4 ms·

This would be a great way to destroy (privately held) farms and significantly, permanently raise food prices.

throwaway894345 4y ago
While incentivizing denser factory farms over free range. Similarly, it incentivizes higher-yield GMOs over organic/local. I’ve been seeing a lot of this pro-density stuff pop up and it seems like urbanites trying to solve for urban problems on a national level despite that much of the nation doesn’t have urban problems. See also the various anti-car/everyone-should-bike-everywhere debates.
- Spooky23 4y ago
  It’s not even that. LVT is one of these magical solutions to problems similar to the gold standard for goldbugs. The reality is that it’s a highly regressive tax. Taxes shouldn’t be a prime driver of economic activity.
- larsiusprime 4y ago
  Have you actually run the numbers? Land value tax would most likely reduce the taxes on most farms, the vast majority of land value is concentrated in urban spaces. The majority of farmland is almost certainly getting a tax break under a land value tax regime, especially if its used to offset existing sales and income tax. Further, while land value tax would reduce the average tax burden on the average farmer, it would change the incentives because it would make passively holding onto land less valuable of an activity on the margin even if there's a net savings to the average farmer. I'm not a fan of factory farming either, but the point you're missing is that the kind of agricultural strategy you and I don't like optimizes NOT for highest yield per acre, but highest yield per dollar of input. Efficiency is not mono-dimensional, it's not about "more efficiency" it's about "more efficient AT WHAT." And what industrial farming is efficient at is not using money and not using human labor. One of the chief ways it does this is externalizing most of its costs (pesticides, herbicides, runoff, erosion, antibiotics, etc), and grabbing up more land to make up for its lower per-acre efficiency.
  - throwaway894345 4y ago
    Whether it reduces tax depends on the specific tax rates. I’m not inquiring about whether it will reduce or increase taxes for farmers, but what kind of farming it incentivizes. If your taxes increase per unit land area, it incentivizes higher density agriculture which is generally going to lean more on chemicals and antibiotics (organic and free range). Unless LVT also increases the costs of inputs and labor, I don’t see how it could possibly incentivize better farming practices.
    - tome 4y ago
      > Whether it reduces tax depends on the specific tax rates. Well, of course, but surely the comparison is with regard to total tax receipts.
ItsMonkk 4y ago
Land taxers believe in the removal of income and property taxes. Since farm land is (pardon the pun) dirt cheap, the tax money that they would have to pay for that land would be low. So long as the farm is in rural territory, the average farmer would have lower taxes than currently.
- s1artibartfast 4y ago
  This is only true if the tax doesn't account for improvements to the land. If you clear, level, and plant the land, it is suddenly more valuable. Alternatively, If you pay to bring an aqueduct into a desert, it is vastly more valuable.
  - pyradius 4y ago
    Yes, Land Value Taxers would exempt improvements. Notably, "The Greening of the California Desert" was financed with Land Value Taxes and "A significant amendment to the Wright Act also embodies the ideas of Henry George. The revised act exempted "all trees, vines, alfalfa, growing crops and all the structures of whatever class or description," from taxation. The full cost of the irrigation systems to be built would fall on the land, not the improvements. Small farmers could take control of their destiny and bring water to their farms." https://www.henrygeorge.org/caldes.htm https://www.henrygeorge.org/caldes.htm
    - s1artibartfast 4y ago
      Some Land value taxers would exempt improvements. however, in practice, it is very difficult separate the hypothetical pre-improvement value from market value. Imagine trying to asses the value of a modern farm today for the hypothetical where a connecting aqueduct had not been built 70 years ago. Exempting improvements also undermines the argument that LVT puts the land to it's best possible use. When you improve land, the best possible use is now different. ostensibly, that's why you improved it in the first place.
      - ItsMonkk 4y ago
throw0101a 4y ago
This can be accounted for: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenbelt_(Golden_Horseshoe) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenbelt_(Golden_Horseshoe)
noahtallen 4y ago
It seems like you’re assuming farmers don’t get taxed on land. According to a brief Google search, “Nationally, 1.9 million farms paid $9.4 billion in property taxes.” The question would be whether removing that in favor of a land tax would really change that. I’m not sure it would make it worse, given that there are (relatively speaking) fewer “property” improvements on top of the land in a farm. Either way, I don’t think this is a fair reason to dismiss LVT outright, as it completely depends on the implementation.
- gravypod 4y ago
  > It seems like you’re assuming farmers don’t get taxed on land. According to a brief Google search, “Nationally, 1.9 million farms paid $9.4 billion in property taxes.” So, for all of the farm land we average to ~5k/farmer? It sounds like what is being discussed in this thread is a tax that would be debilitating to the land speculation market. 5k would not prevent a speculator from holding a plot of land.

