3 ms·

Agricultural land is of low value compared to urban land. And this policy would remove or at least offset the income and sales taxes that fall directly upon far

• opportune 5y ago
  Agricultural land is low value per sq ft but not low value in itself. For example the article (read it last night) says agricultural land is worth $3k/acre or thereabouts. So a small 100 acre farm is worth about $300k, though I’m sure it can be $1m in areas good for farming and $100k in arid areas. A lot of people own a lot of farmland but just for leasing to actual farmers (so the entirety of the income of the property is land rent, as opposed to a regular landlord who also collects building rent). Because the only use-value of the land is land rent, under Georgian the exchange-value of the land on the open market essentially becomes $0. The exchange value is then just a bidding mechanism for who gets to use the land. There is basically no longer any reason at all to hold the land and lease it. I think that’s good overall because I agree with the author and George himself that rentiership is destructive and warps the economy. However, you are instantly making an asset worthless. This affects not only farm-landlords but also owner-farmers who now own worthless - in the sense it has little price on the open market - land. It seems like a great idea overall but so painful in the short term that it’s a non starter politically.