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Land and property improvements are already taxed (at least everywhere I’ve lived in the USA); I see no logical cause and effect relationships between the additi

Land and property improvements are already taxed (at least everywhere I’ve lived in the USA); I see no logical cause and effect relationships between the additional tax proposal and the alleged problems (nimby-ism) it is supposed to address.

larsiusprime 4y ago
Here's some empirical research for you then: http://gameofrent.com/content/is-land-a-big-deal http://gameofrent.com/content/is-land-a-big-deal Additionally, property tax rates vary massively from state to state and there's pretty strong correlation between property tax rates and housing supply and housing affordability. The legacy of California's Proposition 13 and its effects on housing supply are very well studied. Property tax still has inefficiencies (it can punish someone who builds relative to someone who holds an empty lot), and Land Value tax would be more efficient in aligning incentives properly.
- stevenalowe 4y ago
  Thanks for the link! Here’s an equally wordy refutation of Georgism https://dailyanarchist.com/2012/06/12/what-is-georgism-followed-by-a-refutation-part-i/ https://dailyanarchist.com/2012/06/12/what-is-georgism-follo...
  - brightly-salty 4y ago
    I read through it and didn't see any refutation, just a description of the historical movement. At least to my understanding, mutualists like Benjamin Tucker have historically agreed with Georgist philosophy to a great extent, including breaking the monopoly on land.
    - geocon 4y ago
      I think he's talking about the second part, which I found linked wayyyyy at the bottom: https://dailyanarchist.com/2012/06/21/the-single-tax-a-refutation/comment-page-1/ https://dailyanarchist.com/2012/06/21/the-single-tax-a-refut... That said I don't find this to be particularly convincing, given that they have mixed up labor and land, as well as failing to remember that Georgists are concerned with the benefit of land ownership (that is, rents) not the thing itself. The remainder is standard anarchist criticism of the state, which is fine I suppose if you are an anarchist but I don't think will convince anyone else (and I am not an anarchist)
    - pyradius 4y ago
      Tucker was no friend of George's but the anarchist worldview doesn't really hold up to any serious scrutiny. https://cooperative-individualism.org/andelson-robert_critics-of-henry-george-1979-16-ingalls-by-jack-schwartzman.pdf https://cooperative-individualism.org/andelson-robert_critic... "The anarchists' vagueness in attempting to define occupancy and use was best exemplified in the correspondence between Tucker and Stephen Byington (who subsequently became a "disciple" of Tucker's). Byington wanted to know what would happen to occupiers of land or buildings when they would be away from their premises for a period of time. Tucker, reducing his answer to an absurdity, replied that the very last user and occupier would not only lose his land but his personal property as well." These are not serious worldviews.
      - soSadm4n 4y ago
        > These are not serious worldviews. Relativity. You have spent years hearing views that are contrary to Tucker. Of course they seem insincere and worth scoffing at. Making the entire premise unfalsifiable and hewing to hand me down gossip from the past, as if it has a monopoly on “greater good”. Meat based tape recorders rambling inanity of the dead. You should look into squatters rights. Tuckers view is alive and well in some forms in our society. It’s hardly resulted in physics inverting. Vain people defending hand me down story regarding private property on the other hand tends to result in a whole lot of atrocity.
  - scythe 4y ago
