Taxes Avoided by the Rich Could Pay Off the Deficit

[EcoWarrier]

I didn't realize you were a kind of royalty. My bad, your second highest highness. I guess that makes sic the only word that was misspelled.

Warrier is not misspelled - Indian. Now you know. Eco at the highest levels.

 

[awake]

Non-monopoly government is called, "civil war."

Land rent is set by the market, not government. There is a difference between "setting" a quantity and measuring it.

No, provide the desirable services and infrastructure people are willing to pay land rent for access to. That is how LVT aligns the government's financial interest with the public interest.

Any publicly created land rent not recovered for public purposes and benefit is a welfare subsidy giveaway to the landowner.

The use and rent would be set by the market, and the land would be managed and exclusively occupied by the private landholder.

Rothbard made a prize fool of himself when he tried to refute geoist arguments, and the above is a good example. People find pure site rent in practice all the time: it's what they pay for use of land.

Funny how those "impossible" calculations were made quite successfully even in ancient societies where hardly anyone could read...

Reinventing the state to be better than the kind of state we have sounds like a good idea to me.

What if no one wanted any service from your better state? Your whole argument is semantics: using gutted and Orwellian versions of words to describe state confiscation and state abuse of its arbitrary authority. None of your " set by the market" appraisal would be market at all...An army of state assessors would have to try and define land values (impossible) because the owner and seller could not be trusted to assess it properly.

Any amount a land owner could profit over the assessment would be a "give away" as you say, and subject to confiscation to a bureaucracy(community)...Any transaction under the assessment would be ripping off the state which would have to be illigal...Some definition of liberty you have there. It is a complete nationalization of all land under the state and complete tyranny.

The barrage of spam rebuttals, most of which are name calling and denials, reminds me of the desperation the socialists had when Mises devastated the idea of socialism. One after another tried to throw themselves on the grenade that Mises dropped on them, and each and everyone could not invalidate Mises' critique.

Rothbard was a fool...???? Really? This is just intellectual dishonesty.

You admit the reorganization of a more just state is the outcome of your arrangement. I say any attempt to reform the state is antithesis in the goal of human liberty.

 

[Len Larson]

I didn't realize you were a kind of royalty. My bad, your second highest highness. I guess that makes sic the only word that was misspelled.

Finally, the other shoe dropped. Thanks for quoting that Steven. I would have missed that as EcoWarrier[sick ] is on my ignore list.

So, are there any LVTrolls that don't consider themselves to be royalty?
Typical collectivist, everyone is equal, but they are just a little more equal.

 

[MattintheCrown]

LVT, GROUND RENTS & STATE CAPTURE RATIONALE (and why a casino owner specifically should favor such a "single tax")

Actually, you're close to right here. Productive people generally should favor the LVT. In fact, if you consider any productive entrepreneur in place of your casino owner in the diatribe below, it works equally well.

Productive people are beneficiaries of a shift to LVT, in proportion to their productivity. Society as a whole benefits when there's a stronger incentive for individuals to be more productive.

Let's say that I am a visionary who builds a casino in the middle of a desert and promotes it. Eventually it takes on an economic gravity of its own, as more and more people come to take advantage of all the opportunities and amenities induced by the casino. Over time a primarily entertainment and gambling based economy blossoms in the middle of the desert.

As a casino owner, I now have a small problem. I (along with each customer by extension), am now subject to a wide range of taxes. All all those taxes -- gambling, property, sales, capital gains, etc., could go completely away under LVT, as they are "shifted" to a Land Value Tax. That seems like A Very Good Thing. For me specifically, at least.

So far you're doing decently, but even under a LVT scheme, they're likely be a gambling tax. At least as long as gambling was generally illegal as it now is, anyways.

As a profit-maximizing Casino owner, I should LOVE LVT (assuming it really was a single tax), given that it is particularly suited to favor my type of business. The ONLY reason I would favor it over other taxes is the same reason any financial services firm should love it: because my ratio of economic activity to land is much, MUCH higher than literally anyone else's. By nature. And the higher I stack that financial activity, the greater my profits. Of course, that also increases the land value of mine and surrounding lands, but that's incidental, to me at least, as it is my economic activity specifically that is causing that increase.

As a casino owner, I am fully aware that people are coming to take advantage of the privately owned, non-shared, non-public, for-profit capital investment on my privately owned land. I am not so blind or daft as to think for a moment that people are flocking to be in (or near) my casino because they heard about all the wonderful "community infrastructure" and "community created wealth". I know that's complete and utter bullshit. The common infrastructure that I share with everyone is a necessary, but wholly incidental part of a very small cost that is shared in common with others, with no profit-taking on anyone's part for it.

Actually, it's not. As you are obviously referencing Las Vegas, it's worth noting that a massive investment in government infrastructure enabled Las Vegas: Hoover Dam.

Likewise, the other private entities that show up to take advantage of opportunities bring opportunities of their own: so the more the merrier, because that's Division of Labor at work, and everybody wins, as a desert that once offered nothing but hard, dry dust, was seeded with a casino, and now sports a burgeoning Oasis -- Something For Everybody.

ENTER LVT AND ITS ENHANCED GRAVITY EFFECT

AKA: enhanced productivity effect.

Eventually LVT is imposed, forget the details, as a tax on the basis of 100% annual land rents only. Magically, there is no other tax, as they have all been shifted to LVT as a single tax. That is an enormous windfall for me in particular, because while my land is valued relatively high, it is only due my ratio of economic activity to required land.

The owner of the new skating rink next door did not fare so well. He paid/owes a lot for his property, hoping to profit from some of the traffic I drew in, but value of his land (along with land anywhere in close proximity) is now assessed as being of comparable value to the land my casino is on. That represents a cost of ownership increase that has literally priced the skating rink owner, and a few of my non-casino-owning neighbors, off of their land. The skating rink uses the same amount of land as I do, but will never, ever enjoy the same land-to-economic-activity ratio that I enjoy. His land might be "efficiently used", but only for that specific purpose, and only from his point of view -- not the state's, and not those chomping at the bit for the opportunity to set up shop next to a casino.

It's not efficient from society's point of view. He's just squandering a massive opportunity: an opportunity for prospective entrepreneurs, an opportunity for society to benefit from some crazy-ass new casino/resort, an opportunity for the state to collect revenue to improve infrastructure and services.

Result: Bye-bye skating rink. And bye-bye anyone else who must now keep up financially with neighbors in the artificially induced Concentrated Cost of Ownership Zone.

