exclusively, the same right our ancestors exercised for millions of years to survive."

Same response as above. No one would be deprived, because no one would be excluded.

"Yes, and it is a subsidy to the owner, as proved by the land's value."

It would interesting to see your math on that.

"INSTEAD OF TO A PRIVATE LANDOWNER IN RETURN FOR DOING AND CONTRIBUTING NOTHING."

Capital letters do not make an absurd statement any less absurd.

I don't even know where to start. A landowner contributes nothing, but some entity that has no right to collect anything contributes...

"That's just a matter of legal form, not economic necessity. Exclusive use of locations can be paid for without their being owned, as is done with geosynchronous satellite locations, broadcast spectrum allocations, etc. which are administered in trust for the public but not owned."

Exactly. I call those examples 'ownership'. You do not.

If some entity does not own a piece of land, a point in space, or a certain wavelength, they have no authority to exclude anyone from its use. They can only ask. The USA, for example, can control where US launched satellites are positioned and what frequencies are occupied by US based transmitters. The USA can only ask other countries for their cooperation.

"False. Buying and selling land is not voluntary for the people excluded from the land, any more than buying and selling slaves is voluntary for the slaves. It is also not a beneficiary-pay or value-for-value mechanism, as the land's value represents an unrequited subsidy given to the owner, but that benefit is paid for by other people's taxes."

No one is excluded crom voluntary buying or selling.

And yes, I am anxiously awaiting the explanation of how ownership equates to subsidy. That should be fantastic.

"Read and learn:

THE BANDIT

Suppose there is a bandit who lurks in the mountain pass between two countries. He robs the merchant caravans as they pass through, but is careful to take only as much as the merchants can afford to lose, so that they will keep using the pass and he will keep getting the loot.

A thief, right?

Now, suppose he has a license to charge tolls of those who use the pass, a license issued by the government of one of the countries — or even both of them. The tolls are by coincidence equal to what he formerly took by force. How has the nature of his enterprise changed, simply through being made legal? He is still just a thief. He is still just demanding payment and not contributing anything in return. How can the mere existence of that piece of paper entitling him to rob the caravans alter the fact that what he is doing is in fact robbing them?

But now suppose instead of a license to steal, he has a land title to the pass. He now charges the caravans the exact same amount in “rent” for using the pass, and has become quite a respectable gentleman. But how has the nature of his business really changed? It’s all legal now, but he is still just taking money from those who use what nature provided for free, and contributing nothing whatever in return, just as he did when he was a lowly bandit. How is he any different now that he is a landowner?

And come to that, how is any other landowner, charging rent for what nature provided for free, any different?"

in the first example, there is no right to collect money. I nthe second instance, there is the right to collect money.

"I made a mistake there, but I was in a hurry and didn't get back in time to correct it before the edit deadline passed. It should say, "exclusion" instead of "use.""

I'm not familiar with the term "productive exclusion", but if you are using it as meaning what I just read, how would your concept of non-ownership ownership prevent it?

"It is very, very different, as proved by the fact that land value would be near zero instead of astronomical, and the productive would be able to keep the fruits of their labor instead of having them stolen by taxation and given to landowners in return for nothing."

I can't make any sense of this. Of course, if land cannot be bought or sold, there is no way to establish any value.

I can't imagine what fruits of labor are stolen and being given to landowners.

"Already proved false. For example, there is an international commission that controls use of the oceans even though it does not own the oceans."

This commission doesn't control the oceans. They only ask other entities to follow their guidelines.

If China wants to take ownership of some area of ocean, they simply do.

"Already proved false. Control is just one of the four rights property owners enjoy."

Self-contradictory.

"But no entity would own the land or have any right to dispose of it."

If they don't own the land, they have no right to collect rents on it.

"That is false. Administration in trust is not ownership. A trustee has no right of benefit, and in this case would have no right of disposition -- i.e., it would not be able to sell the land, as it would not own it."

For there to be a trustee, there must be a rightful owner, for which the trustee acts in his interest. If there is no owner, no one has any right to assign a trustee.

"No, it does not. See above."

Ownership, by any other name, is still ownership.

"See above. You are either not understanding what I have written, or not using English words correctly."

I definitely cannot follow your argument.

All that I am getting, is that there wouldn't be any private ownership of land. All land would be owned by government, but it wouldn't be called ownership.

 

We are using the word, "rent" in a specific economic sense that you may not be familiar with. You are used to thinking of rent as a payment for temporary use of another's property, like a car. Economic rent is quite different. It has been defined in various ways, but I think the most informative is, "a return obtained by depriving others of access to economic opportunity that would otherwise be accessible."

