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Thomas Piketty’s Radical Plan to Redistribute Wealth

nytimes.com

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Re: Thomas Piketty’s Radical Plan to Redistribute Wealth

#61

Post by endisneigh »

pydry wrote: post #58
endisneigh wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how Georgism solves anything. You need a government to enforce taxation - said government is profiting off unimproved land. Said governments colonize and take others land with force.

Governments that tax unimproved land can reduce taxes on income and spending. Point being that society loses nothing by increasing taxes on unimproved land except an opportunity for parasitic wealth extraction whereas by taxing spending you lose valuable and productive economic activity. For the greatest political impact the money from a land value tax should initially be given to poverty stricken pensioners.

Let's say you taxed unimproved land at 1000%. What's the result? No one will hold it. OK, great you say. The government won't develop it. It'll sit there, owned by the government, unimproved.

Great. What has been accomplished exactly? Georgism is not the solution. Relaxing zoning laws and bureaucracy is. Private money already wants to develop their unimproved land if it's economical to do so. If it's not, taxing them more won't accomplish anything other than result in the land going back to the government, who will do nothing (historically) with it.

Re: Thomas Piketty’s Radical Plan to Redistribute Wealth

#62

Post by tharne »

endisneigh wrote: post #55
rgrieselhuber wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And who gets to decide what inequality is and why?

Good question - who should? Democratically decided upon I suppose?

That just sounds like a form of mob rule. That's why most democratic countries have some basic rights enshrined in a constitution rather than dependent on the will of the voters.

Re: Thomas Piketty’s Radical Plan to Redistribute Wealth

#63

Post by twblalock »

epgui wrote: post #51

I often really like this community, but I have found people here especially prone to falling to the "meritocracy trap". ie.: believing they are mostly where they are because of ability, worthiness or hard work, rather than mostly luck. That's really unfortunate, and results in a lot of non-self-aware political bickering.

On the contrary, the view that life outcomes are due to circumstances and luck leads to the denigration of success and competition, abdication of responsibility for one's life choices, and ultimately to really bad economic policy that will make everyone worse off.

We now see this kind of thing even infecting our education system, and it's driving a lot of liberal people to the political right. Look at how Asian American voters acted in the recent San Francisco school board recall, for example. (Also: try telling those people that their success in our society is due to luck, even though they came here in poverty and were discriminated against every step of the way...)

Re: Thomas Piketty’s Radical Plan to Redistribute Wealth

#64

Post by tharne »

pasquinelli wrote: post #10
colechristensen wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reduce rent seeking, promote local agriculture university outreach programs, gently trim back on waste, promote competition in stagnated fields. There’s not a radical solution where something bold needs to be done. There’s a lot of mundane progress that needs to be done, but before it’s done it needs to be identified and prioritized.

a real attempt to reduce rent seeking would probably lead to civil war.

> a real attempt to reduce rent seeking would probably lead to civil war.

Agreed, but a failure to reduce it would probably lead to the same thing eventually.

Re: Thomas Piketty’s Radical Plan to Redistribute Wealth

#65

Post by endisneigh »

mijamo wrote: post #60
endisneigh wrote: post #43

Is there a single example in history where income redistribution worked while it was also easy for foreigners to enter the country and growth persisted for everyone while maintaining said ratios of acceptable inequality? - If you don't allow foreigners, I'll argue that you haven't solved anything. You've simple picked the winners. - If the ratio of inequality is disrupted, I'd also argue you haven't done anything oth…

Is there a single example of any modern rich country where it is easy to enter?

The United States is relatively easy to enter. It's also relatively easy to enter China on a worker permit (not permanent resident).

Re: Thomas Piketty’s Radical Plan to Redistribute Wealth

#66

Post by twblalock »

pydry wrote: post #58
endisneigh wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how Georgism solves anything. You need a government to enforce taxation - said government is profiting off unimproved land. Said governments colonize and take others land with force.

Governments that tax unimproved land can reduce taxes on income and spending. Point being that society loses nothing by increasing taxes on unimproved land except an opportunity for parasitic wealth extraction whereas by taxing spending you lose valuable and productive economic activity. For the greatest political impact the money from a land value tax should initially be given to poverty stricken pensioners.

The government is always the biggest obstacle to improving land. People try very hard to improve their land and the government puts up tons of red tape. We need less government involvement, not more, and certainly not more in the form of a harebrained utopian scheme like Georgism.