But this happens anyways, Steven. The main difference between LVT and no LVT is is land is allocated quicker and more effectively under the LVT. Without LVT, your rink-owner might remain a while, but inevitably, he'd sell out. In all likelihood, he'd hold out for as long as he could, awaiting increases in land value. Eventaully, he'd sell out, and his rink would be demolished and replaced with a casino. Aside from the fact that a site for a casino would needlessly be squandered over that period, the other big difference would that the ice rink owner would get a massive pile of cash for nothing: due to no work whatsoever on his part, he'd be wildly rich. The casino owners in his vicinity and the government and all the workers at the casinos and consumers from all over the world are what made his land so valuable, yet he'd get to pocket the cash. Without LVT, the cash goes into his pockets, so the government is forced instead to tax producers in proportion to how productive they are. Which is obviously and inarguably stupid.

Those who cannot keep pace must move away from the casino to cheaper land, and all because they cannot pull in enough economic activity (PER SQ. FT) to support the same Land Value Tax rates that my casino caused in the first place, based on the nature of my going concern, and its ability to draw in the largest paying crowd.

Right: a meritocracy. Society demands certain amenities, and only those producers capable of supplying them get to remain on the land. Land is thus allocated efficiently, saving society as a whole a ton of labor and resources.

So I am happy, because LVT encourages and rewards those with the least dependency on land, along with the densest concentration of financial activity, while shifting the bulk of the tax burden onto those with the greatest dependency on population and land, but without a high ratio of income to land required for use.

The LVT rewards the productive. That's a good thing, Steven.

In other words, LVT is special privilege tax, as it is particularly well suited to special types of industries and firms.

No, that's false.

Well, its proponents would argue simply that it is "more efficient land use". What do I care? Yay for me and other casinos, and hooray especially for banks, brokers, insurance companies, developers, and any rent-seeking firm with a high financial activity to land use ratio. They are the clear winners, all of whom are seen as "more efficient" by the aggregate-only thinking geonomists under the new LVT regime.

Everyone benefits from efficiency, Steven. Efficiency means more goods and services for the same input of labor and resources. That's the whole meaning of economization.

Oh, and what about actual residences near the casino? Hehehe...they're the biggest losers of all, because they aren't even firms. Nothing "productive" about homes in the macroeconomic sense. Not unless you're a home developer or lender.

Well, houses are required to supply businesses with employees. Or maybe not necessarily houses, but dwellings (ie, apartments, houses, condos). The casinos could never grow if it were too inconvenient for employees to work there.

Houses are not geared competitively for high LVT either. As as casino owner, however, I think I'll do just fine with my house. Time for some expensive improvements on my house -- make the nearby land more desirable so that I can get those land values up. As a bonus, I'll have geoists arguing that none of my improvements - not the casino or the house, have ANYTHING WHATSOEVER to do the value of the underlying land. Talk about useful idiots as economic allies! I'm not that stupid. Thanks to LVT, I now have a mechanism for clearing out all the "less productive" :::sngt!::: riff-raff from my neighborhood.

There's no LVT now, and there's no houses on the strip in Las Vegas. Even with our current inefficiencies due to lack of LVT, our land market isn't so wildly inefficient as to make casinos and houses neighbors.

LVT - THE RADIAL PERIMETER BURNER EFFECT

So take the case of a landowner who is simply content to exist, serve, and live a quality life, and who is not prone to, or needing, artificially induced economic growth for the sake of growth alone; someone who does not require heavy local traffic, or whose business is not inherently geared for a high financial-activity-to-land ratio (as not all are equal by nature in that regard). Under an LVT regime, the very worst thing that can happen to that landowner is for a big fat Disney, or a casino, or anything else that draws a big paying crowd into itself, to plop its ass down and buy up land anywhere nearby. The cost of ownership is about to heat up, despite the fact that not all businesses or industries are geared the same way (nor need they be under normal circumstances). The blind LVT macro-assumption is that all economic activity is "good for the community", and therefore automatically good for everyone therein. The economic wealth-siphoning heat from a Big Behemoth is what "soaks into the ground". That is what radiates outward, as land values rise (along LVT as a cost of ownership), regardless of specific land use, and regardless of whether there really was any "increased economic benefit" to that particular landowner.

Steven, under any scheme, bad things can happen to individuals. No matter how a government taxes, there will be results which are unpleasant to some. But if the tax acts to increase economic productivity, even those who may be inconvenienced will still benefit from a society that is wealthier, and has more opportunities. No one wants to move, but moving is hardly the end of the world. Consider the dead-weight burden businessmen have to deal with under income and property taxation. Many businessmen who'd be in business under the LVT aren't even in business now, because their tax burden makes them sub-marginal.

LVT proponents have their own spin on all of this, of course, as well as, I am sure, disagreement with what I've written or how I've characterized it. It doesn't matter. It is obvious to me why LVT has always been an easy smack down, which has nothing to do with Roy's characterizations of opponents as evil, murdering apologists for landowner privilege.

No, Roy is exactly right. As your rink owner enjoys the piles of cash his land enable him to receive without doing any work, a casino that could have employed hundreds isn't built. So landowners can get money for nothing, others have to be robbed.

 

[Len Larson]

[Bunch of LVTroll rationalizations] ... others have to be robbed.

What a perfect mission statement for LVT govt.

 

[MattintheCrown]

What a perfect mission statement for LVT govt.

What a worth-while post. Evidently, you can't actually find anything wrong with what I wrote. Maybe it'd be preferable to actually read up on the LVT. Once upon a time, I stopped arguing and read up on the LVT, so I could determine the fundamental flaw in the argument once and for all.

Here I am today.

 

[MattintheCrown]

More accurately, microeconomics is applied TO ALL specific situations, whereas macroeconomics is applied only to those deemed Big Enough To Manipulate, and Too Big To Fail.

No, that isn't more accurate at all. Microeconomics is like a study of a tree, whereas macroeconomics is like the study of a forest.

Interesting choice of words. What does that mean, "do economics"? Economics is supposedly descriptive, predictive, and informative. Not normative. When you say "do economics" you are going outside of the merely informative, using your theories and interpretations to support the normatives you advocate; shoulds, oughts -- major policy decisions. Actual central planning and macro-engineering. (BTW, EcoWarrier[sic] thinks I'm saying "Norman" - just humor him).

No, false. when I say "do economics" I simply mean understanding how the economy as a whole works.

I didn't know there was a single collectivized, homogeneous blob called "economics" to ditch. That's like Roy thinking that because "weeza hatesa [HIS ICKY-ASS VERSION of] gubmint" that automatically means that we are against government in general. That's arrogant, presumptuous and non-self-aware. Did you consider that it is possible that I am ditching only what I consider BAD economics, Matt -- incorrect theories, baseless assumptions, and all the misapplied policies based thereon?

But that's not what you're doing. It'd be one thing to say you disagree with Keynsianism, or Marxism, or Georgism, or Monetarism; what you're doing is ditching entirely the very foundation of all schools of economics.

