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Pufff, Brazil does that since forever. By paying some tax over your land, basically your government is taking it from you every generation or two. Roughly, 2%
by woliveirajr 3y ago
Pufff, Brazil does that since forever. By paying some tax over your land, basically your government is taking it from you every generation or two.
Roughly, 2% each year and in 50 years and it's gone.
- groby_b 3y agoGiven that it was never "your" land to begin with (what, did you create it?), that's not an unreasonable approach.
- WorkerBee28474 3y agoThe government didn't create it either. The only reasonable recipient of the 2%/year tax is God.
- Gigachad 3y agoAt the core of it, land ownership is really about who has the resources to defend it. Since you are relying on the government and surrounding society to defend the land, it’s up to society to define how that ownership works.
- quickthrower2 3y agoThe government is meant to represent the commons. God doesn’t need money. Money is a human concept!
- epistasis 3y agoAs someone who is kept off of that land by somebody else's ownership of it, I am personally the reasonable recipient of a share of that 2%. As is everyone else, including the owner of the land. That share could come as government services, or it could come as a paycheck. But in either case that 2% belongs to all of us equally.
- causality0 3y agoThe people you're paying taxes to didn't create it either.
- xboxnolifes 3y agoIn theory (and ideally), the people the taxes go to includes yourself.
- elteto 3y agoThat device you used to post that comment, what, did you create it? Those clothes you are wearing, did you create them? The car you drive, did you create it? I’m not saying anything pro/con the LVT. But measuring ownership by whether you created it or not is a pretty terrible measure. You wouldn’t own _anything_ worth any value in the modern world.
- phkahler 3y ago>> You wouldn’t own _anything_ worth any value in the modern world. That seems to be the goal. If everyone rents everything that would increase dollars flowing in the economy right? We are all here to work for the man, and rent the air when we inhale.
- harimau777 3y agoThe difference is that someone created the products that I own and I payed them for it. However, no one (at least no one human depending on your religious beliefs) created the land.
- saxonww 3y agoSomeone created the improvements on it, though. Which is most of what you're paying for when you buy or rent a place to live. This isn't going to change much about landlords. If anything, it will increase the amount of housing rented through landlords, because the land value tax will make it uneconomical for more people to own their own homes. In a high value area, the only people who would be able to do so are the very rich.
- harimau777 3y agoA land value tax seeks to only tax the value of the land itself, not the improvements. Of course that's not always easy to assess, but neither are property values for normal property taxes. Even setting that aside, if the land value taxes on the land that someone owns dramatically increase then that means the value of their property has dramatically increased, and they can sell the land for a dramatic profit. Certainly it sucks that someone might have to sell; however, don't think that someone who becomes rich due to their home value appreciating is really much of a victim in the grand scheme of things.
- KRAKRISMOTT 3y agoIn the US, people have the right to property (unlike say, places like Canada https://www.albertalandinstitute.ca/resources/property-rights-guide/are-property-rights-protected-in-canada https://www.albertalandinstitute.ca/resources/property-right...). This is a freedom enshrined in the US Constitution and through the fifth amendment. If the Detroit government pushes too hard and rapidly deprives certain parties of their land, they can expect a constitutional challenge.
- harimau777 3y agoI think that you may be missing the point of the argument that you are replying to. As I understand it, what they are getting at is that no one created the land, it was already here. Therefore, it's not valid to say that the person who originally claimed the land had a right to it in the same sense that, for example, a farmer has a right to what they grow because of the labor they put into growing it. In effect, the argument is that since land was not created by anyone then no one has any more right to it than anyone else. So the land's value should be shared among all of society; which is precisely what a Land Value Tax seeks to do.
- AnimalMuppet 3y agoWell, in the US at least, the one who first claimed the land is the one who built a cabin there, often broke the land to the plow, and then held it against anyone who tried to take it from them. It wasn't just "claiming" the land. They had to work to improve it.
- eru 3y agoConveniently ignoring the people who might have lived there before for millennia? Or even just the Mexicans from whom large parts of the US where conquered? (How Mexico got the land is another story.)
- flownoon 3y agoSo LVT separates the value created by your labor (building the cabin, plowing, etc) from the value you did not create. I think its more just than taxing, i.e. cabins or crops.
- r00fus 3y ago"We sit together The mountain and me Until only the mountain remains" -Li Po Maybe the land isn't really yours to begin with?
