3 ms·

clever. how’d you come up with that?

habitue 2y ago
It's called a harberger tax: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harberger_Tax https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harberger_Tax
- antonvs 2y ago
  As written on that wiki page it’s completely impractical: > Others are able to purchase the property from the owner at the taxed price at any time, forcing a sale. The idea is apparently supposed to “improve societal welfare”, but the reality is it would favor the wealthiest who could afford to have and hold property, while everyone else would be at the mercy of those richer than them.
  - Analemma_ 2y ago
    This is almost certainly never going to actually exist, so this is all idle speculation, but if it was real I don't think it would necessarily play out as you describe. The wealthy would be paying way more in tax than they are now (they have to, or their own assets would be sold as well), which would result in a much more generous system of income redistribution. They'd also need to generate constant cash flow to prevent that property from being sold, so I think you'd have fewer "idle rich" on passive income. I suspect the stable equilibrium would be a lot more renting rather than property ownership, but also a much more generous welfare state such that this was not a problem, since few people would want/need to keep a house as a store of value.
    - habitue 2y ago
      > more generous welfare state That's the bull case. The bear case is "money is distributed to government contractors through overpaying for things"
    - AnthonyMouse 2y ago
      > The wealthy would be paying way more in tax than they are now (they have to, or their own assets would be sold as well) That has nothing to do with the concept. The rate of the tax is separate from how it operates. > I suspect the stable equilibrium would be a lot more renting rather than property ownership Then the person doing the renting out would be paying the tax (and incurring the associated risks) and passing it on as higher rents. What does that help? The problem here is assets that are hard to value. Not just in a subjective sense (what is a piece of art really worth?), but in a very practical sense. Take the things we have very good pricing information on -- stocks. If a share of Google is worth $100 and then six months later it's worth $110, but you put down $100 on the form -- objectively its market price at the time -- now someone can lift your shares off of you for a discount because the value changed and they raced to the filing office before you did. Now imagine the same thing but for something that doesn't have a high trading volume or an observable market price at any given time, but can still suddenly change in value over time. Then it gets worse. Many types of property have a value to the owner which is different than their market value. Suppose you operate a self-storage company. You have a piece of property which is objectively worth $500,000 where you operate your business. You declare that it's worth $500,000, because it is. Now a competitor can buy it off you for that amount just to grief you, because even though that's the value of the property, in order to move you have to contact all your customers and have them come and pick up their stuff, pay real estate commissions to find and purchase an otherwise identical property to move your business to, shut down your business while you hire contractors to move all your storage lockers to the new property etc. Meanwhile the competitor just buys it from you for $500,000 and sells it to anyone but you for $500,000 (easy because that's it's true market value), causing you all this trouble and poaching half your customers in the process. It's the kind of thing academics come up with which has enormous negative consequences in practice.
      - pydry 2y ago
        >The problem here is assets that are hard to value. Not just in a subjective sense (what is a piece of art really worth?), but in a very practical sense. Take the things we have very good pricing information on -- stocks. If a share of Google is worth $100 and then six months later it's worth $110, but you put down $100 on the form -- objectively its market price at the time -- This isn't a problem at all. You can let the brokerage report the value on your behalf. It's weird that you picked stocks specifically, because those are actually very easy to value. That's why your brokerage can provide you with a very precise number that fluctuates every time you log in. >now someone can lift your shares off of you for a discount because the value changed and they raced to the filing office before you did. That someone would be the government, and the government would presumably put a bid in anticipation of your filing. When you file your taxes in April 2025 and you say your grand masterpiece is worth $1.2 million, the tax office can be prepared to say "yup, that sounds like a good price to us. Now sell it to us for that price" at the point when you file your taxes. >Then it gets worse. Many types of property have a value to the owner which is different than their market value. How on earth is that worse? If you put the property in at market value then the government will not try to buy it from you. They'll be going after the low hanging fruit - the guy who valued a picasso at $1 million, not the guy whose grandmother passed down a family heirloom nobody else gives a shit about. >Suppose you operate a self-storage company. You have a piece of property which is objectively worth $500,000 where you operate your business. You declare that it's worth $500,000, because it is. Now a competitor can buy it off you for that amount just to grief you Government, not competitor. If the government employee responsible for finding underpriced assets and bidding on them put a $500k bid on $500k property then their bonus is not likely to amount to much. They'll be aiming for $1 million bids on $10 million property. Yes, if you let anybody bid on things it could cause more issues which require mitigation. Even then, if you put in a threshold that they have to bid 10-15% over then this would stem abuse. Imagine a competitor trying to "grief" you by overpaying $50-75k for your assets. Something tells me that you will still object. >It's the kind of thing academics come up with Sometimes people who object to the practicalities of a tax are actually objecting to it on principle.