And you know what? That, in and of itself, actually isn't unforgivable. Perhaps all of economics has it wrong. Fair enough. But the problem is that you fail to offer any reasoned alternative. The truth is just that you don't like the facts that economics make clear.

How ironic that you should invoke Adam Smith. I know geolibs love quoting Smith because of his position on the Land Value Tax.

It's just a very basic position; it was established with the first major economist of wide renown, and hasn't been disputed since.

However, just as Keynes is considered to be the father of modern the macroeconomics you rely on in support of the tax, Adam Smith is widely considered to be the father of the microeconomics that you don't personally find necessary, relevant or applicable to tax policy.

I'd love for you to expand on what point you think you're making here. Let me know when you do, so I can pop some popcorn.

And it's no wonder, as microeconomics attempts to describe granular reality at all scales, as it is the study of how people interact and how markets actually work. Macroeconomics (the Keynesian-spawned statists' whore, IMO) only concerns itself with how governments can manipulate people and markets.

This is nothing more than a massive misunderstanding of what macroeconomics and microeconomics is.

Let's finally clear some more macroeconomics apples to microeconomics oranges once and for all. Not for you, but for others reading:

The definition of supply I use comes from microeconomics, and is absolutely 100% accurate in that context (as cited and sourced in previous posts) - AKA reality, at the only level that is truly important in my mind; the individual -- each and every one -- not jointly, collectively, or averaged in any way. The definition of supply you are using comes from macroeconomics, and is 100% accurate, but ONLY in that context, where ONLY THE WHOLE is considered -- "the economy", as individuals are blurred, or averaged out into virtual nonexistence, or irrelevance, in deference "to the whole" - which is the only thing that matters to collectivist statists and others such as yourself.

Sigh. It's about context, Steven. From my point of view, if you punch me in the face, and take my wallet, you're that much richer, and I'm that much poorer. From the context of society, nothing has been lost or gained: on person's wealth was transferred to another by force, but wealth in the aggregate has not changed.

The macroeconomic perspective is the correct one for analyzing tax policy, because it allows us to determine whether society as a whole will be better off, or worse off due to the imposition of the tax. It also allows us to determine who will be worse of and why. Microeconomics just isn't relevant. If you hadn't already lost all respect in my mind, I'd feel embarrassed for you, because your misuses of 'macroeconomics' and 'microeconomics' is so woefully wrong.

For example: from the microeconomic perspective of a thief, it is good policy to eliminate rules against thievery; thieves would be much better off without the cumbersome punishments currently associated with theft. But what of society as a whole? You need to consider how theft affects society. We know that a society where theft is prevalent will tend to produce less wealth, so even as thieves are proportionally worse off with our anti-theft laws, society is generally much better off, even to the point of making would-be thieves better off. Ideally, we'd try to design rules such that there'd be no inducement to thievery, as productive behavior would be the easier path. That's what the LVT does: it removes the incentive to be an unproductive parasite, and rewards productivity.

Here's a treatment on the law of supply in one context from one textbook that actually distinguishes the macro from the micro, at least at the level of industrial use of land:

Supply of Land:

Supply of land, from the point of view of an economy, is perfectly inelastic. It means the total supply of land in an economy cannot be increased. Supply of land is free for an economy, as it has no cost of production.

Supply of land for an industry depends on its opportunity cost. If opportunity cost of land increases in one industry compared to another industry, then more of it will be used in the former industry than the latter. Thus, supply curve of land for an industry will slope upward. It means supply of land will increase with rise in its price and decrease with fall in its price.

Supply of land is perfectly elastic so far as a competitive firm is concerned. It means at the price fixed by industry, a firm can use as much land as it requires.

So you can stop with the claims that the definition of supply I am using is "incorrect", and so will I. If you want to be intellectually honest about this, you can argue that the definition is "inapplicable" (and then actually argue why). I have stated above why I believe yours is inapplicable, as it has no regard for the individual. You claim that macroeconomics and microeconomics are not "competing schools", and yet you and Roy BOTH attempt to describe individual behavior from a branch of economics that does not even pretend to do such a thing. That's obfuscation (or ignorance) on both your parts.

That's just false. The whole bone of contention here -the whole reason there's any dispute whatever- is over whether landowners bear the burden of the tax. The macroeconomic perspective is simply the relevant perspective: there is a fixed amount of land available to the economy, and thus demand determines prices. Because imposition of the LVT neither decreases supply, nor increases demand, the LVT can not be passed on to tenants.

 

[Steven Douglas]

No, that isn't more accurate at all. Microeconomics is like a study of a tree, whereas macroeconomics is like the study of a forest.

Wrong. In the absolute. Microeconomics is like the study of "trees" (aka buyers/sellers/industries) and how the interact. It is not "like a study of a tree". Macroeconomics sees only forest - no trees, except as described as a forest.

It'd be one thing to say you disagree with Keynsianism, or Marxism, or Georgism, or Monetarism; what you're doing is ditching entirely the very foundation of all schools of economics.

I disagree with Keynsianism, Marxism, Georgism, and Monetarism, none of which are the very foundation of all schools of economics.

And...ahem...you ditched forgot one. (hint - Where the fuck are you at this moment, Waldo?)

But the problem is that you fail to offer any reasoned alternative.

I did. Many times. You just haven't been paying attention:

Tax entities (anything at all, including LVT) that exist and behave in our economy as a matter of conditional privileged legal status only. That's foreigners, corporations and collectives, foreign and domestic, and anything other than individual, free and natural Citizens, to the extent that they exist and behave as a matter of unalienable right. Those people themselves are free. In all respects. It's that simple. What is commonly owned is NOT FUCKING RENTED BACK TO THE COMMON OWNERS. There are more than plenty enough entities-without-unalienable-rights to foot ALL the bills. And they would be more than happy to foot them, for the privilege of taking part in an economy where they are NEVER ON EQUAL FOOTING WITH REAL PEOPLE WITH REAL RIGHTS.

That's pretty much it in a nutshell. Under LVT, all those entities, many of which already have natural economic advantages, are given an artificial boost to those advantages by LVT - IF they are applied equally to all. Fuck that. Walmart and NON-INCORPORATED Joe Citizen of Joe's Teensy-Tiny Private General Store were NOT FUCKING CREATED EQUAL. It is my position (AND PANACEA SOLUTION) that Joe is THE ONLY ENTITY, between those two, that exists and behaves as a matter of absolute, untrammeled, nontaxable, unalienable right.

 

[MattintheCrown]

Wrong. In the absolute. Microeconomics is like the study of "trees" (aka buyers/sellers/industries) and how the interact. It is not "like a study of a tree". Macroeconomics sees only forest - no trees, except as described as a forest.

Nope.