- EA-3167 3y agoThat's a lot more romantic until you remember it's just going to the government, not some mystical starscape.
- r00fus 3y agoThe government owns all the land and gives you a more-or-less yearly subscription to keep your land at a reasonable cost. If you are a landlord then you're just a middle-man who can profit.
- jackcosgrove 3y agoIf the government owns all the land then the rentiers will get out of the real estate business and into politics.
- trostaft 3y ago... implying that they aren't already? At-least speaking US, there are plenty of real-estate focused PACs.
- username332211 3y agoHmm. So in your view landlords are zamindars, there to extract value from the land and to give a little bit of it to their overlord? I presume in your view, it would be best if governments cut the middle man and seized all land, but alas, they are too incompetent to extract any value from it. So like the EIC of old, they must rely on landlords. That is an interesting view of private property. It certainly explains a lot about about modern rental problems.
- 3y ago
- Yodel0914 3y agoIt's the same in Australia. It seems like a pretty sensible way to encourage the best use of high value land.
- phkahler 3y agoBut who gets to decide the best use? It seems like everyone but the owner.
- Gigachad 3y agoThe market.
- latency-guy2 3y agoThe government is not the market.
- Gigachad 3y agoThe government doesn't set the lands market value
- lalaland1125 3y agoThe market does by pricing the land at a certain value
- itishappy 3y agoYes the owner. Who else? They own it. Edit: Was the stress on "decides" or "best"?
- epistasis 3y agoIt is only the owner who gets to decide the best use, whatever they want! But the land value is determined by what others are willing to pay to no longer be excluded from the area, or to be given a spot in the area.
- eru 3y ago
- harimau777 3y agoYou are already paying taxes, Land Value Taxes just seek to be a more efficient (since they try to target rent seeking rather than profitable labor) and more just (since they target land that the owner didn't create) form of taxation. So arguing that it's effectively the government stealing your property is only a valid argument if you are arguing that all taxation is theft. If that's what you believe then that's fine, but it would be better to be upfront about what argument you are making.
- AmericanChopper 3y agoProperty taxes and wealth taxes undermine property rights in ways that normal income taxes don’t. If I earn $100 and pay tax on it, whatever’s left over is mine forever, and I never have to pay tax on that income again. If I buy $100 worth of property, I have to pay tax on it again every year forever, which basically means I’m only buying the right to rent it from the government in perpetuity. Your use of the phrase “rent seeking” is also a bit weird. It sounds like any extraction of value from capital would meet your definition. It’s fine if you object to a persons right to extract value from their capital, but rent seeking typically describes attempting to extract value from capital _without_ reciprocating any productive value to the person who’s paying you. Which is certainly not the case with land use.
- maxerickson 3y agoYou are renting it from society, not from government. Government is administering the rent.
- eru 3y ago> If I earn $100 and pay tax on it, whatever’s left over is mine forever, and I never have to pay tax on that income again. You know that this is not true in most places? If you put a hundred dollar bill under your pillow, it will be worth less and less as time goes by thanks to inflation. And if you use that hundred dollar bill to buy an asset that hopefully keeps its real value, you pay capital gains taxes on the nominal increase in value (even if there was no real increase in value).
- quickthrower2 3y agoIf they don’t then you are taking it away from other people by owning it.
- dclowd9901 3y agoAnd then they are taking it away from you with guns because no one can fund public safety.
- logicchains 3y agoPeople are perfectly capable of protecting their own land when it's not illegal for them to do so, as demonstrated in the early history of the US. You're much less safe in somewhere like Chicago with "well funded" public safety than you were anywhere in the US in the 1800s.
- phailhaus 3y agoWhat do you mean by "gone"? You still own it.
- epistasis 3y agoThat's only if you derive zero value or income from the land. In which case, perhaps the land is not in the hands of the best steward.
- adverbly 3y agoI do not see Brazil under the Wikipedia section for implementations of land value tax. I tried to look myself, but did not see a definitive answer. It sounds like there is a property tax, but a property tax is different from a land value tax. Also, 2% is in a similar range to many existing implementations, and has been shown to be too low to prevent speculation. Your comment about "it's gone" shows that you do not understand the intent here. I would recommend you watch the following: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=h59se33UCK4 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=h59se33UCK4 In short, the land is not gone. The profits you made if you rented it out are not gone. However, any hope of increased value through speculation will be diminished based on how long you held the high value asset prior to sale... which is the exact intent of this policy change.