We Urgently Need To Revert To Classical Economics

[redbluepill]

You can always tell that someone is making an effective argument when they feel the need to hurl insults.

Please tell us more about how everyone needs to pay a tax because they happen to exist.

Umm, it is you who advocates paying a tax to exist (in the form of rent to a landlord). The LVT is merely for the PRIVILEGE to EXCLUSIVELY use a piece of the Earth.

 

[Kade]

The same is what happens to the money in government coffers right now.

Bingo.

Authority is authority. Power is Power. Many folks here continue to hold onto an earlier idea about the separation that may have been possible when there were open minerals and lands, where population was not out of control.

The market has given us the most powerful government money can buy because that is EXACTLY what the people who control it want. The market gets what the market wants.... and they want absolute control.

Lobby=Corporation=Government

 

[redbluepill]

So, it's fine by you when Crusoe points his musket at Friday and gives him the choice of being his slave or getting back in the water?

Somehow, I kinda figured it'd be something like that.

At least they're being consistent. ;-)

 

[redbluepill]

What does the T in LVT stand for?

Its a misnomer. "Although described as a tax, it is not really a tax at all, but a payment for benefits received. It would replace, not add to, existing taxes."
http://www.landvaluetax.org/what-is-lvt/

Likewise, if a government court orders you to repay your neighbor after doing doughnuts on his lawn you wouldn't call it a tax but restitution.

 

[Steven Douglas]

In that case, I guess we should merge all the Austrian Economics threads.

Tell you what, let's go to a pro-Obama forum and start trolling for Ron Paul. Start a few endless threads about his positions on various issues, hijack and derail a few others (we're just arguing what we feel is best for the country, after all - isn't that what everyone there is doing? Gosh! duh...). Then, when someone suggests they be merged together, we can say "In that case, I guess we should merge all the Obama related threads too."

So you might have had a point, and what you said might have made sense IF this was a GEORGIST/GEOIST/LVT message board, where it was mostly a bunch of Land Socialists talking about All Things Georgism and LVT related -- and IF this was not specifically the RON PAUL FORUMS, and IF Ron Paul wasn't such a RIGHT-LIBERTARIAN, both Austrian School and anti-tax/anti-spend AND VERY ANTI-LVT.

Ron Paul was a staunch supporter of N.D.'s Measure 2, which would have eliminated all property taxes, including the land value tax component thereof. There is no way in hell that Ron Paul would EVER support a Land Value Tax.

Section 4 of Ron Paul's Liberty Amendment reads: SOURCE

Section 4. Three years after the ratification of this amendment the sixteenth article of amendments to the Constitution of the United States shall stand repealed and thereafter Congress shall not levy taxes on personal incomes, estates, and gifts.’.

And you can rest assured that by "estates", he meant that to include all privately owned wealth, including privately owned land. Ron Paul believes that both land and money are different forms of capital, and would NEVER support any form of Land Socialism or "reclaiming socially created wealth for the collectivist land rental commune".

So yeah, let's pretend that Austrian Economics is just another tangent, another forum off-shoot, like the Land Socialist Tax.

 

[redbluepill]

C'mon dude, you know that's not a fair comparison. Right wing parties in most of Europe are more left leaning than Democrats in the USA.

Right wing in Europe has shifted to the left, as it has in North America. Just look at the origins of the Neocons.
More dependance on the state has been the emphasis… a dictatorship by consent like Huxley's Brave New World.

Is Albert Jay Nock libertarian enough for you? He advocated the LVT. How about the anarchist Leo Tolstoy? He also advocated the LVT!

 

[redbluepill]

I thought I was merely wasting my time replying in this thread, but now I feel dirty for helping RoyL achieve climax with his masochistic LVT fetish.

If RoyL truly believes civilization is merely a product of taxes and govt. (or should I say his refusal to admit his knowledge to the contrary ), then I fear there is nothing we can say that will reach him. We can only hope his life experiences in the future will afford him an opportunity to grow. Daisies would be the best I think.

Welcome to my ignore list. EcoWarrier [sic] too.

So the Ron Paul Forum is merely a circle jerk for the Austrian School-minded where any alternative libertarian views are ignored? Eh, suit yourself.

 

[redbluepill]

George Orwell double speak.

Pay your rent and you will have property freedom.

Speaking of Orwell...

"If giving the land of England back to the people of England is theft, I am quite happy to call it theft."