I disagree with Keynsianism, Marxism, Georgism, and Monetarism, none of which are the very foundation of all schools of economics.

And...ahem...you ditched forgot one. (hint - Where the fuck are you at this moment, Waldo?)

Add whatever school you like.

I did. Many times.

False.

You just haven't been paying attention:

Tax entities (anything at all, including LVT) that exist and behave in our economy as a matter of conditional privileged legal status only. That's foreigners, corporations and collectives, foreign and domestic, and anything other than individual, free and natural Citizens, to the extent that they exist and behave as a matter of unalienable right. Those people themselves are free. In all respects. It's that simple. What is commonly owned is NOT FUCKING RENTED BACK TO THE COMMON OWNERS. There are more than plenty enough entities-without-unalienable-rights to foot ALL the bills. And they would be more than happy to foot them, for the privilege of taking part in an economy where they are NEVER ON EQUAL FOOTING WITH REAL PEOPLE WITH REAL RIGHTS.

This is meaningless in general, but is utterly and absolutely meaningless as a basis of economic theory.

That's pretty much it in a nutshell. Under LVT, all those entities, many of which already have natural economic advantages, are given an artificial boost to those advantages by LVT - IF they are applied equally to all. Fuck that. Walmart and NON-INCORPORATED Joe Citizen of Joe's Teensy-Tiny Private General Store were NOT FUCKING CREATED EQUAL. It is my position (AND PANACEA SOLUTION) that Joe is THE ONLY ENTITY, between those two, that exists and behaves as a matter of absolute, untrammeled, nontaxable, unalienable right.

But that is, of course, meaningless, because it's dependent on who Joe is. You've literally said nothing. It's just a bunch of meaningless words. That's the problem with refusing to know things.

 

[Steven Douglas]

Nope.

Unresponsive.

Add whatever school you like.

Austrian.

False.

Unresponsive.

This is meaningless in general, but is utterly and absolutely meaningless as a basis of economic theory.

It's not the basis for an economics theory, nor was it intended to be, any more than the Constitution was. Don't you see how you have your economic carts, policy horses and people riders all mixed up? The reason you missed it is that you, like Marx, George, Keynes and so many Keynesian-rooted geoists, conflate policy and economic theory, in the hopes of borrowing pseudo-scientific prestige, so that an economics theory can serve as the driving engine and chief rationale for whatever STATIST POLICY it is that you ADVOCATE.

Economics theories are supposed to be scientific (or at least they pretend to be) : descriptive, informative, as they attempt to be predictive. Not prescriptive. Thus, it should not matter what policy is in place. Any economics theory should be able to see a policy as just so much information. Then, as that policy is implemented, you might be able to test just how accurate or reliable each economics theory was in being able to describe or predict -- NEVER PRESCRIBING OR ATTEMPTING TO MANIPULATE - its effects on all economies within "the [highly heterogeneous] economy".

My position is that rights should NEVER be derived (let alone eroded or abridged) on the basis of any economics theory. That's not ditching any of them. It's putting all of them in their proper place, because not doing that is what got us this deep into the truly fucked up Keynesian nightmare we're living in now, as economics theories were elevated in status above fundamental principles, and even individual rights, as they suggest solutions to problems described that may not even exist -- or more importantly, that may not actually be problems in search of statist solutions. Sticky wages as people refuse to take pay cuts in a growing economy, oh my! Liquidity traps, deflation and inelasticity of "the money supply", oh my! And people "hoarding" [their own] money? --- OH MY! --- what could be worse than that? Why, "the economy" would shut down and this would be catastrophic! These all require solutions. We can't have regular individuals with that kind of leverage and control. Solution: Gee, a privately owned, privately controlled, politically unaccountable central banking control system with a monopoly on counterfeiting and central interest rate setting power might be just the ticket! It might actually solve "the problems" that our theories clearly show are facing "the economy"!

For economy meddlers and other statist distortionists, economic policy is always a "economy-wide" cost-benefits issue for "society", with actual rights and privileges for real individuals determined primarily by a bunch of theoretical fools and ideologues operating in vacuums with nothing but sociopathic regard for individuals or core principles. Really, Matt, they should be manning wood chippers, but I'm afraid there aren't enough.

But that is, of course, meaningless, because it's dependent on who Joe is. You've literally said nothing. It's just a bunch of meaningless words. That's the problem with refusing to know things.

Yeah, that is the problem with refusing to know things, Matt. I said exactly who Joe is, and your mind, which filters and blurs individuals into nonexistence and irrelevance, drew a complete blank.

Joe is a Free and Natural Citizen; a real human being and living Citizen. There is absolutely nothing ambiguous about that. That is his legal status - pretty black and white, really. That means he is not a foreigner, a collective, a partnership, a corporation, or anything else. Unlike EcoWarrier(sic), he is THE HIGHEST ranking caste member in his own society -- equal to all others of that same legal status. All other entities - ANY ONE OR ANY THING - that is not like exactly like Joe (not a living free and a natural Citizen) would be subject to taxes, regulations, and all manner of conditional behavior and existence within our economy, as a matter of their conditionally privileged, fully alienable legal status. Joe, on the other hand, and everyone just like Joe (ALL free and natural Citizen individuals) would be FREE. Forever.

 

[Len Larson]

Now that we've established the royal predilections of the LVTrolls, this would be a good time to re-examine the feudal characteristics of LVT.

"Society" or the "Community" takes the role of God.
LVTrolls please provide an unambiguous definition of "Community" that is NOT simply reducible to "God".

Somehow, the LVT govt. captures the God-Community and assumes for itself the role of God-Community's representative here on Earth.
LVTrolls please explain the justification for this.

Furthermore, if you're not a member of the Eco-Clergy, an LVT Tax Assesor Lord, or a member of the LVT royal court, then you are forever damned to a serf's life.
LVTrolls please explain how this could ever lead to Liberty for everyone.

 

[MattintheCrown]

Now that we've established the royal predilections of the LVTrolls, this would be a good time to re-examine the feudal characteristics of LVT.

The LVT is as anti-feudal as it gets.

"Society" or the "Community" takes the role of God.
LVTrolls please provide an unambiguous definition of "Community" that is NOT simply reducible to "God".

No definition of community is reducible to god.

Somehow, the LVT govt. captures the God-Community and assumes for itself the role of God-Community's representative here on Earth.
LVTrolls please explain the justification for this.

I have no idea what you're trying to do by tying the word god to community, but the justification for the LVT is that each individual has an equal right to use land; as individuals have formed societies which are based on fixed improvements, there needs to be a way to secure the creators of said improvemnents of their property, while at the same time reconciling each individual's equal right to use land.

Furthermore, if you're not a member of the Eco-Clergy, an LVT Tax Assesor Lord, or a member of the LVT royal court, then you are forever damned to a serf's life.
LVTrolls please explain how this could ever lead to Liberty for everyone.