Property tax is generally not high enough (in the USA, rates have been declining for a century), but more importantly, it is levied on improvements, so the rate can't be raised higher than low single-digit percentages without very damaging effects.

No, the market rent in the relevant sense is not "high." It's just the market price of the privilege. Ownership is not relevant because that's not the relevant sense of "rent."

Again, that is irrelevant, because we are not using the word, "rent" in that sense. If you Google, "Law of Rent" you will see some explanations of the economic concept.

No, that's false in two ways: exclusive tenure inherently deprives everyone but the user of access to the opportunity, by definition; and people would build even more, because they would lose money if they did not use the land as productively as they could. See Hong Kong for proof.

Again, I already proved that claim is false. No one owns the alphabet; but if you stopped someone from using it, you would indisputably owe them compensation for removing their liberty right to do so. Try to find a willingness to understand that compensation is rightly owed for any deprivation, not just of legal property.

Same refutation as above, and as in my previous message. I'm not sure there is any way to state the fact that exclusive tenure means others are excluded so clearly and simply that you would be willing to understand it. Exclusion implies deprivation of that from which one is excluded.

Land value is nothing but the market's estimate of the net future after-tax subsidy to the owner -- i.e., how much more he will be able to take from the community by owning the land than he will ever pay in taxes on it. That subsidy is calculated by the Net Present Value Equation:

V = R / (d + t - g)

Where V is current value, R is the current periodic rent, d is the discount rate, t is the ad valorem tax rate, and g is the rent growth rate. This is a simplified version of a much more complicated equation, obtained by assuming that d, t and g are constant.

It's not absurd. It is an indisputable fact. The land was already there, ready to use, with no help from the owner or any previous owner. Therefore, any payment to the owner for permission to use the land is a payment in return for doing and contributing exactly nothing.

The creator of value has the right to collect payment for that value from those who take it. A baker has the right to charge a customer who takes a loaf of bread from his bakery because he is the one that created the bread's value, of which the one taking the bread is depriving him. In exactly the same way, the community that creates the value of land by securing the landholder's exclusive tenure for him and providing the desirable public services and infrastructure accessible from that location, which together give it its value, has the right to charge the recipient of those benefits for what he is taking. You are merely accustomed to taking the baker's bread and not paying for it, so now you think it is rightly your bread rather than the baker's, and resent any suggestion that you should rightly be paying the baker for it.

Yes, and I am objectively correct, while you are objectively wrong. Ownership requires four rights: exclusion, control, benefit and disposition. An administrator in trust does not have the right of benefit, and so does not own the trust assets. The proposed land administration would not have the rights of either benefit or disposition, and therefore would not own the land. I'm not sure there is any way to state those facts so clearly and simply that you would find a willingness to know them.

Again, that's just objectively false. No one owns the broadcast spectrum, but the FCC definitely excludes unauthorized use of it.

We are not going to progress very far in this discussion if your only method of "argument" is to repeat claims that have already been proved objectively false multiple times.

That is also objectively false. The FCC wields enforcement power.

No, that is also objectively false. There are international bodies with enforcement powers over satellite positions and the EM spectrum.

<sigh> Try to pay attention: buying and selling is not voluntary when what is being bought and sold is other people's rights. Others are involuntarily stripped of their liberty right to use the land, just as a slave is still involuntarily stripped of his right to liberty when his owner and a prospective purchaser enter into their "voluntary exchange." You could with equal "logic" claim that engaging the services of a hit-man is a "voluntary exchange." Sorry, no, because the victim is NOT a voluntary participant in the exchange.

GET IT???

It's a subsidy because the landowner gets to charge users full market value for what government, the community and nature provide. You might notice the absence from that list of anything the landowner provides.

Oh, really? Where did that "right" come from? If government has no right to levy any such charge for use of land, as you claim, then how could it validly confer that right on a private citizen? Are you saying that if a government issues a document conferring a legal privilege, like charging tolls in a pass, or a monopoly on the cinnamon trade, that somehow makes the privilege a right? What if the document is a title deed to a slave, or says the bearer has official permission to kill you? Are those then also rights?

Your claims are absurd and outrageous, and I would suggest it is high time you started thinking about them a little more carefully.

I meant that one of the four rights required for ownership is exclusion, not use.

Because you refuse to know facts.

Objectively false. Land in Indian reservations, for example, cannot be bought or sold, but the market easily establishes the value of exclusive tenure thereon. Same with public range land, etc.

Effectively all taxes that are devoted to desirable public services and infrastructure. Google "Henry George Theorem" and start reading.

