Why do most libertarians hate competition?

It has been known for over 200 years that the only side effect of land value taxation is to lower the exchange value of land.

Land value taxes:
- do not increase the prices of consumer goods
- do not decrease wages
- do not decrease the value of capital
- do not discourage production
- do not discourage trade
- are not susceptible to burden shifting
- are the cheapest tax to administer and collect
- are the least susceptible to corruption and fraud
- are the cheapest tax to enforce (nobody will ever be thrown in prison for non-payment)
- are the only tax that does not interfere with producer and consumer incentives in any way.

So in short, land value taxes produce no "deadweight loss" to the economy. Again, the land value taxes only side effect is to make land cheaper to buy.

So how does this tie into libertarians being monopolists who hate competition?

You see, the majority of libertarians know that government spending, like on protective services, roads, bridges and such, increase the productivity of nearby land. These libertarians also know that if they can get other people (producers or consumers) to pay for these basic government services, services which make land more productive, land prices will increase. Higher priced land will make it harder for new competitors to enter the market.

The majority of libertarians know that land value taxes will decrease land prices, resulting in increased competition, which is an idea they hate, so they support taxes which will make land prices rise, thereby knocking the wind out new competition.

Here Winston Churchill tells about the libertarian ideal:

 

I have no idea what you are getting at because this is all tangled. Are you saying that we don't want taxes on land or what? Put it out there straight.

 

The founder of the Libertarian Party, David Nolan, supported land value taxation as the sole source of government revenue.

"What kind of taxation is least harmful? ... My own preference is for a single tax on land." -- David Nolan, founder of LP

So obviously some libertarians support land value taxes, but most do not. As for the rest, put in simple terms:

- Land value taxes decrease the cost of starting a new business -- thereby increasing competition.

- Income and consumption taxes increase the cost of starting a new business -- thereby decreasing competition.

So I am accusing the majority of libertarians of being anticompetitive. They predominantly support taxes which increase the costs of starting a new business, which necessarily discourages new competition from entering the market.

 

what is the enforcement mechanism for such a tax? States that have property taxes seize the property of those who can't pay. Are property rights really secure when government can seize it for non payment? Doesn't your proposal weaken property rights and therefore lend itself to communism where it doesn't exist?

I would explain to you the difference between Libertarianism as a philosophy and the Libertarian Party, but it's probably better that a Libertarian do that.

 

It is the same enforcement mechanism landowners use on their tenants when the tenant can pay his rent. Surly you don’t have a problem with that?

And other forms of taxation, and subsequent government spending, work to increase land values, making land unaffordable to many to begin with.

Furthermore, are you really so dishonest as to pretend that this type of enforcement is only applicable to property taxes? Just what do you think the government would do if you didn’t pay income or sales taxes? They would take your property and throw you in prison to boot … that is what they would do.

Now you are dishonestly trying to pretend that income and sales taxes do not remove property from the peoples hands? All forms of taxation take property from the people and give it to the government … that is how governments are funded. DUH.

One of the main arguments against the land value tax (among economists) is that it cannot raise as much revenue as the current forms of taxation. In fact, the land value tax can be completely avoided by simply moving your production to lower value land. This INSURES that it takes LESS property from taxpayers, which also means it STRENGTHS property rights, especially the property rights of producers and consumers.

The government of Hong Kong collects more revenue from land value taxation, as a percentage of GDP, than any other country. If this is “communism” in your view, then why is it that Hong Kong is held as a model of free market principles and strong property rights? Why has Hong Kong topped the Index of Economic Freedom ever since the inception of that metric.

 

Eh. Hogwash not worth a thoughtful response.

 

I've always been an advocate of a land tax, but only in circumstances where actual scarcity exists.

 

I think SaintMichaelDefendThem summed it up pretty accurately. It doesn't solve your landowner/tenant problem at all, because you're making government the supreme landlord, which is a monopoly and very anti-competitive. You're the one who hates competition. Why?

 

Really? Why?

 

Why are landowners so much better than tenants? Are tenants subhuman? Why do you favor special treatment for landowners? Devine right?