"Stop to consider how the so-called owners of the land
got hold of it. They simply seized it by force, afterwards hiring lawyers
to provide them with title-deeds. In the case of the enclosure of the
common lands, which was going on from about 1600 to 1850, the
land-grabbers did not even have the excuse of being foreign conquerors;
they were quite frankly taking the heritage of their own countrymen,
upon no sort of pretext except that they had the power to do so."
– George Orwell

http://www.progress.org/orwell01.htm

 

[redbluepill]

http://archive.mises.org/1610/murray-rothbard-and-henry-george/

http://www.nolanchart.com/article69...hbards-critique-of-the-georgist-argument.html

 

[redbluepill]

Tell you what, let's go to a pro-Obama forum and start trolling for Ron Paul. Start a few endless threads about his positions on various issues, hijack and derail a few others (we're just arguing what we feel is best for the country, after all - isn't that what everyone there is doing? Gosh! duh...). Then, when someone suggests they be merged together, we can say "In that case, I guess we should merge all the Obama related threads too."

So you want one thread that is over 2000 pages long completely devoted to the LVT?

1. There are only a few threads devoted to LVT, each of them quite long. From what I've seen, almost all of them are created by different posters. Granted, there were a couple threads hijacked in the past. It happens.

2. Many Georgists are in fact Ron Paul supporters ( though they obviously don't agree with him on everything). Just read a message today on the LVT facebook group. The poster had a picture with him next to Paul.

So you might have had a point, and what you said might have made sense IF this was a GEORGIST/GEOIST/LVT message board, where it was mostly a bunch of Land Socialists talking about All Things Georgism and LVT related -- and IF this was not specifically the RON PAUL FORUMS, and IF Ron Paul wasn't such a RIGHT-LIBERTARIAN, both Austrian School and anti-tax/anti-spend AND VERY ANTI-LVT.

So we all have to agree with Paul 100% if we are to be posting on this forum? Who's sounding like a cult now? He has pretty statist views on illegal immigration (bring the troops home so we can put them on the Mexican border, THATS a libertarian stance?!).

The LVT has a rich history of support from freedom lovers and libertarians. Hardly socialist. But you should know that by now.

 

[Steven Douglas]

So the Ron Paul Forum is merely a circle jerk for the Austrian School-minded where any alternative libertarian views are ignored? Eh, suit yourself.

"alternative libertarian" is one way of putting it, so long as we play fast and loose with the terms "liberty" and "libertarian". We could more easily say "alternative leftist", given its statist/collectivist foundation. Either way, it's a jerk circle of its own that is far more limited.

Funny how words get hijacked, and meanings get distorted. Fidel Castro was a "liberator" of the Cubans, and the Chinese were the "liberators" of Tibet. Why, they were ONLY about "liberty"! They were "For The People!"

Just the word "geolibertarian" is a joke to me. Earth+free? Hardly. Not to humans, anyway, because without Roy's joke of a meaningless Universal Individual Exemption Credit proposal, the Earth is not free to ANYBODY under a geolibertarian regime. Everyone is a slave to everyone else, because everybody is presumed to owe everybody else for depriving them of their putative "liberty rights".

Marxist ideology arrogates monopolistic control over all factors of production to the state. George distilled this into a much subtler "Marxist Lite" version, as he targeted only one factor of production -- albeit THE ENTIRETY of it, with monopolistic arrogation of land rents. Geolib "single taxers" fancy this to be "libertarian" because it calls for an end to income, sales and other taxes.

"See that, Libertarians? We have something in common! We don't want income or sales taxes either! Yippee! We'll all be "liberated"! We only want to reclaim socialist created land value and compensate the people who created this value -- this socialist created wealth! But the people are free to keep everything else that they earn and own!!!!"

It's also very "libertarian" if you buy into Roy L.'s view of everyone having a basic right to "liberty" to all lands, which must then be reconciled by a Land Value Tax, so that those deprived of this "liberty right" can, through the taxing jurisdiction, receive "just compensation".

Yeah, I'll stick with my Austrian School-minded circle jerk and pass on the Land Socialism trying to pass itself off as "alternative libertarianism".

 

[Steven Douglas]

2. Many Georgists are in fact Ron Paul supporters...

Of course -- it's their only real shot for a foot in the door. There are lots of "Green" tree-spiking eco-terrorists who support the Democratic Party also - that doesn't mean they're wanted, or that the party endorses their attitudes, actions or views. And their support doesn't make them any less a turd in the party punch bowl.

 

[redbluepill]

"alternative libertarian" is one way of putting it, so long as we play fast and loose with the terms "liberty" and "libertarian". We could more easily say "alternative leftist", given its statist/collectivist foundation.

It has no statist/collectivist foundation. We have proven that time and again. George and Marx may have agreed in a common problem but they completely disagreed on the solution. George's solution revolved around a free market. Marx's solution was communism.

Funny how words get hijacked, and meanings get distorted.