No, that is also objectively false. There are international laws of the sea and enforcement mechanisms thereof.

See what I mean by your refusal to know facts?

No, that is also objectively false, which is why they have been carefully building up a case that they can take to the relevant international agencies, instead of just making a declaration of ownership.

Garbage. Try doing a little reading on the subject.

Already proved objectively false. A trustee does not own the trust assets, but has a right to collect rent on them.

No, that is also objectively false, like all your other claims. The owner is the trust, and the trustee acts in the interest of the beneficiary according to the terms of the trust, not the interest of the trust.

Again, that is just objectively false, like all your other claims. No one owns the moon, and yet the nations of the earth have assigned trusteeship over it to the relevant international body, the UNOOSA. Here, start reading:

https://spacepolicyonline.com/topics/space-law/

Ownership requires the four rights I identified: exclusion, control, benefit and disposition. The proposed land administration authority would have neither benefit nor disposition rights. You are just objectively wrong. OBJECTIVELY.

Right: you have to contrive some way of not following it because you have already realized that it proves your beliefs are false and evil.

It wouldn't be ownership, as proved above.

 

"We are using the word, "rent" in a specific economic sense that you may not be familiar with. You are used to thinking of rent as a payment for temporary use of another's property, like a car."

I think that you would be better served to respond to my words, rather than try to divine my thoughts.

"Economic rent is quite different. It has been defined in various ways, but I think the most informative is, "a return obtained by depriving others of access to economic opportunity that would otherwise be accessible.""

Yes, I have already made this point. Without right of ownership, all others are deprived of access. With ownership, all others have the right to buy the right of access.

"Land value is nothing but the market's estimate of the net future after-tax subsidy to the owner -- i.e., how much more he will be able to take from the community by owning the land than he will ever pay in taxes on it. That subsidy is calculated by the Net Present Value Equation:

V = R / (d + t - g)

Where V is current value, R is the current periodic rent, d is the discount rate, t is the ad valorem tax rate, and g is the rent growth rate. This is a simplified version of a much more complicated equation, obtained by assuming that d, t and g are constant."

I agree that that is a useable equation.

I can't help but notice that there is no s = subsidy.

"It's not absurd. It is an indisputable fact. The land was already there, ready to use, with no help from the owner or any previous owner. Therefore, any payment to the owner for permission to use the land is a payment in return for doing and contributing exactly nothing."

Do you claim that payments to some other entity, with no claim of ownership, contributes something?

"The creator of value has the right to collect payment for that value from those who take it. A baker has the right to charge a customer who takes a loaf of bread from his bakery because he is the one that created the bread's value, of which the one taking the bread is depriving him. In exactly the same way, the community that creates the value of land by securing the landholder's exclusive tenure for him and providing the desirable public services and infrastructure accessible from that location, which together give it its value, has the right to charge the recipient of those benefits for what he is taking."

This is already accomplished through the levying of property taxes.

"You are merely accustomed to taking the baker's bread and not paying for it, so now you think it is rightly your bread rather than the baker's, and resent any suggestion that you should rightly be paying the baker for it."

Here it is again. Why are you making crap up and then telling me that that is what I think?

Are you a mind-reader? Do you have some special mystical powers?

Why not focus on my words, which are seen and known, rather than your imaginings of what I might think?

"Yes, and I am objectively correct, while you are objectively wrong. Ownership requires four rights: exclusion, control, benefit and disposition. An administrator in trust does not have the right of benefit, and so does not own the trust assets. The proposed land administration would not have the rights of either benefit or disposition, and therefore would not own the land. I'm not sure there is any way to state those facts so clearly and simply that you would find a willingness to know them."

Your argument falls apart.

If the community BENEFITS from the rent paid, it holds ownership. An administrstor simply works on behalf of the owner (the community).

"Again, that's just objectively false. No one owns the broadcast spectrum, but the FCC definitely excludes unauthorized use of it."

True. The FCC doesn't own the broadcast spectrum in the USA. It only operates on behalf of the people of America (the owners).

"That is also objectively false. The FCC wields enforcement power."

Oh? Then why are there AM band radio stations, in Mexico, which broadcast with so much power that they overwhelm stations in the USA?

"<sigh> Try to pay attention: buying and selling is not voluntary when what is being bought and sold is other people's rights. Others are involuntarily stripped of their liberty right to use the land, just as a slave is still involuntarily stripped of his right to liberty when his owner and a prospective purchaser enter into their "voluntary exchange." You could with equal "logic" claim that engaging the services of a hit-man is a "voluntary exchange." Sorry, no, because the victim is NOT a voluntary participant in the exchange.

GET IT???

