Re: Land tax -- the Hudson/Gaffney challenge (Re: better tax code: no income tax, head tax (&| ppty t)
- From: Les Cargill <lcargill@xxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Wed, 19 Mar 2008 00:29:31 -0400
RogerDodger wrote:
On Sat, 1 Mar 2008 01:41:25 +0100, ask@xxxxxx (PeterBP) wrote:<snip>
Why is it any harder to hide rent to land than to buildings or
anything else, when it is profitable to do so? It's even easier,
because land value can be and *is* shifted to buildings.
Why is it impossible to hide only rent to land? Please explain.
Georgists seem to think that by purportedly taxing "land" they
actually are taxing land itself -- but they are taxing only
contractual arrangements.
They are taxing land *rent* - the accrued increase in value
over time of a position due to network effects surrounding
that location. This is a positive externality created by
a community.
There's no particular contractual arrangement here. *As I understand it*
( and my understanding is in no way carefully vetted ), all
land is held in trust by the government, for lack of a better term.
A person cannot form a contract to sell that which he does not
own. I dunno if his license ( see below ) would be transferrable,
or what. I suspect it would simply end the license and a new
one be issued to the next occupier. This isn't that
far off a quitclaim deed in real estate.
This trust is administered by a board, which has employees that
execute the policies of the board. The trust tried to optimize
revenue, putting transactions with it in the realm of standard
price theory mechanisms.
Land use is licensed to a bidder who agrees to pay historically appropriate land rent charges for use of it. Improvements remain
as property of whoever puts them in or would convey with a new
tenant. The license works out like a long-term lease.
The Henry George Theorem states that aggregate government
spending will equal land rent. It's been shown to be roughly
true empirically, although it can break down under some conditions
(no, I don't have a comprehensive idea of what they are ).
<snip>
--
Les Cargill
.
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