While incentivizing denser factory farms over free range. Similarly, it incentivizes higher-yield GMOs over organic/local. I’ve been seeing a lot of this pro-density stuff pop up and it seems like urbanites trying to solve for urban problems on a national level despite that much of the nation doesn’t have urban problems. See also the various anti-car/everyone-should-bike-everywhere debates.

Spooky23 4y ago
It’s not even that. LVT is one of these magical solutions to problems similar to the gold standard for goldbugs. The reality is that it’s a highly regressive tax. Taxes shouldn’t be a prime driver of economic activity.
larsiusprime 4y ago
Have you actually run the numbers? Land value tax would most likely reduce the taxes on most farms, the vast majority of land value is concentrated in urban spaces. The majority of farmland is almost certainly getting a tax break under a land value tax regime, especially if its used to offset existing sales and income tax. Further, while land value tax would reduce the average tax burden on the average farmer, it would change the incentives because it would make passively holding onto land less valuable of an activity on the margin even if there's a net savings to the average farmer. I'm not a fan of factory farming either, but the point you're missing is that the kind of agricultural strategy you and I don't like optimizes NOT for highest yield per acre, but highest yield per dollar of input. Efficiency is not mono-dimensional, it's not about "more efficiency" it's about "more efficient AT WHAT." And what industrial farming is efficient at is not using money and not using human labor. One of the chief ways it does this is externalizing most of its costs (pesticides, herbicides, runoff, erosion, antibiotics, etc), and grabbing up more land to make up for its lower per-acre efficiency.
- throwaway894345 4y ago
  Whether it reduces tax depends on the specific tax rates. I’m not inquiring about whether it will reduce or increase taxes for farmers, but what kind of farming it incentivizes. If your taxes increase per unit land area, it incentivizes higher density agriculture which is generally going to lean more on chemicals and antibiotics (organic and free range). Unless LVT also increases the costs of inputs and labor, I don’t see how it could possibly incentivize better farming practices.
  - tome 4y ago
    > Whether it reduces tax depends on the specific tax rates. Well, of course, but surely the comparison is with regard to total tax receipts.

ItsMonkk 4y ago

Land taxers believe in the removal of income and property taxes. Since farm land is (pardon the pun) dirt cheap, the tax money that they would have to pay for that land would be low. So long as the farm is in rural territory, the average farmer would have lower taxes than currently.

s1artibartfast 4y ago
This is only true if the tax doesn't account for improvements to the land. If you clear, level, and plant the land, it is suddenly more valuable. Alternatively, If you pay to bring an aqueduct into a desert, it is vastly more valuable.
- pyradius 4y ago
  Yes, Land Value Taxers would exempt improvements. Notably, "The Greening of the California Desert" was financed with Land Value Taxes and "A significant amendment to the Wright Act also embodies the ideas of Henry George. The revised act exempted "all trees, vines, alfalfa, growing crops and all the structures of whatever class or description," from taxation. The full cost of the irrigation systems to be built would fall on the land, not the improvements. Small farmers could take control of their destiny and bring water to their farms." https://www.henrygeorge.org/caldes.htm https://www.henrygeorge.org/caldes.htm
  - s1artibartfast 4y ago
    Some Land value taxers would exempt improvements. however, in practice, it is very difficult separate the hypothetical pre-improvement value from market value. Imagine trying to asses the value of a modern farm today for the hypothetical where a connecting aqueduct had not been built 70 years ago. Exempting improvements also undermines the argument that LVT puts the land to it's best possible use. When you improve land, the best possible use is now different. ostensibly, that's why you improved it in the first place.
    - ItsMonkk 4y ago

throw0101a 4y ago

This can be accounted for: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenbelt_(Golden_Horseshoe) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenbelt_(Golden_Horseshoe)

noahtallen 4y ago

It seems like you’re assuming farmers don’t get taxed on land. According to a brief Google search, “Nationally, 1.9 million farms paid $9.4 billion in property taxes.” The question would be whether removing that in favor of a land tax would really change that. I’m not sure it would make it worse, given that there are (relatively speaking) fewer “property” improvements on top of the land in a farm. Either way, I don’t think this is a fair reason to dismiss LVT outright, as it completely depends on the implementation.

gravypod 4y ago
> It seems like you’re assuming farmers don’t get taxed on land. According to a brief Google search, “Nationally, 1.9 million farms paid $9.4 billion in property taxes.” So, for all of the farm land we average to ~5k/farmer? It sounds like what is being discussed in this thread is a tax that would be debilitating to the land speculation market. 5k would not prevent a speculator from holding a plot of land.