There's simply nothing here to address, because you've simply made a nonsensical assertion.

 

[Steven Douglas]

...the justification for the LVT is that each individual has an equal right to use land

When you drill down further, and actually give this some critical thought, you find that the real premise of the justification for LVT is the claim that [each individual] has an equal right to non-exclusive (SHARED - common - communistic) use of land. And when you dig just a little further, you find that "to use land" means any land, including that which is already in exclusively use by others -- for any purpose whatsoever.

THE GEOCOMMUNIST CATCH-22

Since it physically impossible for anyone on Earth to survive and exist without the exclusive use of some minimum fixed area of land, this "equal right to use land" that is advocated as a right by LVT proponents cannot be exercised without automatically resulting in a violation of everyone else's "individual right to use [THAT] land". This poses A Grave Problem, not to mention a Catch-22 for everyone on Earth, who is automatically guilty of rights violations based on their existence anywhere in or near a community of any kind.

It is physically impossible to secure the actual physical rights-to-use (again, of THAT land that is in use exclusively by someone else). That is the setup for the Catch-22, as it means that it is also logically impossible but that billions of rights violations MUST occur daily (as a result of people simply existing and surviving on the Earth). But never fear, as those clever ecommunists known as "geonomists" have come up with a Wonderful Statist Solution to their physically irreconcilable fantasy problem. Because inasmuch as you are automatically a violator of everyone else's rights, guess what? Everyone else is also a violator of yours! We just need to find out to what extent each person is a violator, and balance the books and settle up accordingly.

The Geoist Solution to The Geoist Problem is strictly monetary. It is analogous to a class action lawsuit against every landowner, who is sued perpetually for monetary damages. The principle justification for LVT dictates that whomever uses land exclusively is automatically presumed to have "willingly" entered a guilty plea in that class action suit, and will thus "agree" to incur a Land Use Liberty Rights Deprivation Penalty as a result of using land exclusively violating everyone else's rights. Payment of this penalty to the state is then deemed Just Compensation, as it is owed to everyone else for their equal-rights-to-use-land deprivation. This penalty will be in direct proportion to a) the quantity of land that is in use, multiplied by b) how much that particular land is desired for use by others (the assessed value of the annual land rents).

Nifty, huh? Once everyone who uses land is presumed guilty, the only question that remains is who is the most guilty, as we all settle up (with the state, of course, which every good statist collectivist knows is roughly synonymous and interchangeable with "the people").

The Really Neat Trick: Those who don't rely on land, or any kind of close proximity to a major population center, can nevertheless use all of the infrastructure therein, engage in economic activity therein, and otherwise acquire as much wealth as they desire from it, without paying a penny for the commonly shared government services and infrastructure that made that all possible. Don't worry, though. The locals, and only the locals, will foot the entire bill. This is because it is assumed by those clever geoists that landowners are the only ones deriving economic benefits from the community, based on their exclusive landownership alone.

Farmers, miners, individual residents and other landowners are considered a captive (but willing, doncha know) paying audience. They all "freely chose" to foot the entire bill for all government services the moment they agreed to rent something from what was arrogated en masse into the state's Land Rental Store. As such, only the locals pay for the economic benefits and opportunities, which gives a decided edge to foreigners, strangers, and the relatively landless parties who have it absolutely made, as they may now engage freely, and enjoy all those benefits, completely free of charge. To the extent that they keep themselves relatively landless, competition with all but the most capital improvement rich rent-seeking landowners is like shooting fish in a barrel.

 

[Roy L]

Finally, the other shoe dropped. Thanks for quoting that Steven. I would have missed that as EcoWarrier[sick ] is on my ignore list.

So, are there any LVTrolls that don't consider themselves to be royalty?
Typical collectivist, everyone is equal, but they are just a little more equal.

So you've spewed some stupid, dishonest filth. How special for you.

 

[Roy L]

What if no one wanted any service from your better state?

What if no one went to work tomorrow? That makes about as much sense.

Your whole argument is semantics: using gutted and Orwellian versions of words to describe state confiscation and state abuse of its arbitrary authority.

No, that's nothing but an absurd fabrication on your part.

None of your " set by the market" appraisal would be market at all...

Inevitably, you have to resort to the most fundamentally irrational of all "arguments": A is not-A.

An army of state assessors would have to try and define land values (impossible)

Yet it was done even in ancient societies where hardly anyone could read.

because the owner and seller could not be trusted to assess it properly.

The market will value land accurately. It's just a matter of observing it.

Any amount a land owner could profit over the assessment would be a "give away" as you say, and subject to confiscation to a bureaucracy(community)...Any transaction under the assessment would be ripping off the state which would have to be illigal...

These claims are just meaningless howling devoid of any relationship to LVT.

Some definition of liberty you have there. It is a complete nationalization of all land under the state and complete tyranny.

Hong Kong has "complete nationalization of all land under the state," and has for 160 years. Yet far from being "complete tyranny," it routinely tops lists of the freest countries in the world.

Your belief system considers that impossible. Mine knows that it is inevitable. The facts therefore prove that your belief system is objectively false, and mine is objectively true.

The barrage of spam rebuttals, most of which are name calling and denials,

That is an outright fabrication on your part. I have identified the relevant facts and their logical implications.

reminds me of the desperation the socialists had when Mises devastated the idea of socialism. One after another tried to throw themselves on the grenade that Mises dropped on them, and each and everyone could not invalidate Mises' critique.

I have demolished all "critiques" of LVT as the fallacious, absurd, and dishonest garbage they are.

Rothbard was a fool...???? Really? This is just intellectual dishonesty.

I stated that he had made a fool of himself in his critique of Georgism (which is certainly true), not that he was a fool. The intellectual dishonesty is therefore entirely yours. That will continue to be the case as long as you presume to dispute with me.

You admit the reorganization of a more just state is the outcome of your arrangement. I say any attempt to reform the state is antithesis in the goal of human liberty.

So you are happy with the state as it is, and find that it maximizes human liberty?

Of course, that is a rhetorical question. You know that you were just spewing stupid, dishonest garbage.

It's always the same.

 

[Roy L]

Now that we've established the royal predilections of the LVTrolls,

On the basis of... spelling...? Riiiiight.

this would be a good time to re-examine the feudal characteristics of LVT.

This is a good example of the absurd fabrications typical of anti-LVT shrieking.

"Society" or the "Community" takes the role of God.

Bald fabrication.

LVTrolls please provide an unambiguous definition of "Community" that is NOT simply reducible to "God".

A community is a group of people living and dealing with each other who recognize each other as fellow members of that community.

