What do you think of Land Value Tax (LVT)

[Roy L]

Many of us have read Ayn Rand

You claim to have read Ayn Rand. Do you remember how Galt's Gulch was financed?

 

[heavenlyboy34]

How could property in what nature provided for all possibly constitute an extension of self-ownership? Other than an extension to what is plainly NOT self-ownership, that is.

Because it's not for all. It's for whomever can claim it. It is an extension of self-ownership. You clearly don't understand Locke or any other Natural Rights philosophers. Go do some reading.

 

[heavenlyboy34]

Then you are (surprise!) lying about it.

Incorrect.
No, it isn't.

Yes, there most certainly is. The landowner desires to appropriate to himself the value that government, the community and nature provide. As he neither needs nor deserves that value, that is greedy by definition.

You don't know what the landowner needs or desires (other than food/water/shelter). Everything else is a subjective value judgement-even and especially your claims about property.

Ownership of what cannot rightly be owned is immoral and greedy, sorry.

Yes, some things that cannot be owned-like IP-is immoral. Land, airspace, and other property is perfectly moral and, sorry-a matter of rational self-interest and practicality, not greed. Until there is a super-abundance of material things and land, your fantasy of abolishing private property will remain a fantasy. No property-less society has ever lasted a significant amount of time.

 

[Roy L]

Because it's not for all.

Oh, really? Whom do you claim has no right to access and use the natural resources required to sustain life? And in just what, exactly, would a right to life consist in the absence of a right to access and use what nature provides?

It's for whomever can claim it.

That is not property; it is forcible animal possession. Possession obtained by nothing but force is just as validly overturned by force.

It is an extension of self-ownership.

Nonsense. It just indisputably isn't. Self-ownership is ownership of the self, not the land, the sea, the sky, the moon, the sun, the planets or the stars.

You clearly don't understand Locke or any other Natural Rights philosophers. Go do some reading.

I understand them perfectly. Their arguments are simply not logically defensible. Every philosopher of any competence who has addressed the problem of property in land has recognized that it is logically and morally defective. Some have pretended to have found a rationalization for it. None has in fact succeeded in doing so. Locke, for example, resorts to a notion of "mixing one's labor with land," a patent physical impossibility and nothing but an uninformative and misleading metaphor. There are products of labor and land unaltered by labor. There is no such thing as a "mixture" of land and labor, and never can be.

 

[PierzStyx]

I've read Progress and Poverty and I think George's reasoning is sound. It's a tax on rent which, if you understand the Law of Rent, I think is much more fair than some sort of flat sales tax. A sales tax punishes the consumer more than the producer.

I take George's idea even further. I think there should be a flat tax on wealth itself. This to me, after all I've looked at, seems to me the most fair. You could tax people on their average daily/monthly/yearly net worth. This would allow a flat percentage to be taken from everyone equally and wouldn't be a burden on the lower class any more than the upper class and producers.

The only problem with this is the difficulty in enforcing fairly. Perhaps we could just start with measuring real property/assets and also on your average daily bank balance.

I've said this elsewhere on the boards and many disagree saying that you shouldn't get taxed on what you already own, so they think a flat sales tax or import tax or whatever is more fair. I disagree.

The producer shouldn't be punished at all. And teh consumer is only "punished" insofar as they choose to be, for the most part anyway.

 

[PierzStyx]

Incidentally, I do not lie. Ever. Just as a note, for your future reference.

Unless its to Nazis. And then screw them!

 

[PierzStyx]

Garbage. For 99% of the human species' history, there was no such thing as private landowning. Land was always held communally or tribally. The basis of property rights is the producer's right to own the fruits of his labor.

Not true at all. Every society has had private ownership of property. The most applicable to us would the the native Americans. Many try to say they didn't. That is just another lie fed to you my a crappy educational system. Indians invaded the lands of other tribes ALL THE TIME and wiped them out to take that land for themselves. Sure the wandering tribes didn't have "land" but its because they were nomadic, NOT because they had some egalitarian system of communal ownership. But they all had personal possessions. But its kinda hard to claim land permanently you don't settle on. And every tribe that didn't travel regularly (i.e. all tribes but the plains tribes) did actually have personal land rights. Your house was yours. The plot of land it was on was yours. Everything in your housing structure was yours. This was even the case with the tribes that lived in larger family dwellings. The land technically was in possession of the family elder(s) who dispersed it amongst the family. It was closer to inheritance laws today than anything else. And this pattern repeats world wide. For 100% percet of human history there has been private land owning it just got into larger and larger plots of land as the ages progressed to the modern era.