No. I don't get it. In fact, I think it's bizarre. The buying and selling of rights is absolutely voluntary. Yes, there are crimes where people are extorted into selling. That is a small percentage. I think it would be less than the number of renters illegally evicted under your scenario.

"It's a subsidy because the landowner gets to charge users full market value for what government, the community and nature provide."

The government provides nothing that isn't paid for, times over.

"You might notice the absence from that list of anything the landowner provides."

Sorry, this discussion is too convoluted for me. I can't find any list.

"Oh, really? Where did that "right" come from? If government has no right to levy any such charge for use of land, as you claim, then how could it validly confer that right on a private citizen?"

Once again, I am working under the scenario which you have proposed.

The statement was theoretical, based upon your conditions.

If no one owns land, no one has the right to exact payment for its use.

"Objectively false. Land in Indian reservations, for example, cannot be bought or sold, but the market easily establishes the value of exclusive tenure thereon. Same with public range land, etc."

You have described the market value of the use of land. That is not the same as the value of the land.

"Effectively all taxes that are devoted to desirable public services and infrastructure. Google "Henry George Theorem" and start reading."

Nope, not gonna read. I'll just accept your words.

The landowner pays more in taxes than the poor folk. Therefore, the community disproportionately benefits. They are stealing from him.

"Already proved objectively false. A trustee does not own the trust assets, but has a right to collect rent on them."

Yes, the trustee would collect the rents for the owner.

"No, that is also objectively false, like all your other claims. The owner is the trust, and the trustee acts in the interest of the beneficiary according to the terms of the trust, not the interest of the trust."

I think that you are misusing the word 'objectively'. To me the word 'subjectively' would be a better fit.

After that, it gets confusing.

"Right: you have to contrive some way of not following it because you have already realized that it proves your beliefs are false and evil."

That got a chuckle.

 

Oh, is that what you call them?

No you haven't. You said the opposite:

See? That's just false, absurd nonsense. No one ever owned land -- or even considered it possible -- until a few thousand years ago, and yet everyone who managed to survive did so precisely by exercising their liberty to access the unowned land because no greedy, evil thief had yet figured out how to forcibly deprive them of their liberty rights to do so through the fiction of "owning" it.

No, that is just another bald falsehood from you. With ownership, all others are FORCIBLY STRIPPED of their right to access what would otherwise have been accessible, and must consequently pay a greedy thief (i.e., "landowner") merely for his permission to do so.

R - Vt is the net subsidy: the publicly created value the landowner takes from the community in economic rent but does not repay in taxes.

I identify the fact that paying the community the market price for the desirable public services and infrastructure it provides at that location -- very much including secure, exclusive tenure -- that would otherwise have to be paid for by taking money from other people who are already paying the landowner full market value for access to such services and infrastructure contributes justice. I also identify the fact that taking things from others without paying for them is stealing.

No it isn't. The value of land records precisely how much less the market expects the landowner to pay in property taxes than he will take from the community by owning the land. You might as well claim that by dropping a quarter in the till as you leave the bakery, you have paid for a $3 loaf of bread.

I'm not making anything up. I've simply seen the same fallacious, absurd, and disingenuous garbage from disingenuous apologists for landowner greed, privilege and parasitism hundreds if not thousands of times, and I know exactly the "thinking" behind it.

No, just decades of experience with disingenuous apologists for landowner greed, privilege and parasitism.

I'm just trying to save time by advising you that I am not going to be deceived by your fallacious and disingenuous garbage because I have seen it all before, and I know exactly where it comes from and why you do it.

No, of course it doesn't. Don't be so ridiculous.

False. Ownership requires ALL FOUR rights, not just one, not just two, not just three.

ALL FOUR.

GET IT???

The community is not the owner. There is no owner because no one has the right of disposition -- I.e., no one has the right to sell off, dispose of, or otherwise alienate future generations' liberty rights to use the land. They have a right to require payment for the abrogation of their own rights, but no right to sell off anyone else's rights.

False. America does not own the broadcast spectrum because it also has no right of disposition.

Because the FCC's jurisdiction and enforcement power are limited to the USA.

No, it absolutely is NOT voluntary when the rights are those of people not participating in the exchange.

I'm talking about people whose rights are bought and sold BY OTHERS without their consent, not by themselves under duress.

GET IT?

I don't know what imaginary circumstance you think you might be referring to.

Of course it is paid for. Just not by the landowner who takes its value, same as the bread that a thief takes from the baker without paying for it.

Too factual, logical and honest, you mean.