Somehow, the LVT govt. captures the God-Community and assumes for itself the role of God-Community's representative here on Earth.

This is probably best understood as an example of the mindless gibbering that normally follows a breakdown of rational thought in self-contradiction.

LVTrolls please explain the justification for this.

For what? Garbage you fabricated?

Furthermore, if you're not a member of the Eco-Clergy, an LVT Tax Assesor Lord, or a member of the LVT royal court, then you are forever damned to a serf's life.

Speaking of being "forever damned to a serf's life," see the condition of the landless in every country where private landowning is well established, but the government does not intercede massively on behalf of the landless to rescue them from the effects of landowner privilege.

LVTrolls please explain how this could ever lead to Liberty for everyone.

When you are at liberty to use what nature provided to sustain and enhance your life, you are free. When you are not, you are not. It's not rocket science.

 

[Roy L]

No, you just quote him a lot,

That is a fabrication on your part. I rarely quote him, though I do fairly often quote a letter (not by him) that appeared in one of his books.

tout his theorem as if it was the eighth wonder of the economic world,

The theorem was named in his honor, it was not his discovery.

and add in your own fifty cents as a Roy L remix.

Which is worth about fifty cents more than what you add...

It's that kind of semantic hair-splitting and definition-torturing that makes you so entertaining to me, Roy.

It is not hairsplitting or definition-torturing, but simply correction of a deliberate misuse of ordinary English.

Ergo, in Roy's lexicon, "ownership" is of property,

As in every honest lexicon.

and property cannot be considered property without the ability to "transfer" said ownership.

Correct. Property consists of a bundle of rights. If any of them are missing, it's not property but something else.

He cannot transfer "himself" (whatever that means to Roy, which is not clear or defined),

My guess: it means, "himself."

so we'll invoke a "non-ownership" term called "belonging", or "self-belonging".

That was the term George used. It seems clear and accurate enough to me.

You have your own lexicon of LVT Political Correctness, Roy.

I'm using ordinary words in ordinary senses. They are merely words that can be used to identify facts that prove your beliefs are false and evil, so you have to find some way of not knowing them. Refusing to understand clear, correct, grammatical English words is one way of preventing yourself from knowing such facts.

 

[MattintheCrown]

Austrian.

Sigh. I mean that rhetorically: it doesn't matter.

It's not the basis for an economics theory, nor was it intended to be, any more than the Constitution was. Don't you see how you have your economic carts, policy horses and people riders all mixed up? The reason you missed it is that you, like Marx, George, Keynes and so many Keynesian-rooted geoists, conflate policy and economic theory, in the hopes of borrowing pseudo-scientific prestige, so that an economics theory can serve as the driving engine and chief rationale for whatever STATIST POLICY it is that you ADVOCATE.

As opposed to what, Steven? Drawing policy out of a hat? Throwing darts at a wall with policies listed on it?

Economics theories are supposed to be scientific (or at least they pretend to be) : descriptive, informative, as they attempt to be predictive. Not prescriptive. Thus, it should not matter what policy is in place. Any economics theory should be able to see a policy as just so much information. Then, as that policy is implemented, you might be able to test just how accurate or reliable each economics theory was in being able to describe or predict -- NEVER PRESCRIBING OR ATTEMPTING TO MANIPULATE - its effects on all economies within "the [highly heterogeneous] economy".

Good god. Steven, the point of any science is to determine facts, and come up with theories to explain these facts. It's not an end unto itself either: we learn about the world in order to make our lives better. When we determine facts of economics, it's just common sense to form policies that recognize these facts, as that's the only way we have of making better policy, and thus making the world better.

The problem here is that you're simply not interested in making the world better. Thus, facts which are troubling to your world-view are ignored, or dismissed. It's just a fact that land is fixed in supply. But this fact implies that taxing land by value would have predictable results troubling to your beliefs, so you have sought ways to prevent yourself from knowing the fact. It's just that simple.

My position is that rights should NEVER be derived (let alone eroded or abridged) on the basis of any economics theory.

I agree, but that's a strawman, because no one has advocated such a position.

That's not ditching any of them. It's putting all of them in their proper place, because not doing that is what got us this deep into the truly fucked up Keynesian nightmare we're living in now, as economics theories were elevated in status above fundamental principles, and even individual rights, as they suggest solutions to problems described that may not even exist -- or more importantly, that may not actually be problems in search of statist solutions. Sticky wages as people refuse to take pay cuts in a growing economy, oh my! Liquidity traps, deflation and inelasticity of "the money supply", oh my! And people "hoarding" [their own] money? --- OH MY! --- what could be worse than that? Why, "the economy" would shut down and this would be catastrophic! These all require solutions. We can't have regular individuals with that kind of leverage and control. Solution: Gee, a privately owned, privately controlled, politically unaccountable central banking control system with a monopoly on counterfeiting and central interest rate setting power might be just the ticket! It might actually solve "the problems" that our theories clearly show are facing "the economy"!

It's easy enough to complain that economics isn't perfect, but again, you fail to supply an alternative. Since you seek to ditch economics, and I can assume you'll also oppose drawing policies from hats or the dart-method, what now?

For economy meddlers and other statist distortionists, economic policy is always a "economy-wide" cost-benefits issue for "society", with actual rights and privileges for real individuals determined primarily by a bunch of theoretical fools and ideologues operating in vacuums with nothing but sociopathic regard for individuals or core principles. Really, Matt, they should be manning wood chippers, but I'm afraid there aren't enough.

Again, as opposed to what? Just writing policy and hoping for the best? Psychics?

Yeah, that is the problem with refusing to know things, Matt. I said exactly who Joe is, and your mind, which filters and blurs individuals into nonexistence and irrelevance, drew a complete blank.

Joe is a Free and Natural Citizen; a real human being and living Citizen. There is absolutely nothing ambiguous about that. That is his legal status - pretty black and white, really. That means he is not a foreigner, a collective, a partnership, a corporation, or anything else. Unlike EcoWarrier(sic), he is THE HIGHEST ranking caste member in his own society -- equal to all others of that same legal status. All other entities - ANY ONE OR ANY THING - that is not like exactly like Joe (not a living free and a natural Citizen) would be subject to taxes, regulations, and all manner of conditional behavior and existence within our economy, as a matter of their conditionally privileged, fully alienable legal status. Joe, on the other hand, and everyone just like Joe (ALL free and natural Citizen individuals) would be FREE. Forever.

Not under your system, he wouldn't. You've admitted that since, as you claim, no one can be free without having some land, and since, as you prescribe, all land would be owned by individuals, each person who didn't inherent land would have to buy his freedom from some existing landowner.

Free? Please.

 

[Roy L]

Yes, they are. All of them are, in the aggregate.

