These massive land holdings are the best possible use for a "Harberger Tax", also known as the Weyl-Posner " Common Ownership Self-Assessed Tax (COST)." The id

These massive land holdings are the best possible use for a "Harberger Tax", also known as the Weyl-Posner " Common Ownership Self-Assessed Tax (COST)." The idea for these taxes is that one self-assesses the value of a good (in this case, land), and the tax is levied on that self assessed value...but one must sell if somebody offers to buy the good at that value. The problem with these taxes is that, in general, we want people to be able to enjoy a consumer surplus from owning or improving land. There's an alternative where the value at which sale is compulsory is a multiple of the self-assessed value, and the multiple decreases with time, so that after some number of years the multiple is 1, ie a pure Harberger tax. Looking at this list, it's incredible that most of this land is owned by a "____ Family" or "_____ Heirs" (the Kennedy's are on the list!) A Harberger tax would make these families pay much higher taxes for the privilege of owning it generationally.