Try the immediately preceding sentence: government provides desirable services and infrastructure paid for by taxes; the community provides opportunities and amenities as a result of everyone else's private activities; nature provides the physical qualities of the location.

Which clearly identify the fact that the bandit, the toll taker and the landowner are all doing exactly the same thing -- i.e., nothing -- to earn what they take from the merchant caravans, the only difference being that the latter two have government's help, so the former is taking a bigger risk.

Wrong again. Unlike the payment exacted by the bandit/toll taker/landowner in the story, the payment of rent to the community by landholders is not for use of land, but for depriving others of their liberty to use it, which those others indisputably have a right to exact payment for. While ownership would provide a convenient and familiar legal framework for such payments, it is by no means necessary. There are lots of cases of payment being required for things no one owns. For example, no one owns a person's future earnings, which don't even exist yet, but a court judgment may require a defendant to pay a plaintiff for depriving him of them. No one owns another person's affections, yet courts may require payment for alienation thereof.

So you are just objectively wrong. You will find that happening a lot, as long as you presume to dispute with me.

OK, so you agree that your claim -- that there would be no way to establish any value -- was objectively false. There is no need to establish any exchange value, because the land would not be exchanged (no right of disposition, remember?). Only secure, exclusive tenure would be exchanged, and that is easily valued by the market.

What do "the poor folk" have to do with it? The landowner is taking economic opportunity from everyone who would otherwise be at liberty to use it, and getting the benefit of everyone's taxes.

Garbage. The land's value is the precise measure of how much more the market expects the landowner to take from the community by owning the land than he will pay in taxes on it.

No, that is objectively false. The landowner is depriving everyone else in the community of the economic opportunity accessible from that location, and he is not paying them the market price for what he is taking from them, as the land's value proves.

No. There would be no owner in this case, as no one has the right of disposition.

No, my use of the word is correct.

An uncomfortable one, presumably.

 

"Oh, is that what you call them?"

I read up to there. If you can't have a respectful discussion, I'm not interested.

Don't waste your time responding. I won't read it.

 

BWAWAHAHHAAAA! Nice excuse. You have quite a nerve talking about "respectful discussion" when your "arguments" have consisted mainly of fallacious, absurd and disingenuous nonsense that insults not only my intelligence but that of your readers, like your cretinous claim that people were not free to use land before it was owned.

You have been comprehensively and conclusively demolished, you know it, and you have no answers. Simple.

 

Good luck getting any sense out of our friend. No one but BW can, and even he struggles.

 

So you admit Hong Kong is a terrible example. You admit that things are no different there, than anywhere else in the capitalist world.

 

No worries, that poster gave up and began with the personal attacks. What's a BW?

 

Dial it down, kiddo.

 

He spends his posting days shouting about evil. He's like a Southern Baptist with a new snake.

BW is the poster, "a better world". He's on the same page as our Baptist bud, but quite reasonable, and a good person to debate with.

 

Yes it's a disgrace when people have become so spoiled and precious, that they think they're entitled to live in big cities where you can't buy a family home for less than a million dollars. 30 year olds wailing that they'll never be able to buy property ... in Sydney and Melbourne. Working class people have never been able to afford to live in the most expensive locations, and in the 21stC the most expensive locations are Sydney and Melbourne. Outside those absurdly overpriced areas there is very little homelessness, and everyone can afford (to buy or rent) a house. If these 30 year old spoiled brats had the strength of character to step away from their big city lifestyles, they could easily buy. Plenty of towns and cities in Victoria and NSW selling family homes for under $200k. A working couple could save that in ten years ... and hey presto, they own a house outright. Even if (worst case scenario) they never worked again they would have future security, and so would their kids.

You adapt to conditions, or perish. If people are not adapting, that's a choice they're making. No one is born entitled to live amongst the wealthy. You should rightly condemn those that do so and expect us to feel sorry for them when it doesn't work out.

As for homelessness, that is also a disgrace. When people indulge their addictions to that degree, and trash relationships with those who could have helped them (family & friends), we ought to be very concerned about the direction society is going.

 

Tsk, tsk. Makin' $#!+ up again, I see. You're good at that. You're the one who gave up, because you are not used to people calling you on your fallacious, absurd and disingenuous bull$#!+.

 

As imperfect as it is, it's a counter-example that utterly demolishes absurd and infantile claims that no one will ever build anything on land they don't own. It also establishes the economic superiority of the geoist model -- private ownership of private production, public ownership of public production -- over capitalism.

No, that is just you makin' $#!+ up again. It is very different, as is China, because it is not capitalist, and hasn't been for over 160 years. It shows the way of the future, which is neither right (capitalist) nor left (socialist) but forward (geoist).