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Thomas Paine wrote an excellent essay on this concept back in the day. It is worth reading: https://www.ssa.gov/history/paine4.html https://www.ssa.gov/histor
by bcheung 11y ago
Thomas Paine wrote an excellent essay on this concept back in the day. It is worth reading:
https://www.ssa.gov/history/paine4.html https://www.ssa.gov/history/paine4.html
You might want to look into Georgism and Geolibertarianism as well.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geolibertarianism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geolibertarianism
The basic premise of all these is that land and natural resources can not be owned. If you want to use them you have to rent / buy rights to them. That rent goes into a basic fund that is then used for basic income. The basic argument is that land belongs to everyone, so everyone should get an equal share of the rent from the land.
- jqm 11y agoI believe that is the solution to the problem and I'm not sure why others don't see it. Stop taxing labor. It's counterproductive. Tax what really does belong to everyone... the land and raw materials. This approach (in addition to more morally just in my estimation) would have the added benefit of built in environmentalism. There would be a financial incentive to do more with less, to conserve and to recycle.
- usrusr 11y agoI certainly see why the idea of putting the whole tax burden on land and raw materials could be appealing to people who are making software. It's difficult to make a compelling argument for change when one is so clearly on the winning side of it (which I dare to assume, given the HN demographic).
- jqm 11y agoAgreed on benefit to the group. But that doesn't mean it wouldn't also be a vast improvement for society in general. Because one stands to gain from an idea doesn't in and of itself make the idea a bad one.