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Georgism

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Re: Georgism

#51

Post by MiroF »

CydeWeys wrote: post #32
JSavageOne wrote: post #17

I've yet to see a single valid objection as to why LVT (Land Value Tax) should not be the primary tax, yet it's nowhere to be found in the political dialogue. Such a shame that the majority of the tax burden instead falls on the working class while the landowners get a free ride.

What tax should tech companies pay then, given that the only land they really need is cheap rural land for data centers? This taxation system does make sense for land, but there's way more economic activity happening that isn't associated with land than there is that is.

> there's way more economic activity happening that isn't associated with land than there is that is.

First, that is an actively contested claim. Pointing to tech companies as "way more economic activity" is laughable because (even though they occupy a huge proportion of public discourse) tech companies are a very small percentage of economic activity globally.

Second, intellectual property holdings would be considered "land" in the Georgian sense.

Re: Georgism

#52

Post by thechao »

nabla9 wrote: post #20
alexmingoia wrote: post #11

The problem with georgism is that “unimproved value” is a non-market price. It’s just made up by whoever is appointed assessor. Georgism conflates made up “value” with market “value”. Ultimately some person has to assess the value of the unimproved land, meaning someone anointed to write down whatever number they want. Value is subjective. There is no such thing as “unimproved land value”, unless you’re talking about…

There is brilliant way to solve it so that value and market-value meet. Keep the land always in market. It's called Common Ownership Self-Assessed Tax (COST). Land owner would self-assess the value of assets they possess, pay a tax on that value. The owner would be required to sell the asset to anyone willing to purchase them at this self-assessed price. If you value the land high for any reason and want to keep it,…

This is exactly how non-private copyright & patents should work. That is copyright/patent "for hire" would be COST, with the rate of taxation increasing by a small amount each year until tax rate was 100%. This would given Disney the ability to keep the mouse for 120 years, but also free up less lucrative works for public enjoyment.

Re: Georgism

#53

Post by tlholaday »

alexmingoia wrote: post #39
nabla9 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is brilliant way to solve it so that value and market-value meet. Keep the land always in market. It's called Common Ownership Self-Assessed Tax (COST). Land owner would self-assess the value of assets they possess, pay a tax on that value. The owner would be required to sell the asset to anyone willing to purchase them at this self-assessed price. If you value the land high for any reason and want to keep it,…

Someone being able to take my house or business away at any time because they have more money doesn’t sound brilliant or practical. It’s also not market based at all. Trades are willing.

Yes, trades are willing; and when you turn down a bona-fide offer to buy your house for $X, that is very strong evidence that you value your house at more than $X.

Re: Georgism

#54

Post by xiphias2 »

CydeWeys wrote: post #42
LVTfan wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They generally locate where they can draw on a pool of talented people, and those people are drawn by social amenities, good schools, good infrastructure. All those things contribute to land value.

You're not being concrete. How do you properly tax a tech company whose land allocation is negligible compared to the overall value of the company? Tech companies have less than 1% of their value tied up in land. If they're all-remote and cloud-based, then they have $0 in land. How would you even tax them if the only tax is based on land? Also, I live in an apartment. Should my tax be $0? Or if I owned and lived on l…

The whole point of this tax type is encouraging efficiency. Tech companies are usually efficient, and taxing them less increases their efficiency even more. At the same time their harmful effects should be regulated (GDPR is an example of such regulation).

Countries and states that let tech companies thrive are winning the race for capital.

Re: Georgism

#55

Post by spangry »

acd wrote: post #21

I think commons like fish in the ocean and air quality in cities should be priced. If of you fish its not free you pay to the country whos fish you fish. If the fish is extinct or heavily MSC on the red list the price is sky high in the millions this is to protest the species and our eco system so future generations can enjoy that fish. By pricing eco systems and sustainable common resources. We avoid tragedy of the…

Sounds like you're describing Pigovian taxes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pigovian_tax

Re: Georgism

#56

Post by MiroF »

PeterisP wrote: post #49
JSavageOne wrote: post #17

I've yet to see a single valid objection as to why LVT (Land Value Tax) should not be the primary tax, yet it's nowhere to be found in the political dialogue. Such a shame that the majority of the tax burden instead falls on the working class while the landowners get a free ride.

Some time ago wealth and production of wealth was heavily tied to land, agriculture and various natural resources were key to the wealth of a nation. This is not the case any more - only a tiny fraction of our economy is tied to the land, primary production (agriculture/forestry/fishing and mining including oil) is just a few percent of the total economy; real estate/rents/leasing is perhaps 15% but most of that is r…

"Land" for George is just things you can rent-seek on and are fixed in supply, that includes stuff like intellectual property, etc.