Re: Thomas Piketty’s Radical Plan to Redistribute Wealth

#67

Post by twblalock »

zach_garwood wrote: post #18
xhkkffbf wrote: post #3

[flagged]

Musk is a bad example, he didn't actually invent or develop those things you mentioned, he just acts as the figurehead. If he disappeared today, the only thing we would miss would be his hot Twitter takes.

Tesla would have gone out of business years ago if Musk hadn't been running it. His leadership of the company, his wealth, and his showmanship and thirst for publicity have been essential. So what if he wasn't one of the founders?

Re: Thomas Piketty’s Radical Plan to Redistribute Wealth

#68

Post by epgui »

twblalock wrote: post #63
epgui wrote: post #51

I often really like this community, but I have found people here especially prone to falling to the "meritocracy trap". ie.: believing they are mostly where they are because of ability, worthiness or hard work, rather than mostly luck. That's really unfortunate, and results in a lot of non-self-aware political bickering.

On the contrary, the view that life outcomes are due to circumstances and luck leads to the denigration of success and competition, abdication of responsibility for one's life choices, and ultimately to really bad economic policy that will make everyone worse off. We now see this kind of thing even infecting our education system, and it's driving a lot of liberal people to the political right. Look at how Asian Ameri…

On the contrary, the only way to be successful while not putting in a lot of hard work, is to start off from a very fortunate place.

The idea is that we want the system to be more meritocratic, and that a good place to start is to acknowledge that it's currently not as meritocratic as we tend to think. That's what the "meritocratic trap" is: thinking we have meritocracy when we don't.

Re: Thomas Piketty’s Radical Plan to Redistribute Wealth

#69

Post by pydry »

endisneigh wrote: post #61
pydry wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Governments that tax unimproved land can reduce taxes on income and spending. Point being that society loses nothing by increasing taxes on unimproved land except an opportunity for parasitic wealth extraction whereas by taxing spending you lose valuable and productive economic activity. For the greatest political impact the money from a land value tax should initially be given to poverty stricken pensioners.

Let's say you taxed unimproved land at 1000%. What's the result? No one will hold it. OK, great you say. The government won't develop it. It'll sit there, owned by the government, unimproved. Great. What has been accomplished exactly? Georgism is not the solution. Relaxing zoning laws and bureaucracy is. Private money already wants to develop their unimproved land if it's economical to do so. If it's not, taxing them…

I dont believe anybody has ever suggested taxing it above 100%.

100% is the level whereby 100% of the profit a landlord makes will be due to the quality of the improvements and 0% will be due to land speculation.

A landlord owning a shitty building in a hot location will lose money. Hopefully a lot. That is by design. They sell up, somebody demolishes it and builds something better and denser and therefore makes a profit.

>Private money already wants to develop their unimproved land

All the private money in the world isnt enough to convince land owners in San Francisco to demolish their low density housing and build high density housing to accomodate all the people who want to live there.

Tax them on the land and not only will they stop NIMBYing private money at every opportunity theyll sell up gladly to property developers to avoid paying their eye watering LVT bill.

Re: Thomas Piketty’s Radical Plan to Redistribute Wealth

#70

Post by endisneigh »

pydry wrote: post #69
endisneigh wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's say you taxed unimproved land at 1000%. What's the result? No one will hold it. OK, great you say. The government won't develop it. It'll sit there, owned by the government, unimproved. Great. What has been accomplished exactly? Georgism is not the solution. Relaxing zoning laws and bureaucracy is. Private money already wants to develop their unimproved land if it's economical to do so. If it's not, taxing them…

I dont believe anybody has ever suggested taxing it above 100%. 100% is the level whereby 100% of the profit a landlord makes will be due to the quality of the improvements and 0% will be due to land speculation. A landlord owning a shitty building in a hot location will lose money. Hopefully a lot. That is by design. They sell up, somebody demolishes it and builds something better and denser and therefore makes a pr…

> All the private money in the world isnt convincing land owners in San Francisco to demolish and build apartment blocks to accomodate demand.

This has nothing to do with tax. Just change the laws. smh.

Plenty of people want to develop their land in San Francisco. Here's one example: https://reason.com/2018/02/21/san-francisco-man-has-spent-4-...

Again, private money already wants to develop. Taxation is not necessary. Remove the red tape. Government involvement is the problem not the solution.

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