Yeah, funny. Like calling ideas 'statist' or 'collectivist' when they are clearly not.

Just the word "geolibertarian" is a joke to me. Earth+free? Hardly. Not to humans, anyway, because without Roy's joke of a meaningless Universal Individual Exemption Credit proposal, the Earth is not free to ANYBODY under a geolibertarian regime. Everyone is a slave to everyone else, because everybody is presumed to owe everybody else for depriving them of their putative "liberty rights".

No one owes anyone anything unless they themselves are depriving others from what nature provided. Pretty simple concept.

Marxist ideology arrogates monopolistic control over all factors of production to the state. George distilled this into a much subtler "Marxist Lite" version, as he targeted only one factor of production -- albeit THE ENTIRETY of it, with monopolistic arrogation of land rents. Geolib "single taxers" fancy this to be "libertarian" because it calls for an end to income, sales and other taxes.

There is no monopolistic arrogation of land rents. The government doesn't decide who uses the land, hows its used, or even how much each piece of land is taxed.

"See that, Libertarians? We have something in common! We don't want income or sales taxes either! Yippee! We'll all be "liberated"! We only want to reclaim socialist created land value and compensate the people who created this value -- this socialist created wealth! But the people are free to keep everything else that they earn and own!!!!"

Whats with the big 'L' for libertarian?

And its not 'something' in common its about 98% of issues we have in common.

It's also very "libertarian" if you buy into Roy L.'s view of everyone having a basic right to "liberty" to all lands, which must then be reconciled by a Land Value Tax, so that those deprived of this "liberty right" can, through the taxing jurisdiction, receive "just compensation".

Its a view shared historically by many libertarians and freedom lovers. Many of them more libertarian than Paul.

Yeah, I'll stick with my Austrian School-minded circle jerk and pass on the Land Socialism trying to pass itself off as "alternative libertarianism".

Easier to hold onto false doctrines when you only surround yourself with the likeminded.

 

[redbluepill]

Of course -- it's their only real shot for a foot in the door. There are lots of "Green" tree-spiking eco-terrorists who support the Democratic Party also - that doesn't mean they're wanted, or that the party endorses their attitudes, actions or views. And their support doesn't make them any less a turd in the party punch bowl.

So I have to agree with Ron Paul on all his stances to be a 'supporter'?

 

[redbluepill]

Btw, many libertarians don't consider Paul to be a real libertarian for many of his stances (abortion, immigration, etc.)

 

[silverhandorder]

Btw, many libertarians don't consider Paul to be a real libertarian for many of his stances (abortion, immigration, etc.)

Real libertarians as in voluntarists know Ron Paul is a voluntarist.

 

[redbluepill]

Real libertarians as in voluntarists know Ron Paul is a voluntarist.

Funny, there is no question about Paul's claim to being a 'voluntarist' yet geolibertarians are shot down as socialists. Paul is a voluntarist when it comes to abortion or immigration? Give me a break.

 

[Steven Douglas]

It has no statist/collectivist foundation. We have proven that time and again.

...to your own satisfaction, of course. Delusions of truth and moral rightness are common defining characteristics of LVT proponents. They fancy themselves as "proving" things, and "destroying/demolishing arguments", as they deal only in "indisputable facts of objective reality", while others "refuse to know", and are "objectively false".

George and Marx may have agreed in a common problem but they completely disagreed on the solution. George's solution revolved around a free market. Marx's solution was communism.

We obviously disagree on what "free market" means.

No one owes anyone anything unless they themselves are depriving others from what nature provided. Pretty simple concept.

Yes, it is a simplistic enough concept, so long as you swallow the whole "right not to be deprived by others of what nature provided" premise. Which I do not.

There is no monopolistic arrogation of land rents. The government doesn't decide who uses the land, hows its used, or even how much each piece of land is taxed.

Then you didn't read carefully. I didn't write "monopolistic determination of land use". I wrote "monopolistic arrogation of land rents". Which it most certainly is.

2) Unless you're calling for the abolishment of zoning laws, and land use allocation decisions, the government most certainly does decide HOW land is used. And under an LVT regime there is a built-in incentive to exercise this zoning and allocation power such that LVT revenues are maximized. Thus, for example, if industry or commerce is willing to pay more for more land than housing, more land will be zoned for commerce and industry, less for housing (just like fucking Hong Kong does now).

3) The government most certainly does, and would, decide how much each piece of land is taxed. Valuation is part of the levy determination, which is determined by Roy's "army of competent appraisers" that he has so much faith in. But even they were 100% accurate, such that it paced perfectly with the otherwise free market that wouldn't exist for comparison, there's still the mill rate/multiplier side. That's where human decisions are made to determine the valuation multiplier to obtain the amount levied -- i.e., how much land rents to actually capture (50%? 90%? 100%? 200%?).

