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> A better system imo would require active bidding on scarce resources. If you are not generating wealth with your resource, someone can take it from you by out

> A better system imo would require active bidding on scarce resources. If you are not generating wealth with your resource, someone can take it from you by outbidding the amount of taxes you are paying for it. But its easy to game this system by generating token wealth. For example, if you make it mandatory to keep your houses non-empty, then all you need to do is register a token business and rent your house to that business for a token amount. All you stand to lose is a few hundred dollars of registration fees etc. In some cases, its hard to even know how to generate wealth from the assets (gold, rare paintings...). How will you force people to ensure that they generate wealth from gold, so that its price won't skyrocket during inflationary times? Finally, wealth generation is relative. How can you measure wealth generated in non-monetary terms? Sure, you can "develop" your one acre plot by building more apartments there, but what about the wealth lost by losing a great scenic view of the bay? Why should everything be measured in terms of money?

notahacker 10y ago
I think you're completely missing the OP's point, which is a hypothetical scenario in which all scarce resources like land are effectively leased from the government to the highest bidder, in which case you can keep your houses as empty or full as you like (or bay views as pretty as you like), but if someone is willing to pay the government higher annual fees for the use of the land (or oil, or spectrum) then they get the use of it instead of you. This system comes with its own problems (no incentive to invest in developing a resource if someone can slightly outbid you for its use after you've invested all that cash in improving its potential yields in the long term) but ease of evasion though fake companies and difficulty of establishing how much a resource should yield aren't amongst them.
- Taek 10y ago
  Yes exactly. I'd rather the entity doing the leading not be the government, but I do not know what other entity could. For purely digital resources you could use a blockchain. But digital resources tend not to be scarce.

notahacker 10y ago

I think you're completely missing the OP's point, which is a hypothetical scenario in which all scarce resources like land are effectively leased from the government to the highest bidder, in which case you can keep your houses as empty or full as you like (or bay views as pretty as you like), but if someone is willing to pay the government higher annual fees for the use of the land (or oil, or spectrum) then they get the use of it instead of you. This system comes with its own problems (no incentive to invest in developing a resource if someone can slightly outbid you for its use after you've invested all that cash in improving its potential yields in the long term) but ease of evasion though fake companies and difficulty of establishing how much a resource should yield aren't amongst them.

Taek 10y ago
Yes exactly. I'd rather the entity doing the leading not be the government, but I do not know what other entity could. For purely digital resources you could use a blockchain. But digital resources tend not to be scarce.