 

[Roy L]

You don't know what the landowner needs or desires (other than food/water/shelter).

Wrong. I know the inherent character of what he does as landowner. As labor earns (deserves) its product, and land is not a product of labor, it is impossible that he could deserve ownership of the land. And as tenants live just fine without owning land, I know that he does not need it. Landowning is therefore an expression of greed just as surely as raping is an expression of lust.

Everything else is a subjective value judgement-even and especially your claims about property.

Nope. The facts are self-evident and indisputable. There is no basis for claims of property in land other than brute force. And as already explained, an advantage obtained by force is not property, and is just as validly overturned by force.

Yes, some things that cannot be owned-like IP-is immoral.

The landowner privatizes what is rightly in the public domain just as the IP holder does.

Land, airspace, and other property is perfectly moral

And slaves, where slavery is sanctioned by law....?

Sorry, but that is a blatant question begging fallacy.

and, sorry-a matter of rational self-interest and practicality, not greed.

Bull$#!+. Hong Kong has not had any private ownership of land for over 160 years, and it has been eminently rational and practical.

Until there is a super-abundance of material things and land, your fantasy of abolishing private property will remain a fantasy.

You again choose deliberately to lie about what I have plainly written. I have never proposed abolishing private property. You know that. Of course you do. You just decided you had better deliberately lie about it.

No property-less society has ever lasted a significant amount of time.

<sigh> You know that I do not propose a property-less society, so you can stop lying. There was no such thing, not even such a concept, as property in land for 99% of the human species's history. That seems a more significant amount of time than the few thousand years since some evil genius concocted the notion of claiming what nature provided as his own, and found fools gullible enough to believe him.

 

[Roy L]

The producer shouldn't be punished at all.

Nor should the consumer.

And teh consumer is only "punished" insofar as they choose to be, for the most part anyway.

Garbage. You could with equal "logic" claim the producer is only punished insofar as they choose to be.

Production and consumption are just two sides of the same economic coin. You can't tax one without taxing the other, except to the extent that production is exported and consumption imported.

 

[Roy L]

Not true at all. Every society has had private ownership of property.

You are trying to change the subject, because you have no arguments and you know it.

The subject is private property IN LAND, not private property per se. I have stated this many times.

The most applicable to us would the the native Americans. Many try to say they didn't. That is just another lie fed to you my a crappy educational system. Indians invaded the lands of other tribes ALL THE TIME and wiped them out to take that land for themselves.

That was forcible animal possession, not property, and it was tribal and communal, not private.

Sure the wandering tribes didn't have "land" but its because they were nomadic, NOT because they had some egalitarian system of communal ownership.

Wrong again. Not all were nomadic. But none had private landowning.

But they all had personal possessions.

Which were products of labor. Not land. This is stated clearly in the post to which you purport to be responding. Try reading it.

But its kinda hard to claim land permanently you don't settle on.

European colonial powers did so routinely.

And every tribe that didn't travel regularly (i.e. all tribes but the plains tribes) did actually have personal land rights.

None had private property in land.

Your house was yours.

A house is not land. Please try not to be so dishonest.

The plot of land it was on was yours.

No, that is a flat-out lie. You had temporary use of the land while your house was sitting on it. You had NO CLAIM WHATEVER to the land once you were no longer using it as a place to hold up your house.

Everything in your housing structure was yours.

Nope. Only the products of labor. Try reading the post to which you purport to be responding.

This was even the case with the tribes that lived in larger family dwellings. The land technically was in possession of the family elder(s) who dispersed it amongst the family.

Flat false. It was only temporary occupancy and use, not ownership, and was dissolved as soon as the land was vacated.

It was closer to inheritance laws today than anything else.

Garbage. There was no ownership interest in the land. None. It was simply administration of temporary possession and use.

And this pattern repeats world wide.

The pattern of no private landowning. Right.