Nope. If they try, people will just use less land. That puts the owners of the unused land over a barrel. They have to drop their price in order to get tenants and not lose money to the tax. If they just abandon the land, it is then available for use, and some other landowner will then be stuck with land taxes to pay and no tenant to pay them. Because supply is fixed, the market just forces the rent of all the land back down to its pre-tax level.

They just aren't able (in theory) to gain a competitive advantage that allows them to charge more rent than the other landowners, assuming the tax is proportionately levied on everyone. Assuming a perfectly competitive market, if the tax increases, all rents charged by landlords will increase in the aggregate.

Nope. Flat false. It's been known for 200 years that landowners can't pass on a land value tax, as explained above, and that fact is not disputed by any competent economist.

The effect of the poor paying rents to landlords doesn't go away at all (it actually increases, as shown below).

No such thing is shown below, or ever will be, anywhere.

A portion of it only shifts from the property rents landlord to the ground rents landlord, the state.

The UIE portion no longer has to be paid at all, proving you wrong.

The fact remains that supply is a dynamic variable - not fixed or inelastic - within its physical, theoretical limits.

The fact remains that the supply of land is fixed.

Here's an excerpt from an online tutorial (with the five variable criteria I mentioned bolded in red):

Microeconomics - Theory of Supply
Supply is defined as the quantity of a product that a producer is willing and able to supply onto the market at a given price in a given time period.

That definition specifically excludes land, as it is not a product, and has no producer. That is very much the point: something in fixed supply HAS NO PRODUCER BECAUSE IT CAN'T BE PRODUCED.

The seller in that case is referred to as a "producer" (a subset of sellers/suppliers), just as the "thing" being supplied is referred to as "product" (a subset of any thing being supplied). Supply is not constrained to producers and products, but the required elements are all there, regardless how the sentence is constructed.

False. A seller is not a producer. People selling the same piece of land around and around amongst each other does not produce land or increase the supply of land. B selling a thing to A does not increase the supply of that thing. That is one of the numerous places where you are going wrong.

LAW OF SUPPLY:
The direct relationship between supply price and the quantity supplied, assuming ceteris paribus factors are held constant. This economic principle indicates that an increase in the price of a commodity results in an increase in the quantity of the commodity that sellers are willing and able to sell in a given period of time, if other factors are held constant.

Wrong again. The Law of Supply does not apply to land because sellers are NOT ABLE to sell more, no matter how high the price goes. If you produce 10 bushels of corn in the expectation of selling it for $1/bushel, you might well produce 15 bushels if you expect to get $2/bushel. But if you have 10 acres of land, you can't sell 15 acres no matter how much anyone offers you. That is all fixed supply MEANS.

See that, Matt? For anything to be counted as "supply", there must be:

1) ability to sell

Right. And for anything to be in increased supply, there must be an increased ABILITY to sell. But landowners have no ABILITY to sell more land than they own, no matter how high the price goes. That is all "fixed supply" means.

That is not my idiosyncrasy at work. That is truly basic economics. Inability to sell - NOT SUPPLY.

Bingo. All the additional acres of land that no one is ABLE to sell because they don't exist and can never exist AREN'T PART OF THE SUPPLY.

Both of my quotes stand as the truth as it relates to land and LVT. The greater the increase on the tax levied on the basis of landownership, the more land is sold (supplied) to avoid the tax, given that the cost of ownership (to the state) becomes artificially prohibitive. That's not controversial, that's a geoist plank!

That's just reduced price, not increased supply.

You're only confused because you don't know any basic economics. See "supply" above. It's not a complicated concept, Matt.

Well, it was complicated enough for you to miss the fact that increased supply requires an ABILITY to sell more, an ability that in the case of land does not exist.

If every landowner was levied at a rate that was impossible for anyone to pay, everyone would be forced to sell (100% supplied to the market) to avoid the tax.

?? "Forced to sell"?? To whom? You are just spewing nonsense.

Those who could not sell would still not be able to pay and would lose title anyway, which means that no matter what, 100% of the land would be "supplied" (even if by the repossessing state alone) to the market.

100% of the land is always supplied (available) to the market.

With LVT, the state is saying, in effect, "Landowners and land developers, you can profit from rents on any 'artificial land' you build above ground.

No, you are just makin' $#!+ up again, Steven. Landowners qua landowners do not build anything. You are trying to sneak in a premise that landowners are productive contributors of improvements. But you know that they are not. You have to use self-contradictory terms like, "artificial land" to prevent yourself and others from knowing the facts that prove your beliefs are false and evil.

The state profits from the ground itself, and everything below and found therein."

No. "Profit" is an excess of revenue over expenses, and the state spends its revenue. So that is another fabrication on your part.

That is the fundamental division - the partnership between landowners/developers and the state.

Another fabrication.

It is also why developers and speculators would be more inclined to own just enough of the best lands (lakeside, bay view, downtown commercial, etc.,) on which to build a vertical profit tower.

I.e., they would put the land they held to productive use, and would no longer have a motive to hold good land out of use. Right.

All the rent-seeking behavior is still there, as before.

No, that is just you makin' $#!+ up again. There is no longer a motive to accumulate land you aren't using.

The incentive is now in place to make sure that all resources that are taken out of the earth are simply lifted above the earth (where taxes are supposedly nonexistent) on as small a land footprint as possible. THAT is how "new land" comes into existence under LVT.

These are good examples of the absurdities the evil engage in to enable atrocities.

LVT is a mechanism for artificially concentrating urban populations (read=the majority of the world population), which are herded vertically and condensed into less horizontal space.

No, that's just you makin' $#!+ up again. LVT enables the NATURAL and EFFICIENT concentration of activity that makes infrastructure most cost-effective, and allows people to reduce the time they waste in transit between their various destinations.

The "community activity" that actually provides the income for landowners to pay land rents is the very basis for the Land Value Tax in the first place.

Which Steven wants landowners to be able to appropriate in return for doing nothing.

Now for the Neat Trick - the insidious consequence and side effect, regardless of anyone's intent:

I.e., now for Steven to make some stupid $#!+ up again:

Since a downtown skyscraper (or casino in the desert) with lots of "community activity" automatically raises the land rents/LVT on all empty adjacent parcels in its vicinity, all a developer needs to do in order to price the majority of the population completely out of neighboring land market (in terms of LVT cost of ownership ONLY) is concentrate on developing his own small parcel of land!

I.e., concentrate on being productive!

That automatically makes all the remaining parcels in the vicinity -- including empty lots -- cost prohibitive to all but the most well-healed developers.

I.e., the opportunities at that location have become so great that only a small number of highly productive people are qualified to make the best use of them. I'm still waiting for Steven to come up with a downside to this phenomenon.

Vertical profit towers with "captive concentrated communities"

So now taking advantage of superior opportunities makes one a "captive"??

