I don’t think that excerpt is false, or a good summary of the book really. My point is unless you understand the Georgist argument well, it is misguided to thin

I don’t think that excerpt is false, or a good summary of the book really. My point is unless you understand the Georgist argument well, it is misguided to think there are better policies to prevent rent seeking causing housing crisis. When both heterodox and orthodox economists agree on the soundness of a policy such as the LVT, you at least have to compare it to your novel proposal or have a good reason for why so many smart people are wrong. I agree with most of what you say about more developed areas having higher wages. But this is predicted in Progress and Poverty: as a society progresses in terms of increasing land value and increasing productivity (in wages and efficiency of land use) poverty arises because the rents tend to eat up all value so that wages become just enough to survive. The best way to reverse this is to tax the unimproved rents. This encourages housing development (efficient use of land) and discourages speculative land bubbles (since you lose money if you do not use the land or let others use it).