For 100% percet of human history there has been private land owning

No, that is a flat-out lie.

it just got into larger and larger plots of land as the ages progressed to the modern era.

Complete garbage. You clearly know nothing whatever of land tenure traditions or the origin of property in land.

 

[redbluepill]

All apologists for landowner privilege lie. That is a natural law of the universe. There has never been an exception to that law, and there never will be.

Its just as Tolstoy said, "People do not argue with the teachings of Henry George, they simply do not know it."

 

[redbluepill]

Because it's not for all. It's for whomever can claim it. It is an extension of self-ownership. You clearly don't understand Locke or any other Natural Rights philosophers. Go do some reading.

Some got it right others got it wrong. Locke was so close. He initially states land and all its creatures are common to all man. But his theory that mixing your labor with the earth makes the earth yours is terribly flawed (how much labor is required? Does that "land property" extend only on that which one applies his/her labor?) You say we do not understand the natural rights philosophers yet I have provided plenty of evidence of many of those philosophers who sympathized with ground rent and who viewed land as unique from capital/property.

Let me ask you this, have you read Progress & Poverty, let alone any article/speech by Henry George? How about Fred Foldvary or Mason Gaffney? I assume not.

 

[redbluepill]

Heavenlyboy, you may be surprised how much you may disagree with John Locke on this issue:

John Locke, the natural-law philosopher whose thought is reflected in the Declaration of Independence and Bill of Rights, wrote, “the things of nature are given in common”11 and “no man could ever have a just power over the life of another by right of property in land ...”12 Locke recognized the benefits of private ownership of land and the right of individuals to possess land — a right he contended came about when an individual mixed his labor with the land. But Locke, in his famous “proviso,” stipulated that such private ownership would be held on the condition “where there is enough and as good left in common for others.”13 Though Locke did not explicitly state how that condition could be met, the payment to a community of the rent, which measures the extra productivity of superior relative to inferior land, would seem to satisfy the condition, since this would keep in common the benefits of holding the better lands. ...

Natural-law philosophers such as John Locke have reasoned that all human beings have a natural ownership right to their labor and the products of that labor. The fundamental equality of humanity means it is fundamentally wrong for some to take away the labor done by others.31 That notion is almost universally recognized today with respect to slavery, and some folks are beginning to recognize that the current tax system—which taxes our earnings and taxes how we invest or spend those earnings—also violates man’s natural right to the fruits of his labor.

John Locke is often misrepresented by royal libertarians, who quote him very selectively. For example, Locke did say that:

Whatsoever then he removes out of the state that nature hath provided, and left it in, he hath mixed his labour with, and joined to it something that is his own, and thereby makes it his property.

But Locke condemned anyone who took more than he needed as a "spoiler of the commons":

...if the fruits rotted, or the venison putrified, before he could spend it, he offended against the common law of nature, and was liable to be punished; he invaded his neighbour's share, for he had no right, farther than his use called for any of them, and they might serve to afford him conveniences of life.

The same measures governed the possession of land too: whatsoever he tilled and reaped, laid up and made use of, before it spoiled, that was his peculiar right; whatsoever he enclosed, and could feed, and make use of, the cattle and product was also his. But if either the grass of his enclosure rotted on the ground, or the fruit of his planting perished without gathering, and laying up, this part of the earth, notwithstanding his enclosure, was still to be looked on as waste, and might be the possession of any other.

Locke also restricted appropriation of land by the proviso, ignored by royal libertarians, that there must be still enough, and as good left; and more than the yet unprovided could use. So that, in effect, there was never the less left for others because of his enclosure for himself: for he that leaves as much as another can make use of, does as good as take nothing at all.

Now if the situation is that there is enough free land, and as good, left after you take and cultivate your land, than your land has no market value, for who would pay you for land that is not better than land that can be had for free? So, besides the fact that Locke's justification of privatizing land is far more limited than royal libertarians portray it to be, it is irrelevant to the question of land value tax, as it applies only to land that has no value.
Furthermore, Locke based his scenario on pre-monetary societies, where a landholder would find that "it was useless, as well as dishonest, to carve himself too much, or take more than he needed." With the introduction of money, Locke noted, all land quickly became appropriated. Why? Because with money, those who can take more land than they have personal use for suddenly have reason to do so, as between them they will have taken all the land, and others will have to pay rent to them. So, with the introduction of money, the Lockean rationale for landed property falls apart, even according to Locke.