Steven is just makin' $#!+ up again.

eventually become profitable to the point where Land Value Tax is not a concern at all.

How? It's the location that makes them so profitable, and that value will be recovered by LVT.

This in turn concentrates the power of landownership, with long-term speculation on smaller spaces in the very best areas.

Pure fabrication. There is no point in speculation, as any increase in land value is taxed away.

The nearby outlying parcels are always shielded from ownership by any average person due to the increased LVT on adjacent parcels - all based on proximity alone.

"Shielded from ownership" by any average person? What does that even mean? Average people can't make the most of the best opportunities? True enough. That's why we don't want to stop the market from allocating those opportunities to the most productive people.

The landowner can just take the rents from the population that is now herded and confined to vertical profit towers,

"Herded"? "Confined"?? These are just stupid and dishonest propaganda words with no relation to reality. The UIE enables people to live in the locations they prefer, for free.

and give the state its proportionate due -- just like Hong Kong.

It would be much better than HK, as already explained, because HK relies on long-term leases with fixed payments.

Only in the case of LVT, there are no leasehold titles; just conditional ownership titles, held in perpetuity by anyone who is willing to continue paying the taxes.

Correct.

Which are no longer a problem,

They were never a problem, any more than paying for a loaf of bread is a problem.

since all the livable/usable "artificial land" is now floating safely above ground, out of the reach of taxes, with all the "productive community members" paying rents mostly on capital improvements.

Bald self-contradiction. There is no way to make those "vertical profit towers" make any economic sense unless their locations are extremely advantageous. And LVT makes those who occupy advantageous locations pay full market value for them.

 

[Roy L]

I am not an economist

Ain't that the truth...

Supply is the total quantity of a good or service that is available for purchase (seller both willing and able) at a given price, within a given time.

No, available to the market. Any amount that already exists in market participants' hands is part of supply.

You can't get it out of your head that SUPPLY IS NOT THE TOTAL QUANTITY IN EXISTENCE.

It is the quantity available to the market. In the case of land, price does not affect it.

In the real world, if the general market price of a good rises (assuming no hyperinflation or other economic distortions), MORE SELLERS will be willing to sell more of those goods at that higher price. That is absolutely true of the land and real estate markets, which are no exception to that rule.

It is definitely an exception, because people trading the same inventory around and around does not make more of it available to the market. When you sell your car to a neighbor, it does not increase the supply of cars. Probably there is no way to explain that fact to you so clearly and simply that you would become willing to know it.

Everybody wants to buy low and sell high.

But for everyone who buys low, someone is selling low, and for everyone who sells high, someone is buying high. Hello?

A "SALE" requires both a seller and buyer.

And a price requires a sale. Bingo.

A SUPPLY requires a SELLER. Period. Duh.

No. If no car changes hands in a given period of time, that does not mean the supply of cars has dropped to zero, and it does not matter how long that period of time is.

You're back to confusing "supply" with "sale"

That's your confusion.

Look at the original definition of supply, and you will see that it does not depend on an actual sale.

It also does not depend on an intention to sell.

I take out a 1,000 separate ebay listings for 1,000 individual coins at an asking price of $10 per coin. IF NOT ONE COIN SELLS my "quantity supplied" is still 1,000 coins at a price of $10 per coin.

None sold, so there was no price. A wish or hope is not a price.

If I offer ten thousand acres at a bazillion dollars per acre, that is the quantity supplied

Right. And it is the same quantity supplied if it is offered at $1/acre. THAT'S WHAT FIXED SUPPLY MEANS.

Taxed things simply get distorted.

Except when the tax removes a distortion.

If the tax is on the basis of ownership, those things that serve as the basis for that tax get supplied more (dumped on the market to avoid the tax). They get SUPPLIED MORE, but they are DEMANDED LESS based on that same market distortion, because the artificial increase in the cost of ownership applies equally to buyers and sellers, and thus encourages selling while simultaneously discouraging buying.

No. The supply is the same. The price is just lower.

Again, LVT makes land cheap to buy, NOT CHEAP TO OWN.

Right. And that's a GOOD thing.

Again, you don't have the slightest clue what you are talking about, as you are right back to clinging to the false notion that land is "fixed in supply".

Land is definitely fixed in supply.

The artificial sprawl we suffer from now is a direct result of unsound currency and corrupt, centralized monetary policy.

Silliness.

Skyscrapers, otherwise known as Casinos in the desert, prove that to be complete and utter bullshit.

They prove you wrong.

First they are built, however small, but larger and more expensive than surrounding improvements. By developers. Entrepreneurs. It is not until the people come that the land value increases.

No, that is false and absurd. Entrepreneurs build skyscrapers BECAUSE the people are ALREADY there and the land is ALREADY so valuable that it makes economic sense.

The only difference is that the geolibs want the cause of land values attributed solely to buyers (economic "community" activity)

As land's supply is fixed, its value is determined solely by demand.

and public infrastructure - not landowner developments, which are the primary reason everyone came to buy in the first place.

False. Landowners don't contribute development, and development follows services and infrastructure, not the other way around.

The focus was not on the cost of the skyscrapers, but rather on the effects that skyscrapers have (based on the "economic activity" therein) on making NEIGHBORING LANDS COST PROHIBITIVE, based on increasing LVT under an LVT regime.

??? How can they be "cost prohibitive"? LVT is just what someone WILLINGLY pays for the economic advantage the land confers on its user. If the rental price goes up, it's only because that price is NOT prohibitive to someone.

And that is primarily because geolibs fail to acknowledge "developments" as a primary contributing factor for increased "economic activity", and therefore land values.

No, that's just you makin' $#!+ up about what geoists have plainly said. Development is very much a contributor to the community-provided opportunities and amenities that increase land rent. But it is developers -- members of the community -- who contribute developments, not landowners.

On the whole, all things being equal, and cost being no consideration, MOST PEOPLE would prefer to live in houses, not fucking apartments.

But cost IS a consideration. Duh. And most people are not all people.

LVT sets in motion a dynamic that makes the cost of landownership, and therefore homeownership and cost of living in a home, DELIBERATELY AND ARTIFICIALLY COST PROHIBITIVE.

No. Even without a UIE, LVT actually makes homeownership more affordable. The homeowner is no longer paying for government twice to support idle landowners, so he has much more disposable income to spend on a house; he does not have to pay all the future land rent up front, so he doesn't have to pay all that mortgage interest on the land cost; and the need to use land productively means there would be an ample supply of good, livable houses available at competitive prices, so he will be paying less for them, too. With LVT, it would be routine for people to pay less than a year's (untaxed) wages in cash for a nice house in a good neighborhood. If you weren't deterred by a fixer-upper, you could get a livable house in a good neighborhood for a month's wages.