    Is this the kind of critique you're looking for? >A common explanation of Georgism’s failure is that the philosophy itself is flawed and, ultimately, would strengthen collectivism and the state, not individualism. In this vein Tucker asked a fundamental question: How can a collective like society own land if such ownership is improper for individuals? Either land could be owned by an individual — and, thus, sold or transferred to another individual — or it was not subject to ownership at all. He considered collective ownership to be a contradiction in terms. Or, as Tucker might ask, “Can I sell my share? No? Then I don’t own it either individually or as part of a collective.” >It is to such critiques of Georgism that Part II of this article will turn. Granted, that might be a good criticism of Georgism from the perspective of a committed anarchist, but I was expecting, you know, economics.
    - yellowapple 4y ago
      Such a critique also misses the point of Georgism. A land value tax is pointless if there's no state, because without a state there's no private ownership of land in the first place. Georgism is a reaction to statism - that is, if there's going to be a state using its monopoly on violence to enforce exclusive claims of ownership over that state's sovereign territory, then such statism should at the absolute least benefit society as a whole instead of only benefiting landowners at everyone else's expense.
- Hellbanevil 4y ago
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
geocon 4y ago
Well, land and property taxes are not the same- the notable difference being that property taxes penalize building/remodeling/additional construction and so forth. A big part of addressing NIMBYism is to remove the economic incentives for it, a lot of which is attempting to profit off of increasing land values, which is much harder with an LVT- so shifting the way that people think about housing, away from investment and towards a consumer good, goes a long way. Even beyond NIMBYism treating housing as a method for household wealthbuilding causes problems.
- stevenalowe 4y ago
  The NIMBYism I've noticed - a small subset, to be sure - would not be affected by any tax. People don't want mass housing, prisons, or industries in their neighborhood because of the increased risks (traffic, crime, pollution, etc.) and inconvenience, not just the effects on property values. Adding another tax solves nothing.
  - bobthepanda 4y ago
    Part of how LVT "solves" this is that if you really don't want to develop your property to the point that the market thinks it can handle, you have to put your money where your mouth is to enforce NIMBYism, since the land tax of developing vs not developing would be the same.
    - notahacker 4y ago
      Frankly, people are already giving up moneymaking opportunities by not turning their literal own backyard into a multistorey apartment development or glue factory where permitted. LVT doesn't radically alter that, just adds a stick incentive as well as a carrot incentive Usually the obstacle is they're not permitted to, not least because the neighbours don't want it. LVT doesn't solve the neighbours not wanting it - at best they get a small tax reduction but they still live next door to a glue factory and will lose money selling their house. For some things it makes it worse: now people protest against mass transit they don't think they'll hear or will bring the "wrong sort of people" into the neighbourhood because land near a transit hub will be in a higher tax bracket. And if LVT is assessed on development potential of the land, homeowners that dont want to sell to developers should absolutely love some more restrictive covenants on the neighbourhood that mean the nice plot they live on is no longer classed as suitable to build anything bigger than the house they already live in.
SilasX 4y ago
Improvements are taxed well above the Georgist level (0%), and land well below the Georgist level (80%+ depending on who you ask).