4) Not only does the government determine what formulae are used to determine how much to levy, but also how much NOT to levy (special circumstances, exceptions to the LVT rule). That's where the power of Renaissance and Enterprise zones come into play, as well as exemptions, abatements, grants, special use privileges, etc., which allow taxing jurisdictions to compete, while giving distinct preferential treatment and economic advantages to those favored.

5) The government does not decide WHO SPECIFICALLY uses what land, any more than the FED decides who specifically gets which of its counterfeited fiat currency. In other words, NOT TRUE, but let's pretend it is true. Even without favoritism, the very regime itself is designed such that it is predictable which class of entities will ultimately have access to the very best lands (i.e., those who are willing to pay the most to the state), with ALL entities (not necessarily people) presumed as having equal status under the law.

Whats with the big 'L' for libertarian?

Consistency. I use a big G and S for Geo-Socialist, and I capitalize Marxist, as in Land Rents Marxist, and I capitalize Georgist as well.

 

[redbluepill]

...to your own satisfaction, of course. Delusions of truth and moral rightness are common defining characteristics of LVT proponents. They fancy themselves as "proving" things, and "destroying/demolishing arguments", as they deal only in "indisputable facts of objective reality", while others "refuse to know", and are "objectively false".

The fact that many well known proponents of LVT were minarchists or even anarchists should be a signal to you that it is not a collectivist idea. There is also something called geoanarchism and links have been posted numerous times to it.
http://www.anti-state.com/geo/foldvary1.html

We obviously disagree on what "free market" means.

free market 
noun
an economic system in which prices and wages are determined by unrestricted competition between businesses, without government regulation or fear of monopolies.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/free market


Nothing in that definition that is in violation of geoism.

Then you didn't read carefully. I didn't write "monopolistic determination of land use". I wrote "monopolistic arrogation of land rents". Which it most certainly is.

2) Unless you're calling for the abolishment of zoning laws, and land use allocation decisions, the government most certainly does decide HOW land is used. And under an LVT regime there is a built-in incentive to exercise this zoning and allocation power such that LVT revenues are maximized. Thus, for example, if industry or commerce is willing to pay more for more land than housing, more land will be zoned for commerce and industry, less for housing (just like fucking Hong Kong does now).

I do call for an abolishment of zoning laws as does geolibertarian Fred Foldvary: http://www.progress.org/fold189.htm

3) The government most certainly does, and would, decide how much each piece of land is taxed. Firstly, there is the determination of how much land rents to actually capture (50%? 90%? 100%? 200%?). That human decision determines the amount levied, as a multiplier for the valuation. That's the other side of the levy determination, which is determined by Roy's "army of competent appraisers" that he has so much faith in.

While the percents have varied throughout history, a pure LVT would be at 100% of the land value. Yes, it would be up to government (or whatever ruling organization in charge) to enact the percentage, but the government wouldn't decide what the value actually is of each piece of land.

4) Not only does the government determine what formulae are used to determine how much to levy, but also how much NOT to levy (special circumstances, exceptions to the LVT rule). That's where the power of Renaissance and Enterprise zones come into play, as well as exemptions, abatements, grants, special use privileges, etc., which allow taxing jurisdictions to compete, while giving distinct preferential treatment and economic advantages to those favored.

The problems with corporatism are a huge reason why I am an LVT advocate. Compared to other forms of taxation it is easy to track and practically impossible to avoid (can't store away land on oversea bank accounts). The wealthy and/or privileged would have difficulty taking advantage of such a system. At least if they do it is not kept hidden from the public.

There may be a few cases where I am for temporary deferments when transitioning over to a geoist system but ideally there would not be preferential treatment.

5) The government does not decide WHO SPECIFICALLY uses what land, any more than the FED decides who specifically gets which of its counterfeited fiat currency.

Government does not generate land nor would it hand it out under a geoist system. Poor analogy.

The very regime itself is designed such that it is predictable which class of entities will have access to the very best lands (i.e., those who are willing to pay the most to the state), with ALL entities (not necessarily people) presumed as having equal status under the law.

Certain classes already have access to the very best lands. The LVT breaks up the monopoly and makes it easier for the rest to acquire a piece of nature.

And the LVT doesn't mean the government gets to offer a smaller percent tax to one class/group and a higher percent to another class/group. That has nothing to do with LVT

 

[redbluepill]

Consistency. I use a big G and S for Geo-Socialist, and I capitalize Marxist, as in Land Rents Marxist, and I capitalize Georgist as well.

I ask because Libertarian usually implies the LP while libertarian implies a political ideology.