It's called a harberger tax: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harberger_Tax https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harberger_Tax

antonvs 2y ago
As written on that wiki page it’s completely impractical: > Others are able to purchase the property from the owner at the taxed price at any time, forcing a sale. The idea is apparently supposed to “improve societal welfare”, but the reality is it would favor the wealthiest who could afford to have and hold property, while everyone else would be at the mercy of those richer than them.
- Analemma_ 2y ago
  This is almost certainly never going to actually exist, so this is all idle speculation, but if it was real I don't think it would necessarily play out as you describe. The wealthy would be paying way more in tax than they are now (they have to, or their own assets would be sold as well), which would result in a much more generous system of income redistribution. They'd also need to generate constant cash flow to prevent that property from being sold, so I think you'd have fewer "idle rich" on passive income. I suspect the stable equilibrium would be a lot more renting rather than property ownership, but also a much more generous welfare state such that this was not a problem, since few people would want/need to keep a house as a store of value.
  - habitue 2y ago
    > more generous welfare state That's the bull case. The bear case is "money is distributed to government contractors through overpaying for things"
  - AnthonyMouse 2y ago
    > The wealthy would be paying way more in tax than they are now (they have to, or their own assets would be sold as well) That has nothing to do with the concept. The rate of the tax is separate from how it operates. > I suspect the stable equilibrium would be a lot more renting rather than property ownership Then the person doing the renting out would be paying the tax (and incurring the associated risks) and passing it on as higher rents. What does that help? The problem here is assets that are hard to value. Not just in a subjective sense (what is a piece of art really worth?), but in a very practical sense. Take the things we have very good pricing information on -- stocks. If a share of Google is worth $100 and then six months later it's worth $110, but you put down $100 on the form -- objectively its market price at the time -- now someone can lift your shares off of you for a discount because the value changed and they raced to the filing office before you did. Now imagine the same thing but for something that doesn't have a high trading volume or an observable market price at any given time, but can still suddenly change in value over time. Then it gets worse. Many types of property have a value to the owner which is different than their market value. Suppose you operate a self-storage company. You have a piece of property which is objectively worth $500,000 where you operate your business. You declare that it's worth $500,000, because it is. Now a competitor can buy it off you for that amount just to grief you, because even though that's the value of the property, in order to move you have to contact all your customers and have them come and pick up their stuff, pay real estate commissions to find and purchase an otherwise identical property to move your business to, shut down your business while you hire contractors to move all your storage lockers to the new property etc. Meanwhile the competitor just buys it from you for $500,000 and sells it to anyone but you for $500,000 (easy because that's it's true market value), causing you all this trouble and poaching half your customers in the process. It's the kind of thing academics come up with which has enormous negative consequences in practice.
    - pydry 2y ago
      >The problem here is assets that are hard to value. Not just in a subjective sense (what is a piece of art really worth?), but in a very practical sense. Take the things we have very good pricing information on -- stocks. If a share of Google is worth $100 and then six months later it's worth $110, but you put down $100 on the form -- objectively its market price at the time -- This isn't a problem at all. You can let the brokerage report the value on your behalf. It's weird that you picked stocks specifically, because those are actually very easy to value. That's why your brokerage can provide you with a very precise number that fluctuates every time you log in. >now someone can lift your shares off of you for a discount because the value changed and they raced to the filing office before you did. That someone would be the government, and the government would presumably put a bid in anticipation of your filing. When you file your taxes in April 2025 and you say your grand masterpiece is worth $1.2 million, the tax office can be prepared to say "yup, that sounds like a good price to us. Now sell it to us for that price" at the point when you file your taxes. >Then it gets worse. Many types of property have a value to the owner which is different than their market value. How on earth is that worse? If you put the property in at market value then the government will not try to buy it from you. They'll be going after the low hanging fruit - the guy who valued a picasso at $1 million, not the guy whose grandmother passed down a family heirloom nobody else gives a shit about. >Suppose you operate a self-storage company. You have a piece of property which is objectively worth $500,000 where you operate your business. You declare that it's worth $500,000, because it is. Now a competitor can buy it off you for that amount just to grief you Government, not competitor. If the government employee responsible for finding underpriced assets and bidding on them put a $500k bid on $500k property then their bonus is not likely to amount to much. They'll be aiming for $1 million bids on $10 million property. Yes, if you let anybody bid on things it could cause more issues which require mitigation. Even then, if you put in a threshold that they have to bid 10-15% over then this would stem abuse. Imagine a competitor trying to "grief" you by overpaying $50-75k for your assets. Something tells me that you will still object. >It's the kind of thing academics come up with Sometimes people who object to the practicalities of a tax are actually objecting to it on principle.