Actually it is pretty much a libertarian principle:

"What kind of taxation is least harmful? ... My own preference is for a single tax on land." -- David Nolan, founder of LP

"In my opinion the least bad tax is the property tax on the unimproved value of land, the Henry George argument of many, many years ago." — Milton Friedman, Nobel laureate in Economics (1976)

"Men did not make the earth …… it is the value of the improvement only and not the earth itself, that is individual property …. Every proprietor owes to the community a ground rent for the land which he holds … from this ground rent I propose to create a National Fund, out of which there shall be paid to every person a sum." — Thomas Paine (1737 - 1809)

Another means of silently lessening the inequality of [landed] property is to exempt all from taxation below a certain point, and to tax the higher portions or property in geometrical progression as they rise. --Thomas Jefferson

Ground rents are a species of revenue which the owner, in many cases, enjoys without any care or attention of his own. Ground rents are, therefore, perhaps a species of revenue which can best bear to have a peculiar tax imposed upon them. --Adam Smith

From the original constitution of the U.S.:

 

Because he knows that the other taxes are stupid and destructive.

 

The government doesn’t own the land. If the government owned the land then it could keep the land value taxes it collected, and spend those taxes on a new yacht or a mansion in France. A land owner can spend his rent anyway he pleases, the government can’t do that, and you know it can’t … you just decided to lie about that fact.

 

"A right of property in moveable things is admitted before the establishment of government. A separate property in lands, not till after that establishment. The right to moveables is acknowledged by all the hordes of Indians surrounding us. Yet by no one of them has a separate property in lands been yielded to individuals. He who plants a field keeps possession till he has gathered the produce, after which one has as good a right as another to occupy it. Government must be established and laws provided, before lands can be separately appropriated, and their owner protected in his possession. Till then, the property is in the body of the nation, and they, or their chief as trustee, must grant them to individuals, and determine the conditions of the grant." --Thomas Jefferson: Batture at New Orleans, 1812. ME 18:45

"But the earth in its natural state, as before said, is capable of supporting but a small number of inhabitants compared with what it is capable of doing in a cultivated state. And as it is impossible to separate the improvement made by cultivation from the earth itself, upon which that improvement is made, the idea of landed property arose from that parable connection; but it is nevertheless true, that it is the value of the improvement, only, and not the earth itself, that is individual property." --Thomas Paine: Agrarian Justice

 

Well, because a land tax is the only tax I can morally justify in some way. If an individual is trying to deny other people access to what nature provided, then those people have a right to demand some kind of compensation, but only where actual scarcity exists. I do not believe in central governments levying a land tax. The central government's revenues should be derived exclusively from tariffs and whatever the states decide to give them. Land taxation is a local issue.

 

See, this is what I don't like about it. Everyone becomes a tenant on the governments land. I actually like all those things you accused of being the reasons I don't like it.

Has anyone done a study, recently, that tries to find out how much revenue this is likely to yield?

 

What difference does that individual not representing a government make?

 

It's mostly a straw man, but I think that list of benefits does deserve a thoughtful response.

 

That list mentioned in the OP is (fairly) legit and worth considering, but that ties into "libertarians hate competition"? Not even worth a thoughtful response.

 

I can get behind a land tax IF the proceeds were distributed evenly to the entire population like Thomas Paine suggested.

Quite frankly, I don't understand why you are calling libertarians out specifically since many of them do in fact see some sense in a land tax and very few support an income tax as you stated. It seems to me that this entire thread is just you assigning positions as you see fit without actually having any reason to do so...

 

I don't know what you mean.

 

Well, you said that you see moral justification in the fact that there is an evil in the owner excluding others from the land.
But under that current system and under a LVT system the land would have one owner and, perhaps, one tenant. Everyone else is excluded either way. Another similarity is that the land goes to the highest bidder in either case. But, then, now I think of a third similarity, which is something of an objection to my objection. It's that, right now, if you don't pay property taxes, the government can take your land. So it pretty much owns it anyway.

 

It's not evil. It just denies those other people their equal right to access what nature has provided. In a stateless society, those individuals would demand compensation of some sort, so a land tax is merely the extension of that natural process. It extends from Locke's maxim. You should only occupy that land that you can work. However, modern technology has made it so one individual could technically "work" vast tracks of land. This is why I feel there is need of some form of land taxation.

Sorry, I don't follow.

 

I use evil comparatively pretty often. When you see it preceded by "an", it does not mean extremely wicked. It just means not good. I really don't how else to explain it. This is the first time I've ever heard anyone say the people would demand compensation for land they don't occupy in a stateless society. How would that work out?

 

When you say that the government will “take your land” you act as if they are intent on keeping that land for their own pleasure. The fact is that even under the current system, the government will try to find a new owner as quick as possible, and that would certainly be the governments intention under a strict land value tax system.