And while Locke did not propose a remedy specifically for to this problem, he repeatedly stated that all taxes should be on real estate.

http://wealthandwant.com/themes/Locke.html

 

[helmuth_hubener]

And here you guys go again claiming the natural land is property.

Surely you understand that this is the crux of our disagreement! Yes?

You say: Man didn't create the universe, so it must be held in common for all humanity.

I say: OK, maybe we didn't create it. Let's privitize it anyway.

If you, Explorer Redbluepill, ramble along into a vast uninhabited wilderness and claim some of it, there's no one there whom you are ripping off. No one's rights have been violated. Other people show up later, you're not ripping them off either. They didn't create the universe! They have no right to it! You found it, you claimed it, it's yours.

Perhaps that's the root disagreement from a moral perspective: You think "OK, here's a universe, here's human beings, the human beings didn't create the universe, so we all have a equal right to the whole universe." I, on the other hand, think "OK, here's this universe, none of us can show any proof we created it, so nobody has a right to any of it." Then it just becomes a practical matter of splitting it all up in a way that doesn't violate anyone's rights. That's an easy fix: homesteading. Just go claim and use stuff no one else is claiming. Since nobody has a right to any of it, no foul. In your philosophy, big foul, against all humanity no less, because everybody owned, owns, and will always own, whatever stuff you just claimed.

You say everybody has just claim on the empty universe, I say nobody does.

 

[helmuth_hubener]

You claim to have read Ayn Rand.

Actually, I didn't.

LIAR!

LIAR!

LIAR!


Just kidding.

 

[helmuth_hubener]

Roy L., in post #447, you wrote:
Once fixed improvements are a significant element in the economy, land is going to be monopolized in any case. Government, whose job it is to administer possession and use of land, can reverse the injustice that would otherwise be inherent in its monopolization by recovering the publicly created rent of land for the purposes and benefit of the public that creates it. We know payment of just compensation reverses an injustice, so it is YOU who want to continue the injustice forever.