> real estate/rents/leasing is perhaps 15% but most of that is related to the value of buildings, not the value of land.

Not at all clear that most of that is related to the value of the building and also you conveniently neglect to mention that that is the largest share of GDP out of any industry in the world.

Further, land includes a lot more stuff that is not counted in the economic measures you are using. [0]

[0]: https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/03068290...

Re: Georgism

#57

Post by grey-area »

rikroots wrote: post #4

Back in a different life, I worked on the Lyons Inquiry which looked at English Local Government finances. Final report was issued in 2007[1]. As part of the work we had to look into Land Value Taxes as a supplement/alternative to Council Tax and Business Rates. There's nothing wrong with the idea. The big issues were mainly around introducing a new tax system and the massive upheavals and uncertainties businesses an…

Why tax capital instead if income?

The reason to do so is because it reduces inequality and leads to a fairer society.

Re: Georgism

#58

Post by LVTfan »

alexmingoia wrote: post #25
JSavageOne wrote: post #17

I've yet to see a single valid objection as to why LVT (Land Value Tax) should not be the primary tax, yet it's nowhere to be found in the political dialogue. Such a shame that the majority of the tax burden instead falls on the working class while the landowners get a free ride.

Land value (like all value) is subjective. There is no inherent value to land. What one person is willing to pay is not the same for everyone. Appointing someone to imagine a price for the purposes of taxation doesn't change this fact.

Every teardown provides a clear picture of the land value for that neighborhood: the transaction price plus the cost of clearing off the old building. The similar sized lot next door is worth just as much. And the value of whatever improvement is on it is the difference between what the building-plus-land is currently worth, and the value of the land -- pretty much the depreciated value of the existing improvements.

Map these values, and you have a pretty good tool for good land assessments. And for lots a wider or narrower, or deeper or shallower, there have been very usable tables for over 100 years. NYC was doing this in the first decade of the 20th century.

A tax on land values asks us to pay to exclude others from our site. In the middle of nowhere, that price can be $0. On valuable sites, it can be quite high.

Today, a lot of city land is leased, and the tenant pays the landlord for the use of the land. The higgling of the market sets the price. There is a lot of revenue potential there, and collecting it for public purposes doesn't take from anyone something he created.

And that can't be said for sales taxes, or wage taxes, or taxes on buildings.

Re: Georgism

#59

Post by snidane »

alexmingoia wrote: post #25
JSavageOne wrote: post #17

I've yet to see a single valid objection as to why LVT (Land Value Tax) should not be the primary tax, yet it's nowhere to be found in the political dialogue. Such a shame that the majority of the tax burden instead falls on the working class while the landowners get a free ride.

Land value (like all value) is subjective. There is no inherent value to land. What one person is willing to pay is not the same for everyone. Appointing someone to imagine a price for the purposes of taxation doesn't change this fact.

Property taxes are bad because they punish labor and effort.

Land tax (important to distinguish) doesn't inhibit labor and effort. On the contrary cities implementing land taxes see increase in output because land gets better allocated to who need it. Simply because people sitting on vacant and absent land in the middle od cities drop it and sell it somebody else.

Land is not subjective but perfectly objective. It is a necessary input to all production - whether it is agricultural (obvious) or manufacturing (your factory has to be placed somewhere) or services (you need access to concentrated area for qualified workers in big cities).

You can't even survive without standing on land.

100% of people need land to survive so how can it be subjective? It might be subjective to birds.

Re: Georgism

#60

Post by andrepd »

geofft wrote: post #31
oDot wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It actually makes much more sense to use a uniform sales tax: (1) If you spend more, you're taxed more. Obviously this is better for poorer people, who spend less, but also for rich yet reserved people, who keep most of their money in the bank (which lends it) and are earning an income (=productive). Both will not penalized. (2) It's much hard to raise, because people will just stop buying stuff, which is much easier…

> rich yet reserved people, who keep most of their money in the bank (which lends it) and are earning an income (=productive) ... will not penalized. This goes against just about every standard defense of the ability to be rich: that rich people are job creators, that they power the economy by buying things, etc. Why should we discourage them from employing people and buying things? I don't want a loan (that needs to…

Replace "the rich" with "Lords" and your post is an adequate defense of feudal society. In other words, you're thinking "inside" the system, i.e. justifying the system with itself.
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