larsiusprime 4y ago

Here's some empirical research for you then: http://gameofrent.com/content/is-land-a-big-deal http://gameofrent.com/content/is-land-a-big-deal Additionally, property tax rates vary massively from state to state and there's pretty strong correlation between property tax rates and housing supply and housing affordability. The legacy of California's Proposition 13 and its effects on housing supply are very well studied. Property tax still has inefficiencies (it can punish someone who builds relative to someone who holds an empty lot), and Land Value tax would be more efficient in aligning incentives properly.

stevenalowe 4y ago
Thanks for the link! Here’s an equally wordy refutation of Georgism https://dailyanarchist.com/2012/06/12/what-is-georgism-followed-by-a-refutation-part-i/ https://dailyanarchist.com/2012/06/12/what-is-georgism-follo...
- brightly-salty 4y ago
  I read through it and didn't see any refutation, just a description of the historical movement. At least to my understanding, mutualists like Benjamin Tucker have historically agreed with Georgist philosophy to a great extent, including breaking the monopoly on land.
  - geocon 4y ago
    I think he's talking about the second part, which I found linked wayyyyy at the bottom: https://dailyanarchist.com/2012/06/21/the-single-tax-a-refutation/comment-page-1/ https://dailyanarchist.com/2012/06/21/the-single-tax-a-refut... That said I don't find this to be particularly convincing, given that they have mixed up labor and land, as well as failing to remember that Georgists are concerned with the benefit of land ownership (that is, rents) not the thing itself. The remainder is standard anarchist criticism of the state, which is fine I suppose if you are an anarchist but I don't think will convince anyone else (and I am not an anarchist)
  - pyradius 4y ago
    Tucker was no friend of George's but the anarchist worldview doesn't really hold up to any serious scrutiny. https://cooperative-individualism.org/andelson-robert_critics-of-henry-george-1979-16-ingalls-by-jack-schwartzman.pdf https://cooperative-individualism.org/andelson-robert_critic... "The anarchists' vagueness in attempting to define occupancy and use was best exemplified in the correspondence between Tucker and Stephen Byington (who subsequently became a "disciple" of Tucker's). Byington wanted to know what would happen to occupiers of land or buildings when they would be away from their premises for a period of time. Tucker, reducing his answer to an absurdity, replied that the very last user and occupier would not only lose his land but his personal property as well." These are not serious worldviews.
    - soSadm4n 4y ago
      > These are not serious worldviews. Relativity. You have spent years hearing views that are contrary to Tucker. Of course they seem insincere and worth scoffing at. Making the entire premise unfalsifiable and hewing to hand me down gossip from the past, as if it has a monopoly on “greater good”. Meat based tape recorders rambling inanity of the dead. You should look into squatters rights. Tuckers view is alive and well in some forms in our society. It’s hardly resulted in physics inverting. Vain people defending hand me down story regarding private property on the other hand tends to result in a whole lot of atrocity.
- scythe 4y ago
  Is this the kind of critique you're looking for? >A common explanation of Georgism’s failure is that the philosophy itself is flawed and, ultimately, would strengthen collectivism and the state, not individualism. In this vein Tucker asked a fundamental question: How can a collective like society own land if such ownership is improper for individuals? Either land could be owned by an individual — and, thus, sold or transferred to another individual — or it was not subject to ownership at all. He considered collective ownership to be a contradiction in terms. Or, as Tucker might ask, “Can I sell my share? No? Then I don’t own it either individually or as part of a collective.” >It is to such critiques of Georgism that Part II of this article will turn. Granted, that might be a good criticism of Georgism from the perspective of a committed anarchist, but I was expecting, you know, economics.
  - yellowapple 4y ago
    Such a critique also misses the point of Georgism. A land value tax is pointless if there's no state, because without a state there's no private ownership of land in the first place. Georgism is a reaction to statism - that is, if there's going to be a state using its monopoly on violence to enforce exclusive claims of ownership over that state's sovereign territory, then such statism should at the absolute least benefit society as a whole instead of only benefiting landowners at everyone else's expense.
Hellbanevil 4y ago

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

geocon 4y ago

Well, land and property taxes are not the same- the notable difference being that property taxes penalize building/remodeling/additional construction and so forth. A big part of addressing NIMBYism is to remove the economic incentives for it, a lot of which is attempting to profit off of increasing land values, which is much harder with an LVT- so shifting the way that people think about housing, away from investment and towards a consumer good, goes a long way. Even beyond NIMBYism treating housing as a method for household wealthbuilding causes problems.

stevenalowe 4y ago
The NIMBYism I've noticed - a small subset, to be sure - would not be affected by any tax. People don't want mass housing, prisons, or industries in their neighborhood because of the increased risks (traffic, crime, pollution, etc.) and inconvenience, not just the effects on property values. Adding another tax solves nothing.
- bobthepanda 4y ago
  Part of how LVT "solves" this is that if you really don't want to develop your property to the point that the market thinks it can handle, you have to put your money where your mouth is to enforce NIMBYism, since the land tax of developing vs not developing would be the same.
  - notahacker 4y ago
    Frankly, people are already giving up moneymaking opportunities by not turning their literal own backyard into a multistorey apartment development or glue factory where permitted. LVT doesn't radically alter that, just adds a stick incentive as well as a carrot incentive Usually the obstacle is they're not permitted to, not least because the neighbours don't want it. LVT doesn't solve the neighbours not wanting it - at best they get a small tax reduction but they still live next door to a glue factory and will lose money selling their house. For some things it makes it worse: now people protest against mass transit they don't think they'll hear or will bring the "wrong sort of people" into the neighbourhood because land near a transit hub will be in a higher tax bracket. And if LVT is assessed on development potential of the land, homeowners that dont want to sell to developers should absolutely love some more restrictive covenants on the neighbourhood that mean the nice plot they live on is no longer classed as suitable to build anything bigger than the house they already live in.

SilasX 4y ago

Improvements are taxed well above the Georgist level (0%), and land well below the Georgist level (80%+ depending on who you ask).