#406:
Wrong. Government's most fundamental function is to secure and reconcile people's rights. It cannot secure property rights in fixed improvements without enabling land monopolization. That is why hunter-gatherer societies do not have government or landowning, but agricultural societies have both.

~~~

Georgism, as I understand it, and as you have yourself presented it, does not advocate abolishing land ownership/monopolization/appropriation. All it does is say "OK, we're going to let you landowners keep owning land, but you have to pay a fee to do it". You indeed have said many nasty things about land ownership and made it clear you think that to monopolize land is to enslave the non-monopolists. That stridency and flaming rhetoric just makes it all the more shocking that you do not want to abolish this allegedly horrible injustice. You instead want to "correct" it by having a Land Value Tax. Once again:

Wrong solution:
[Landowner (enslaver)]...........................--> [Money] -->......................................[non-landowner (slave)]

Actually just solution, assuming Georgism to be true:
[non-landowner (normal human)]..............<<[Justice & Mutual Harmony between them]>>..............[also-non-landowner (normal human)]

That movement of money in the Wrong Solution does not erase the Existential Injustice of enabling land monopolization.

Thank you for your attention. You may now concede that I was 100% correct in stating that you do not want to abolish land ownership, and thus do not want to abolish the slavery that land ownership is. You just want to pay off the slaves.

I await your concession.

 

[helmuth_hubener]

One of the third type [of lie] you told was that a chainsaw contains "raw matter." You knew that every molecule of a chainsaw has been refined, processed and shaped by labor, and can by no stretch of terminology be described as "raw matter." You KNEW that. Of course you did. You simply decided to lie about it.

This is actually a pretty important philosophical point. A chainsaw does, in fact, contain raw matter. Without raw matter, no chainsaw can you have. Every molecule most certainly has not been refined, processed, nor shaped by labor. Many of the molecules are still exactly as nature provided them. And certainly the space which the chainsaw occupies exists just as nature provided it.

A skyscraper must use raw matter, space, and other resources (in economics, we generally call these natural resources "land"). A chainsaw likewise must use raw matter, space, and other resources (in economics, we generally call these natural resources "land"). If you want to tax all land, you must tax the land of the chainsaw just as you tax the land of the skyscraper. What's more, for the skyscraper you must tax not only the "land" which is the surface area of the planet which it occupies (as Georgists propose to do) but also the vertical area it occupies, also the raw matter extracted to form its beams and windows, etc., etc.

Redbluepill addressed this by saying he would like a one-time extraction fee for matter removed from nature and made into goods. You, on the other hand, Roy L., have thus far been silent on this matter, apparently not grasping the dilemma, instead being satisfied with accussing everyone who disagrees with you of lying. I'm glad redbluepill is back, and perhaps he can add some intelligence to the conversation.

 

[heavenlyboy34]

Heavenlyboy, you may be surprised how much you may disagree with John Locke on this issue:





http://wealthandwant.com/themes/Locke.html

It's true that Locke was wrong about the "commons". However, Locke (chapter V, "Concerning Civil Government") clearly explains that his view of "the commons" stems from his belief that God gave the world to man in common-which man later improved upon and privatized. In no. 34 of chapter V, "Concerning Civil Government", Locke writes "...God, by commanding to subdue, gave authority so far to appropriate. And the condition of human life, which requires labour and materials to work on, necessarily introduces private possessions." Locke, like most everyone else, could be contradictory-but to spin him as anti-land ownership or anti-property is just bullshit.

 

[Roy L]

You say: Man didn't create the universe, so it must be held in common for all humanity.

No. Rather, no one created natural resources, so no one has any more right to them than anyone else.

I say: OK, maybe we didn't create it. Let's privitize it anyway.

IOW you don't care if privatizing natural resources violates the rights of the productive for the unearned profit of the privileged.

If you, Explorer Redbluepill, ramble along into a vast uninhabited wilderness and claim some of it, there's no one there whom you are ripping off. No one's rights have been violated.

Correct. And as something that no more than one person wants has no value, such land would not be subject to LVT.

Other people show up later, you're not ripping them off either.

Wrong. You are forcibly depriving them of the exercise of their rights to liberty. They would be at liberty to use the land if you did not forcibly stop them by violent, aggressive physical coercion. This fact is self-evident and indisputable. You will now attempt to contrive some way of not knowing it.

They didn't create the universe! They have no right to it!

They have rights to liberty. You are merely advocating that they be forcibly deprived of their rights to liberty without just compensation, and consequently, in effect, enslaved.

You found it, you claimed it, it's yours.

By what right could claiming something make it yours?

You think "OK, here's a universe, here's human beings, the human beings didn't create the universe, so we all have a equal right to the whole universe." I, on the other hand, think "OK, here's this universe, none of us can show any proof we created it, so nobody has a right to any of it."

If you believe people have a right to liberty, then they have a right to exercise it in the universe. Where else?

Then it just becomes a practical matter of splitting it all up in a way that doesn't violate anyone's rights. That's an easy fix: homesteading.

Nope. Wrong. Homesteading is not a fix at all, as it violates the rights of all who would otherwise be at liberty to use the homesteaded land.

And that's aside from the fact that there is not a square inch of privately owned land, anywhere on earth, whose title can be traced in an unbroken line of consensual transactions to an initial act of homesteading that violated no one's rights. So even if you were right that homesteading is a fix, which you are not, it would be irrelevant to all ACTUAL land titles.

Just go claim and use stuff no one else is claiming. Since nobody has a right to any of it, no foul.

Everyone has a right to USE all of it: the right to liberty.

In your philosophy, big foul, against all humanity no less, because everybody owned, owns, and will always own, whatever stuff you just claimed.

No one owned it; everyone had -- and has -- a right to liberty.

Using natural resources no one else wants to use violates no one's rights. But as soon as someone else wants to use them, forcibly depriving them of their liberty to do so violates their rights. This is self-evident and indisputable. You are simply engaged in trying to contrive a way of not knowing it.

You say everybody has just claim on the empty universe, I say nobody does.

Do people have a right to liberty? If they have no just claim to exercise it in the universe, of what, exactly, could such a right be thought to consist?

 

[Roy L]

Actually, I didn't.

See post #505. To whom were you referring as "us" that did not include you?

LIAR!

LIAR!

LIAR!

Just kidding.

I see. You don't "lie," you just "kid."